95th WMD Civil Support Team

The 95th Civil Support Team (CST), Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) was certified for Operational Deployment on 10 December 2001. The teams is staffed with 22 full-time service members from both the Army and Air National Guard. The civil support team consist of seven specific sections comprised of specialist in each of the primary functional areas: Command, Operations, Communications, Decontamination/Logistics, Medical, Science and Survey.

The 95th is capable of rapid response to chemical, biological and radiological threats. If a known or unknown terrorist incident should occur, the CST upon request of the Incident Commander would immediately deploy to the affected site and provide a number of significant capabilities to include detection, identification, analysis, communication support, expert medical advice and limited decontamination of personnel.

The 95th CST's primary responsibility is to Northern California, but can be deployed anywhere within the United States or its territories. The team is operational 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The first CST element to arrive on any scene is the Initial Response Team (IRT). The team will conduct scene size up, request for additional CST assets, confirm contamination is not present within the staging area, command post and cold zone areas. In addition, the IRT can perform limited entry operations, sampling operations and analytical operations. The second element, if required, is the main force. This will consist of additional entry personnel, decontamination, communications, operations, mobile field lab and medical personnel. This force is tailored to meet the needs of the incident or the request from the Incident Commander.

The CST can provide expert advice to the on-scene commander via its Electronic Reachback capabilities through the Unified Command Suite (UCS). Reachback allows the CST and the Incident Commander to consult with civilian experts in science and medicine. The CST deploys to incident locations by the most expeditious means possible. The team is equipped to transport its assets by ground, helicopter and fixed wing air platforms.