[.ca] First Responder Chem-Bio Handbook: A Practical Manual ... (ISBN 096654370X)

Great quick reference for CB warfare:
Although not as pretty as "Jane's" version, this mini-manual gets right to the point and is useful in this regard. During an actual CB attack, there is little time to read and read, you need answers quickly! This handbook is small enough to fit in a pocket as well as being spiral bound and has tabbed indexes to the important areas. If you are in Law enforcement, first responder, military, etc, this is your book. You never know when a CB attack will happen but with this you will be ready! A helpful list of emergency contact numbers is also included in the back page...priceless!

For field use, more basic than its competitor:
This book is concise and portable. It is particularly clear regarding the recognition of BC events and identifying agents from signs and symptoms. A comparable book is "Jane's Chem-Bio Handbook". Comparing the two, First Responder CBH (1) has a larger font more suitable for field conditions, (2) is pitched at a more simple level, and (3) contains far less information.

Excellent:
This book is an excellent tool. It is very easy to read and follow. I would recommend this for personal as well as professional use. Other books seem to be too filled with complicated wording and they tend to be hard to follow. This book eliminates that and gets straight to the facts. It is excellent.

Breaking new ground:
This is the first book I have encountered in this area that appears to have been designed from the ground up as a handbook for first responders, rather than being designed along the lines of, and with frequent lifting of sections from, various military field manuals. The result is a handbook that presents the "must know" information concisely and in a format that allows it to be rapidly found without having to sift through a lot of background information (Tempest appears to have decided to let form follow function and has put the background in a separate book). Even the printing is good - large letters with enough white space to let you read it easily even under low light conditions. A minus - initial isolation distances aren't listed for the chemical agents (I wrote them in in the table of contents for Section C - Chemical). Of course, none of the other "Chem-Bio Handbooks" lists them, either - perhaps if they read their reviews...

A useful refresher for emergency personnel:
As the book's title indicates, it is intended to serve as a ready-reference for fire, police, and emergency medical personnel who may be first on the scene of a chemical or biological attack. It is less useful for anxious laypeople (including me!) because it presupposes detailed knowledge of (and presumably practice in) decontamination procedures, using specialized personal protective gear, and emergency medicine. At the very least, I recommend having a medical dictionary on hand as you read and noting definitions of unfamiliar terms on the page margins. Taking a comprehensive first-aid course would also be a good idea. This book serves it's purpose admirably, but it is not the chem/bio equivalent of Cresson Kearny's "Nuclear War Survival Skills". I suggest that the publisher produce a civilian manual along the lines of Kearny's classic civil defense guide.