911 Dispatch Failure Provides Lessons in Continuity

Posted on April 20, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in Weblogs2 Comments on 911 Dispatch Failure Provides Lessons in Continuity

Ever wonder what we're protecting with all our computer passwords? Now don't get me wrong – I'm all for reasonable protections. But sometimes we just don't think things through.

Case in point – this morning's San Francisco Chronicle contained a short article about a failure of the Department of Emergency Service's computer system during a fire on New Year's Eve. The failure came to light almost by accident during a routine hearing before the city's Disaster Council. Failure of the system was, of course, something for which the Department is expected to be prepared. However, the Department was unable to switch to its backup system because the password was not available and they could not locate the only person who knew it. The Department operated for two hours on a manual system before the primary system could be restored.

When queried about the problem, the Department spokesman gave the impression that this was no big deal, implying that system might not be all that necessary. NOT what your elected officials want to hear after a screw up.

There are a number of lessons to be gleaned from this faux pas:

• In planning for crisis, we need to assume key people will be absent and have a mechanism for delegating authorities and providing passwords and keys.
• Having more than one backup plan is a really good idea.
• If you've screwed up, you better take it seriously and fix the problem before it comes out in public. You've got to be able to say, "Yes, that happened. Here's what we've done about it."

Tsunami Fallout: Lost Wealth

Posted on April 15, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Tsunami Fallout: Lost Wealth

Here's one of those "gee, I never thought of that" problems that surface after a disaster. It seems that the Japanese police are having to deal with hundred of metal safes found in the debris after the recent tsunami. Apparently many Japanese keep cash in their home or business. Add to this money found in envelopes, hidden in  furniture, unmarked bags, etc. and it poses an interesting problem in recovery. How do you identify the owners and substantiate claims?

Might be an interesting topic for a tabletop exercise.

Social Media and the Japanese Earthquake

Posted on April 12, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Social Media and the Japanese Earthquake

The use of social media in disasters is a hot topic for emergency managers these days. I suspect that at the heart of this debate lies the fact that, while we see the potential, we really don't understand it. Judging from the websites I've seen, we certainly haven't grasped the concept that social media is first and foremost a dialog and not just another method for the release of information.

However, we can't ignore the fact that the recent earthquakes and tsunami in Japan showed how social media is changing the dynamic of how we deal with disasters. Within an hour of the main earthquake, tweets from Tokyo exceeded 1200 per minute. Videos of the tsunami were posted on YouTube as they were occurring and there are over 63,000 videos listed on YouTube under the keywords "Japan tsunami". The mayor of a small community made a worldwide appeal for assistance on YouTube and got it.

More importantly, we're starting to see the emergence of mechanisms for consolidating and making sense out of all this data. Esri, Inc. created a social media map that would certainly be useful in any emergency operations center.

There's no question that social media is of benefit in disaster operations. The real question is how do we filter the data and display it in a way that will enhance those operations. And that's still very much a work in progress.

Japan’s Radiation Levels: Crisis Communications Without Context

Posted on April 7, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Japan’s Radiation Levels: Crisis Communications Without Context

 

It's hard for the average citizen not to feel concern over the news coming out of Japan about harmful radiation. After all, a reading 100,000 times higher than normal background radiation, as was recently reported, has to be of concern, right? Actually, you can't really tell from the information available in the news stories.

The problem is that radiation is a complex issue, which makes it rough on reporters. There are three areas of concern: the radiation coming from the source, the amount actually absorbed by a person, and the biological risk from exposure. These are three separate and distinct elements, each with a different unit of measurement. To make things more interesting, there are two systems of measurement in use – the conventional system used in the United States and the System Internationale derived from the metric system and used by the international community.

Not complex enough yet? There are four different types of radiation (alpha and beta particles, gamma rays, and x-rays) and each type has a number known as a Quality Factor that is used to multiply the absorbed dose to determine the biological risk. The absorbed dose is a product of the source radiation multiplied by the time of exposure.

So what's my point? The fact is that to simply state that the source radiation is at such and such a level tells us nothing about the true risk. Stating that it is 100,000 times greater than normal background radiation sounds scary but it is meaningless without any context. Is this high or really, really high? What does it mean to the average citizen? Are we all going to die? How long can someone be exposed to this level before it hurts them?

We don't really know what the long term effects will be from Japan's problems. We worry about drifting particles that have already begun to reach North America. There is concern that radioactive iodine will find its way into the food chain over time. But will the levels of radioactivity cause harm?

Without context, our citizens can't make informed decisions. We generate needless fear and encourage unnecessary precautions – sales of potassium iodide increased considerably in the United States in March. So take the time think through your crisis management message. Try to look at it through the eyes of the recipient. Ultimately, it's not enough for you to send the message; the recipient needs to receive and understand it.

Triangle of Life: Is it a reality?

Posted on April 5, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Triangle of Life: Is it a reality?

In Bram Stoker's classic novel, Dracula, the vampire hunter Van Helsing gives specific instructions for how a vampire must be dealt with to prevent it from continually rising from the grave. I sometimes wish there was a similar ritual one could perform to remove bad information from the Internet.

Case in point is the "Triangle of Life" theory that keeps making the rounds after every major earthquake. Like most bad theories, there is just enough truth in it to make it sound plausible. The theory is based on the presence of void spaces during stuctural collapse, small spaces that form as a building collapses. According to the theory's proponent, Doug Copp, teaching people to seek out these void spaces rather than using the standard "duck, cover and hold" technique taught in the United States would save more lives.

