It’s not unthinkable: If Napa were hit by a major disaster, such as a high-magnitude earthquake, it could be three days or longer before the local fire, emergency medical and police departments can come to the aid of neighborhood residents.

Meanwhile, water and power could be disrupted, buildings damaged and residents injured and killed.

“In a disaster, you’re short of everything but emergencies,” said Neal O’Haire, retired Napa County emergency-management czar.

O’Haire, who said he’s worked “25 Presidentially-certified disasters” during his career, was speaking to a group of 17 Napa County residents enrolled in the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) course created by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). He is one of several volunteers, headed up by Napa County employee Sherry Vattuone, who teach the CERT class each year.

In the absence of the traditional first responders, neighborhoods will have to fend for themselves during the chaotic hours and days that first follow a disaster, O’Haire said, adding rhetorically: “Do you feel lucky, or do you take CERT?”

The training is not only valuable in the immediate aftermath of a catastrophe – it also makes the trainee a prized asset in the larger community response, which in Napa County is administered by the Volunteer Center of Napa Valley.

“You’re the least likely person we’re going to assign to the end of a shovel,” Volunteer Center executive director Katie Meehan-Rubin told the CERT trainees last week.

The course is given in different locations around the county, whenever enough local trainees and volunteers are signed up. It includes classroom sessions, videos, hands-on instruction and the final exam: a live disaster-response exercise at the city fire station on Park Avenue.

On Saturday, I was one of the 17 trainees who had spent that morning and four of the previous weeknights in a meeting room at Napa Valley College, learning how to perform searches and triage, bind wounds and carry victims. The exercise of Saturday afternoon was designed to put our newfound knowledge to the test.

Administered by Vattuone with Napa fire captain and hazardous materials expert Carl Johnson, retired Napa firefighter Scott Neely and Calistoga firefighter Joe Russo, the exam got off to a slow start but soon became all-absorbing.

First, in buddy teams of two, we put out a live fire with an extinguisher (see the video).

That was the easy part. Then the simulation began:

The Big One had struck, the firefighters told us. We’d been called together to help a hard-hit neighborhood.

In our newly-issued green helmets, reflective vests and work gloves, we searched a four-story tower for casualties, administered first aid to the “victims” (several dilapidated dummies) and used lumber and a crowbar to lever a heavy weight off of another “victim” (see the video of Saturday morning's practice session at the college).

Working together, we discovered that the things we’d learned in the classroom came back to us more easily than we’d expected. In the end, the 17 of us had “rescued” and “treated” several “victims” – one headless torso was beyond our skills – and passed muster with the firefighters, who then handed out our FEMA certificates for completing CERT.

In the event of a disaster, we can now don our vests, gloves and green helmets and do our best to help our neighborhoods. If we forget something we learned, it’s sure to be in the thick FEMA manual we used as a textbook.

The CERT instructors also offer what Johnson called "sustainment" training at various times during the year: A six-hour household-hazmats course is coming up on April 2.

To learn more about CERT, call (707) 253-4580. Vattuone has also set up a Facebook profile for Napa Valley C.E.R.T., where she posts updates on training sessions.

And if the Big One should hit before you get the chance to train, you can still volunteer to help out: Contact the Volunteer Center at (707) 252-6222, go to its offices at 1820 Jefferson St. or go to one of two alternate sites Meehan-Rubin identified as neighborhood volunteer meeting places: Hopewell Baptist Church at 2755 Linda Vista Ave. in north Napa and the Napa City-County Library at 580 Coombs St. downtown.