Emergency Preparedness, Communication and Flood Disaster Management

Emergency Preparedness

It is evident that the emergency services were only just able to cope with the recent floods. Authorities and the public have been taken aback by the "sheer scale" of the flooding that took place in November. Many of the residents, homeowners, farmers and business people experienced their properties been flooded long before they received a warning from any organisation. So what went wrong and can we learn from our mistakes?

The most critical element in any disaster management plan is the emergency preparedness and response activity. The response to a natural disaster warning must be immediate, comprehensive and demonstrate very clear lines of command. There must be a mechanism to draw upon external resources available at higher levels of government when the local level of response is not sufficient. The keys to effective emergency response are advance planning, ability to mobilise sufficient resources quickly, and periodic exercises to identify weaknesses and problems.

Urgent and fundamental changes are needed in the way this country is adapting to the risk of flooding, which is an ever-increasing reality because of the impact of climate change. Emergency response drills must be undertaken to ensure that services work and can protect the community. Emergency planning and preparedness is first a local responsibility. There must be strong and reliable communication linkages. Emergency response must include input from community and political levels, there must be clear lines of authority. Disaster management requires some form of inter agency body to take responsibility for overall control and leadership of essential services during an emergency.

One of the most urgent changes that is required are providing early flood warning systems, especially to flood-risk areas. A community and its local government must develop adequate disaster management plans to manage such risk when faced with the reality of future loss of life and extreme economic hardships when the future event occurs. A participatory process is required that includes community involvement identifying the various factors that increase or decrease risk exposure and can lead to greater community participation in developing solutions to the flooding problem in the future.

A change to proactive management of natural disasters requires an identification of the risk, the development of strategies to reduce the risk, and the creation of policies and programmes to put these strategies into effect. One agency must be given responsibility to manage this responsibility. Based on recent experiences we must adapt mitigation plans to assess the ability for reducing risk exposure by undertaking a thorough risk assessment of the event and put in place adequate disaster management plans and mitigation measures for the future. With the probability of extreme weather events increasing with climate change, activities such as the stockpiling of sandbags, emergency food and water supplies, and the evacuation of communities and businesses will become common. Centralised depots are required for each sensitive river catchment area that allow for fast and efficient access to supplies and equipment.

Inventory
A key component of any emergency preparedness plan is an inventory of resources that can be accessed. In the case of flooding this would include items such as emergency vehicles, buses and trucks, earthmoving equipment, pumps, plastic, plywood, emergency generators, supplies of gravel and sand, sandbags, and mobile communication equipment.
The inventory should also include access to expertise such as surveyors, civil engineers, electricians, insurance valuators and other professionals and community leaders.


Communications
Access to information and communication are the most important aspects of disaster management. Flood preparedness and emergency response is to a large extent dependent on the ability of the relevant national, local and community institutions to communicate. A community cannot adequately respond to a natural disaster where they are not prepared or forewarned of the event. Local authorities should collate and map drainage systems and emergency services should work with telephone companies to introduce an "opt-out" telephone flood warning scheme, in which at-risk people are automatically signed up.
Poor coordination across administrative bodies and line agencies results in fragmented flood mitigation and prevention intervention measures including mobilisation and co-ordination of resources from the national to local level.

Coordination is critical in flood disaster management to overcome the invariable fragmentation that results from departmental specializations between local government and emergency services including healthcare, fire services, army and Garda Siochain.

Emergency services must not rely completely on mobile phone or landline telecommunications to communicate as where networks are damaged, as was the case in Bandon, this manner of communication collapses and with it the treat of proper co-ordination of flood relief. For urban areas emergency services must have access to other forms of communication including low frequency battery operated handheld radios.

Post flooding
The emergency response does not end with the flood event but includes clean up. People will want to know what assistance will be made available, who is responsible, and how to go about seeking that assistance. Waste containment or temporary waste disposal sites must be identified to segregate and store the huge quantities of waste material resulting from floods. Affected residents and businesses will need to access information on risks and cleanup. They will need immediate access to insurance valuators, waste disposal operators, clean drinking water, sanitary services, accommodation, support services and mobile water pumps.

After a major flood event it is beneficial to conduct an assessment of the causes and effects of the flood and to make recommendations that would improve preparedness for the next event and reduce future flood losses. The long term economic and social implications of flooding become evident in the post disaster period.

Governments need to demonstrate leadership and sometimes take bold steps to restore employment, address social issues and move the economy in a new direction. In that sense disasters can be a positive motivator for change.

Compensation as part of the disaster assistance should always have as a goal the reduction of future flood damages. Rather than simply paying for damages, the funds should be focused on flood proofing.

Economic and Social impact of Flooding
Apart from the cost to householders flooding can have a detrimental impact on the local economy and community in a number of ways: cost of repairing damages to property and businesses, cost of replacing goods and products, environmental cleanup, loss of home, public health concerns, stress, anxiety, depression and redundancy. The startling truth is that as many as 25% of small business do not reopen after a disaster. This figure may be seen to be much higher in a period of economic recession.