Incidents involving dangerous goods rarely happen. When they do, shippers and transporters of certain dangerous goods in Canada are required to have a Transport Canada-approved Emergency Response Assistance Plan (ERAP) in place and ready for activation.     

Emergency Response Assistance Canada (ERAC) works with dangerous goods shippers and transporters (our Plan members) to ensure compliance with Transport Canada’s strict regulations and provides a well-executed emergency response in those instances when an ERAP is activated.

To ensure public and first responder safety, and our plan members’ compliance with Transport Canada, ERAC holds several firefighting training sessions across the country for Canadian-based emergency response teams and first responders. This training includes classroom studies and demonstrations and concludes with full-scale, live-burn, hands-on training exercises.

This October, ERAC will be in Prince George, British Columbia to hold a two-day flammable liquids firefighting training session with five of our highly trained, Canadian-based emergency response teams. These training sessions ensure that ERAC response teams who attend to a flammable liquid incident are well-trained and competent to provide a safe and effective response, protecting people, property and the environment.

ERAC is proud to support Transport Canada’s objective to promote public safety and security during the transportation of dangerous goods and is prepared to respond effectively on those rare occasions when an incident occurs.

Spencer Buckland
President

ERAC has developed the ERAP Readiness and Review Program, a robust resource for Plan members to determine their organization’s level of readiness in response to an emergency response assistance plan (ERAP) activation. This valuable web-based tool can be accessed at any time and covers topics that include:

What are my responsibilities as the ERAP holder?

Who do I call in the event of an ERAP activation?

What are ERAC’s responsibilities during an ERAP activation?

The ERAP Readiness and Review program is designed to:

1. Improve your operational response readiness and highlight the importance of ERAPs, including the roles, capabilities and responsibilities of your organization and ERAC.

2. Determine your organization’s readiness through the ERAP Readiness and Review Self-Assessment questionnaire.

3. Offer tailored ERAP awareness training with ERAC, if requested.

The ERAP Readiness and Review Program presentation can help you learn more about your ERAP, your responsibilities as the ERAP holder, and ERAC.

Should you have questions or would like more information on the Plan Participant ERAP Readiness and Review program, please visit our website.

The beginning of October marks the opening of our bi-annual Responder Survey.  

If you are an ERAC responder, you will receive an email invitation to participate in our 2023 Responder Survey on October 1.  

Please take the time to complete the survey by October 30.  

We are committed to continuous improvement and your participation is important to us as your feedback helps us meet your expectations and needs.

ERAC has developed standardized Incident Command System (ICS) 100 and 200 courses that meet the required topics of ISC Canada stream courses, but without the burden of cost to organizations who may need this training. These two internal adaptations are intended to provide ICS training internally to our ERAC responders who respond to transportation (rail & road) incidents involving liquefied petroleum gases and flammable liquids.

ERAC’s ICS 100 and 200 courses are available for free to Canadian-based first responders (firefighters, police, EMS) and our Plan members and their employees.

You can learn more about our ICS courses here.