‘Better to be prepared than surprised’

Konfitma in Chamorro describes the essence of the Konfitma training, which is “confirming the plan” or more literally, to “confirm.”

In this year’s edition of the real-life scenario training that concluded last Wednesday, the goal remained the same, to confirm a solid plan for frontlining response agencies and to further prepare these individuals when faced in such dangerous situations.

CNMI Homeland Security and Emergency Management played a major role in leading the two-day drills, which covered responding to active shootings, mass care, and biochemical cleanups.

“We don’t want a real-world situation like this to happen, but it’s best that we practice and we exercise these drills so we’re prepared if it does happen,” said HSEM spokesperson Bernard Villagomez, adding that early on in the training, the goal was to save lives and protect the CNMI should these scenarios hit home.

Villagomez shared that around 100 frontliners participated in the training, with an active shooter and hostage simulation on Day 1.

On Day 2, Villagomez shared, “The final day for Konfitma 2024 was a simulated chlorine leak scenario at the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. Lower Base chlorine storage unit. The CNMI Hazardous Material Response Team was activated to access and stop the leak inside the storage unit. Two groups made entry into the storage unit. The first group discovered the leak, assessed it, and recorded critical data and footage for the second group. Once the first group went through the decontamination process, they shared the information with the second group. The second group then entered the storage unit and stopped the leak inside. Upon exiting they conducted their decontamination procedures.”

The Department of Fire and Emergency Services was one of the agencies that was part of the CNMI Hazardous Material Response Team.

DFEMS public information officer Robert Mojica expressed his gratitude for the training opportunities and emphasized just how important being prepared for these real-world scenarios.

“I think it’s really good that we have training scenarios like Konfitma that we are able to plan and coordinate different tactics with our partnering agencies…There has been people that have asked me why are we doing this big scale training exercises, ‘it’s never going to happen on Saipan,’ well you never know that this isn’t going to happen. You’ll never know if we’re going to get an active shooting. You’ll never know if we’re going to get a chemical compound or a biological compound lab, and we do have terrorists planning things out there,” he said.

Mojica added, “We never thought we would have a hostage situation in San Antonio, we’d never thought we’d have an armed gunman somewhere, but it happened [in 2020].”

With all the uncertainty, he said it was better to be prepared than surprised.

“We never know, and it’s always good to plan and always good to prepare because at least we’ll have that readiness to say, yes, we have trained for this, we have guys that know what they’re doing. We have guys that are going to go in attack and accomplish the mission at hand.”

As this year’s training comes to an end, Villagomez shared a big thank you on behalf of CNMI Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

“On behalf of the CNMI Homeland Security and Emergency Management, we would like to express our gratitude to all the participating agencies that contributed to the success of Konfitma 2024. The dedication, collaboration, and commitment to enhancing our community’s preparedness are truly appreciated. The knowledge, resources, and expertise shared played a critical role in making Konfitma 2024 a success. We look forward to continuing our partnership with all government agencies as we work together to protect and strengthen the CNMI.”