There are several problems with this theory:

• Void spaces do form but we don't know if they can be anticipated or if people can be taught to anticipate them during an earthquake. To my knowledge, no research has been done on this issue so there is no evidence that it works.
• We do have research that suggests that at least half of the injuries in earthquakes are from non-structural objects, which duck, cover and hold was developed to prevent.
• The theory is supposedly based on Copp's observations from participating in rescues at multiple disaster sites around the world. However, there is ample evidence that Copp's claims about his rescue experience are fabricated and he lacks credibility.

The two best rebuttals to this theory are a paper written by Dr. Marla Patel, an actual expert in earthquake deaths, and the American Red Cross response written by my colleague and friend, Rocky Lopes.

So please help me stake this vampire – don't pass on Copp's bad ideas and if you get a copy from a friend send them the links above. Now if I can just get rid of the "stand in the door" theory…

Japan’s Nuclear Reactors: Another Over-rated Doomsday Scenario?

Posted on March 14, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Japan’s Nuclear Reactors: Another Over-rated Doomsday Scenario?

There's an article making the rounds on the Internet purported to be from an MIT scientist that offers a very lucid explanation of the crisis at the Japanese nuclear plants and why they do not pose a major hazard similar to the meltdown at Chernobyl. While I am no expert on nuclear reactors, my colleagues who are agree that it's well worth reading and can be found here.

One of the hardest things for us as crisis managers is to ensure that accurate information gets out to the public. Subtle nuances, like the difference in types of radiation, sometime get overlooked or are not clearly understood. There is also, of course, a media bias towards the sensational but my experience with my media colleagues has been that most reporters want to get it right -that's how Pulitzers are won. So it really begins with our message and gets back to what I mentioned in my previous blog – the need to go beyond just straight facts and give simple, easily understood information.

However, this problem goes beyond just public information. Prioritizing the wrong problem in response means that resources get diverted instead of going where they are needed most. It's critical in any response to continue to assess changing needs and to focus on what is really needed rather than letting perception drive operations.

Emergency Warnings – Could They Be More Effective?

Posted on March 11, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Emergency Warnings – Could They Be More Effective?

Had an interesting morning here in San Francisco. After staying up late following the recent earthquake in Japan, I was awoken early by a text message from a good friend in the neighborhood concerned about calls and texts she was receiving from friends about a tsunami. She lives on the top of a hill located well outside our 20 foot run up zone and I told her I'd be by for breakfast since her home was safer than mine which is only a block outside the run up zone.

A few minutes later, I received a call from another friend in Iowa advising me to start filling my bathtub and pots and pans in case we lost our water supply. After chuckling a bit, I reminded her what I did for a living.

These contacts from concerned friends reminded me once again that we really don't do a good job of public warning. Amanda Ripley points out in her excellent book, The Unthinkable, that our warnings contain fact and actions but don't always stress "why". In this case, the local authorities provided a timely warning with good information and appropriate actions. What they didn't do was couch the warning in a way that allayed concern.

Our tsunami warning include a potential for a 2-3 foot wave. The problem is the average citizen has no idea what a 2-3 foot wave would do. They tend to think in terms of a tsunami that would wash over the entire peninsula, something that is not even geologically possible given the shape of our shoreline. A wave of the size predicted would probably not even have gotten over our seawall. The EOC staff took a reasonable precaution by closing the Great Highway adjacent to the seawall and elected not to evacuate the immediate area which demonstrates they understood the risks. Unfortunately, this information wasn't really shared well with the public and the media.

This should not be taken as criticism of my local colleagues who did everything appropriately according to our accepted practices. Instead, I'm suggesting that we need to rethink the way we issue warnings and the mechanisms we use to distribute those warnings. We need to share our reasoning with the public rather than just telling them what to do. Our studies show that people don't really trust our messages and will seek verification from other sources before acting. Understanding why they should take the actions we recommend could help reduce this lag.

So the next time you need to issue a warning, give some thought to explaining what the potential threat really means. Your warnings will be a lot more effective. 

Social media and transparency in government

Posted on March 9, 2011 by Lucien Canton | Posted in WeblogsLeave a Comment on Social media and transparency in government

There are several criminal investigations under way in San Francisco regarding the activities of undercover narcotics officers. The officers are alleged to have conducted illegal searches of suspects' residences and falsified police reports to cover up their actions. Unfortunately, at least four incidences of alleged misconduct were caught on closed circuit surveillance cameras. The public defender presented the videos as evidence in court, where it became a public record. He then called a press conference, showed the video and then posted it to the You Tube site maintained by his office.

What makes this so interesting is not the alleged crime but rather the fact that the public defender of a major city is using You Tube for official purposes. There was a time when we would have read about an incident of this type in the papers but would always wonder if the reporter got it right. Now the evidence is readily available at the click of a button from an official source.

This is yet another example of how social media is changing how we do business in government. Transparency in government is generally considered a good thing but as social media continues to evolve, we're going to be confronted by a whole host of privacy and legal issues. But there's no putting the genie back in the bottle – social media is rapidly becoming part of the fabric of our day-to-day lives and, sooner rather than later, we will need to embrace the changes it brings.