The International CBRN Congress was hosted and organized by the Prime Ministry Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD), the coordination authority in Turkey regarding national disasters and emergencies. The Congress aimed to share knowledge, new technologies and experience from the field of the CBRN with the contribution of internationally renowned experts and academics. More details about the Congress can be found at www.cbrncongress2017.org.
Olivier Mattman, HZS CEO, stressed during his presentation the importance of realistic training for CBRN emergency preparedness. It’s almost universally agreed that the threat of CBRN agents is becoming more visible and increasingly complex. Forensic aspects and the emergence of improvised devices with the CBR payload are forcing both military and civil organisations to provide solutions for this ever changing threat. While tactics, techniques and procedures can be developed to meet this demand, only training and exercises with authentic or “live” agents ensure that new systems work in the environment they are designed for. Training with live agents provides clear advantages over training with simulants alone. Stress levels, decision making capability and work rates all show improvement after the completion of live agent training.
Oliver Terzic, HZS R&D manager, discussed the importance of sampling applied in recognition, confirmation or investigation of CBRN events. Such events can provide diverse sampling opportunities and challenges. Oliver presented sampling approaches and tools, as well as shared some of his experience from participating on different field missions with the United Nations and Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in the Syrian Arab Republic, conducted in period 2013-2015.
Yaugen Ryzhykau, HZS Senior Consultant, provided a comprehensive overview of the different types of chemical weapon (CW) destruction technologies. In addition, Mr. Rzyhykau discussed their operation effectiveness, safety, lessons learned during his vast career in the field as well as shared the latest developments in this area. The countries that possess chemical weapons and of whom are members to the Chemical Weapon Convention are required to use safe technologies for their destruction. The CW destruction technologies have been developed to destroy assembled unitary chemical weapons (artillery projectiles, mortars, air bombs, rockets, rocket warheads, spray tanks), CW agents stored in bulk, binary munitions and recovered CW munitions.
HZS participants were greeted by Prof Dr. H. Avni ÖKTEM, CEO of NANObiz® – NanoBiotechnological Systems R&D and Consultancy Ltd. Co, the HZS partner company in Turkey, and his colleagues.