TORRINGTON – The Goshen County Emergency Response Team has stayed plenty busy so far this year.

This area, of course, is known for its unpredictable weather. With that, the primary responsibility of the team is to make sure the entire county is prepared for essentially any emergency that can occur.

Goshen County had an incredibly harsh winter this year, filled with intense blizzards and dangerous sub-zero temperatures. For weeks at a time, it once again became standard practice for many to let our sinks drip throughout the night to avoid any pipe bursting. Of course, some residents still had the incredible misfortune of experiencing pipes breaking due to the extreme cold. 

All the while shoveling and plowing the heavy drifts of snow seemed as if it would never come to an end.

Torrington Emergency Management Coordinator (EMC), Chuck Kenyon, noted the natural elements this year has proved challenging both for members of Goshen County and for the emergency officials of the area trying to stay ahead.

“The weather has occupied probably the most of our time,” Kenyon said. “The snow this year in the county was especially deep.”

Yoder EMC Justin Burkart added that although Goshen County residents are calloused to blizzards, they should always be taken seriously and properly prepared for.

“A blizzard can be a big deal,” Burkart said. “There’s a lot of logistics, such as where do you get your fuel at? A lot of backup generators throughout the county has been a priority project for the last several years.”

Even so, once winter began to pass and weather began to turn, things have only proved to continue being interesting weather-wise.

Goshen County EMC Tom Bozeman stated the county has had an incredibly high number of severe weather reports so far this summer. Bozeman is underway in his first year in the position, having started last January after arriving from Virginia.

A crucial element to Bozeman’s position as the EMC of Goshen County is working closely and proficiently with the National Weather Service (NWS) out of Cheyenne.

“So far this year we’ve ranked third with the most tornado warnings, just behind 2019 in the southeast Wyoming region. We’ve been issued 309 severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings.”

Bozeman further stated that although his first year has been incredibly busy, he, along with team members, have stayed productive in training while ensuring all equipment is quality and up to date.

“I can speak for myself, being that I just started in January,” Bozeman continued. “It’s been about six months now. I’m doing a whole lot of board training and getting emergency management related certifications and things like that. Equipment-wise we’ve done an assessment of the equipment we have, and are hoping to use as much of our grant funds to upgrade everything.”

With Bozeman’s extensive background in law enforcement and emergency response, particularly training with Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), he has so far proved to be a reliable fit for the position.

“I’ve had 26 years now of law enforcement, and have done a lot of FEMA classes at my prior employment. In that capacity, my occupations have been planning for hurricanes, flooding and snow storms. I was also in command for several protest and riot situations across the country in recent years.”

Bozeman, Kenyon and Burkart have unanimously agreed their work involves extensive preparation for worst-case scenarios, as well as maintaining strong, trustful relationships with other departments. These departments include the NWS, the  Goshen Sheriff’s Department, Torrington Police Department, EMT’s and local fire departments.

All three coordinators agreed having trust with citizens and various emergency units long before an event will lead to a much better outcome with certain situations.

“So if we want to know what we are going to do in an emergency, we want to meet people face to face,” Kenyon said. “It’s always good to know who you’re asking to help before you have to talk [in an emergency]. It’s better to meet at a coffee table or training table. It’s about making those relationships occur, understanding their priorities, our priorities and representing the citizens.”

The NWS in particular is a department the Goshen County Emergency Management Team works with on a close, regular basis and one which requires constant and accurate communication.

“Part of our job is doing the weather things and working with them,” Bozeman said. “We force multiply, which is a military term. It’s where we are their eyes and ears out in the field. After a storm comes through, we do damage assessment, which tells a greater story for the weather service. They need to send a team [like us] to assess storm strength and things like that.”

Kenyon further added, “The storm watch over the past 30 days has been remarkable. One of the storm activities is working in cooperation with the NWS out of Cheyenne. They can see what’s going on above us, but they can’t see what’s happening on the ground. They rely on us for what’s called ground truth. What they are seeing may not hit the area, but we are always reporting back.”

According to Burkart, working extremely close, as well as doing extensive preparation for Goshen County schools  remains a top priority.

“One of the projects I’ve been working on is updating the school’s radio system,” Burkart said. “Prior to the updates, the school system didn’t have communication with first responders and vice versa. Our radios wouldn’t work inside. We’ve written grants and have implemented first responders to have adequate communication within the school system. Southeast will be our first school that we complete within the next couple of months. When you’re in an emergency you want to be able to talk immediately.”

When it came to preparation for any emergency, the three men noted when it all comes down, no one can really predict what can happen weather or emergency wise. The fact yet still remains it is always better to be overprepared than underprepared. Tornadoes, floods and blizzards are just among a few examples of things that can have a severe domino effect if not properly ready for.

Kenyon noted a well-known local business as an example.

“For example if the Torrington Telegram, suffered a fire in the print room, what is the backup plan to make sure there’s a paper out Friday? Do we involve a contract for sombody else to print the paper? Where will reporters do their jobs? Where are the files backed up at? When you think about that at that level of a simple business, look at the level of a county, city, school district or college.”

“It’s trying to identify ways where we are being resilient so that we can ensure when things happen,” Bozeman concluded. “We can’t always stop them from happening but when they do, we have to be quick to recover and get life back to normal as quick as possible. Whether it be technology, obviously being one of the biggest things or anything else, I’m going to focus on that over the next few years. You always have to have a plan.”

For questions or further information regarding the GCEMT, call 307-532-7039, or visit www.goshencounty.org.