The Foreign Service Journal - December 2017

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | DECEMBER 2017 37 includes saws, hand tools, generators, fuel containers, tents, cots and portable sinks and showers. A week and a half after their arrival, USAID’s DART returned home. Though our USAR members did not find any survivors, we are incredibly proud of what our team accomplished. Helping people around the world after disasters strike represents the best of America, and we did everything possible to help our neighbors in Mexico during their time of need. Alex Mahoney served as the response teammanager for USAID’s Mexico Earthquake Response Management Team. He formerly headed USAID’s Middle East Crisis Humanitarian Response. For their work saving lives in Syria and Iraq, he and the team received the 2017 Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medal in the category of national security and international affairs. After the Sept. 19 earthquake in Mexico, USAID’s Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance deployed a response team. American canine teams meet up with Tijuana-based teams. USAID deployed a Disaster Assistance Response Team comprised of 15 disaster experts, as well as 67 members of the Los Angeles County Fire Department Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) Team and five canines. It was the 17th time since 1988 that USAID deployed a USAR team to help with international rescue efforts. For more than a week, the teamworked with others from across the globe in an around-the-clock effort to search for survivors. Working in tandemwithMexican teams, DART’s USAR team searched eight buildings—including the 24-hour scouring of a col- lapsed office building. DART structural engineers also assisted the Mexican government in the assessment of more than 50 damaged buildings, helping to determine whether it was safe for people to return to their homes and for schools, clinics and offices to reopen. The USAR members of DART were one of the last teams to depart Mexico City. At the request of the Mexican government, the team helped coordinate the demobilization process for the other international search teams and worked with Mexican counter- parts to strengthen their capacity to implement this process in the future. In addition, USAID is working with the Mexican Red Cross to render assistance to the elderly, the disabled and those who were injured in the earthquake. We also supported the transfer of some of the USAR team’s search-and-rescue equipment and supplies to the Mexican Red Cross to help with continuing relief efforts. This