The Coast Guard Container Inspection Training and Assistance Team (CITAT) was established at the Transportation Safety Institute in Oklahoma City, OK in 1994, to serve as a standardized source of training and knowledge for the Coast Guard and other federal agencies in the field of hazardous materials containerized inspections. " Our aim is to provide training and assistance where needed (on-site). Operating within an established budget, CITAT assists multi-agency inspection operations and provides recurrent 49 CFR and International Maritime Dangerous Goods (IMDG) code training, container material condition inspection and hazard awareness training to agencies involved in such operations."
LCDR Douglas Lincoln, Supervisor, CITAT
Oklahoma City...In the spring of 1994, the U.S. Coast Guard was given $3.6 million in recurring funds by Congress and 76 new billets to establish a nationwide Intermodal Container Inspections Program. The Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard directed 51 of the billets to select Marine Safety Offices, while another 15 were sent to headquarters staff. The remaining 10 billets were sent to Oklahoma City to form a specialized container inspection training and assistance team called "CITAT".
Modern "INTERMODAL" transportation began in earnest in the 1960s. Commercial carriers discovered they could cut labor costs and time by shipping cargo in standardized 20- or 40-foot trailer bodies (containers) that could be transported by vessel, rail, and truck. Technological advances in the equipment that handled and moved containers contributed to the rapid growth of intermodal commerce. By 1992, the number of containers being shipped annually through the United States was nearly double that of a decade earlier. With this growth came an increase in the transportation of explosives, poisons, and other hazardous materials. Consequently there was an increase in the numbers of deaths and injuries caused by the transportation of these materials.
On January 3, 1992, the M/V Santa Clara I encountered heavy weather and lost four containers of aresenic trioxide, a highly toxic pollutant, 40 miles off the coast of New Jersey. This incident coupled with the results of several U.S. Coast Guard pilot programs which revealed a high level of regulatory non compliance with containerized shipments of hazardous materials, led to greater government oversight of commercial hazardous materials transportation and to the establishment of the U.S. Coast Guard's National Container Inspection Program. CITAT was established at the Department of Transportation's Transportation Safety Institute to assist U.S. Coast Guard units in implementing the Container Inspection Program. CITAT provides specialized on-the-job training to U.S. Coast Guard units and other federal, state, and local agencies on hazardous material transportation regulations and intermodal container inspection standards. CITAT also augments hazardous material enforcement task force operations, evaluates new container inspection equipment, and provides safety awareness training for the hazards associated with container inspection operations and hazardous material enforcement.
