Posts Tagged: disaster

Disaster’s Coming – How is Your Agency Preparing?

When she’s not wearing her 80’s gear and rocking out as the lead singer of our city employee band, the Black Death Socks (BDS), Breanna Medina is the Emergency Management Coordinator for the city of Rancho Cucamonga, California.  I asked Bree about her role and how she’s preparing our city to be a resilient community.Read… Read more »

It’s Hurricane Season—Informing Federal Disaster Management

Hurricane season is well under way, and we’re highlighting some of our reports and resources that can help inform federal disaster management in events such as hurricanes. 2014’s first named storm, Hurricane Arthur, has already found a place in the record books. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Weather Service, July 3rd—whenRead… Read more »

NASA, DHS Demo Victim Location Radar

NASA and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday demonstrated a portable radar device intended to detect heartbeats and breathing patterns of victims trapped in large piles of rubble after a disaster. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will also test the Finding Individuals for Disaster and Emergency Response system this year and next, NASARead… Read more »

NASA, DHS Want Radar Device to Detect Disaster Victim Heartbeats

NASA and the Department of Homeland Security are working to develop a new radar technology for helping locate victims during emergencies. The Finding Individuals for Disaster and Emergency Response device is intended to identifyheartbeats of human beings buried at several depths under rubbles of catastrophes, NASA said Tuesday. DHS’ science and technology directorate and NASA’sRead… Read more »

Cross Government Collaboration: Lessons from Superstorm Sandy

Cross Government Collaboration: Lessons from Superstorm Sandy Rear Admiral Steven Smith, Director of SBA Disaster Planning Unit Desiree Matel-Anderson, Chief Innovation Advisor, FEMA Marion McFadden, Chief Operating Officer, Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force Admiral Steven Smith, begins the Cross-Government Collaboration session with a illustrative anecdote. In 2008, after Hurricane Ike, he described a meeting ofRead… Read more »

Emergency Managers: Time to Think In Terms of Supply Chain Management

Hurricane Sandy. The Alabama tornados. Japan’s tsunami. On and on, natural disasters seem to come at a greater clip than ever, and some besieged emergency managers are shifting from reactive to proactive by re-envisioning disaster recovery as supply chain management. Charlotte Franklin, deputy coordinator of emergency management for Arlington County, Va., wrote recently on theRead… Read more »

Zetta.net Unveils 2013 Predictions for Online Backup and Recovery

Hardware Backup Appliances Move toward Extinction While New Generations of Cloud-based Backup and Recovery Technologies Are more Widely Adopted Zetta.net today unveiled five predictions for the online backup and recovery market for 2013, all pointing to the broader adoption of online backup in more industries and the extinction of hardware backup appliances. From education andRead… Read more »

Prepare A Zombie Survival Kit

Ever since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) launched their creative “zombie apocalypse” campaign last year, Americans have been even more exposed to the recommendation of making a survival kit for any disaster. I explore my own “go bag” in this video to see if I have all of the recommended suppliesby theRead… Read more »

Non-Emergency 311 Centers Can Save Lives

When disasters strike towns and cities, 911 centers quickly become inundated with calls beyond those that are truly life-threatening situations. The result is that emergency response is delayed which can sometimes lead to deadly consequences. A case in point is a story in the New York Post about how New York City’s 911 center wasRead… Read more »