CASTINE – Maine Maritime Academy will launch a pilot port security training program this month designed specifically for all first responders likely to be involved in an emergency incident at Maine’s seaports.

MMA received a $58,000 grant from the Maine Emergency Management Agency earlier this year to conduct the pilot program of a U.S. Maritime Administration course titled “Maritime Security for Military, First Responder and Law Enforcement Personnel.” The college’s continuing education department contracted with the academy’s maritime security training partner – Maritime Protection, Auditing, Counseling and Training – to conduct the course.

The pilot program is being offered to 100 first responders and law enforcement officers from Eastport, Bar Harbor, Searsport and Portland.

“Those are the deep-water ports that see the most activity,” said Victoria Stearns, MMA’s coordinator for continuing education. “They were the obvious choices for a pilot program.”

The two-day course is designed to develop an understanding of the unique circumstances, operational conditions and potential improvements to security in the maritime arena. The goal, according to Stearns, is to develop a way for the different groups of responders to work together and to do it before an incident occurs.

Participants in the pilot program are all connected with the four seaports, and include harbor masters, customs and border patrol officers, and Coast Guard personnel, as well as state, county and local law enforcement officers. The first two-day session will be held at MMA’s Castine campus on Nov. 29-30. Portland’s Port Authority will host two sessions on Dec. 5-6 and Dec. 8-9.

According to Daniel Walsh, president of MPACT, a Florida-based maritime security company, the joint program with MMA will meet U.S. Coast Guard-prescribed security measures for ports and port personnel developed in response to the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002.

The course exceeds initial federal requirements, having been expanded in response to lessons learned by federal agencies in the wake of hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. In assessing the response to those hurricanes, the U.S. Maritime Administration and the U.S. Coast Guard jointly concluded that maritime security training should include a course aimed not only at military security and law enforcement personnel, but also at first responders who work at or near ports.

To that end, according to Walsh, the course includes operations of all potential members of a marine incident response team.

The idea for the new program grew directly out of requests for harbor master training at several area Maritime Security Committee meetings. Officials from MMA’s continuing education department and MPACT presented a proposal to the governor’s Task Force on Homeland Security almost a year ago and, according to Stearns, worked closely with some task force members as they developed the course.

MMA and MPACT have worked together in the past to develop other security-related programs, including a recent offering for National Guard Civil Support Teams. The college also has developed courses on ship, company and port security in response to new international and federal regulations, and also has provided those courses for maritime, military and state organizations through its continuing education program.

Although the pilot program was limited to 100 participants from just four ports, Stearns said, eventually the program would be offered to law enforcement and first responders from other active Maine ports.

“We want to get responses back from the people involved and include them in the course,” she said. “Once the pilot program goes through, we would open it up during the next year.”

Though geared specifically to Maine, the course also could become a model for other states to work with in the future, Stearns said. If endorsed by the federal Office of Grants and Training, which is currently reviewing the pilot, the program would become the lead program for federally subsidized response team training initiated by state, municipal and port emergency managers.