Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
awareness and in training certain populations, such as schoolchildren, to evacuate when time
is of the essence. However, as previously discussed, the committee knows of no cost-beneit
studies to evaluate evacuation drills that involve the public regarding whether they increase
public readiness and knowledge and, if they do, whether these beneits outweigh the social and
economic costs of staging them. Nevertheless, the committee identiies some beneits of having
individuals, households and neighborhoods practice evacuation behavior. In very small commu-
nities that may have less than 30 minutes to evacuate and limited vertical evacuation options,
these voluntary drills may be useful in promoting tsunami awareness, providing social cues, and
building social networks. However, the utility of these voluntary exercises is likely limited to very
small communities. Also the transferability and applicability is minimal, and perhaps dangerous,
to larger communities with far-ield threats and greater options for vertical evacuation.
California and Alaska use “live code” tsunami tests, in which the communication system
is tested from the initiation through to issuing a public test message. Such end-to-end tests,
if done well, could provide great beneits. For example, such live code tests would help to
“integrate” the different components of the system, contribute to improved coordination,
“enculturate” the hazards with the local population, and potentially reduce confusion during
a real event. However, there are also major risks associated with such tests. If the tests were
designed poorly, e.g., distribute a “bad” message to the public that could confuse people, the
tests would lead to potentially negative societal impacts. Therefore, care would need to be
given to properly design these tests (good emergency planning) and to appropriately imple-
ment them (adequate training provided to those who would conduct the test). Important con-
sideration in designing the test include using the correct message content distributed to the
public as well as the appropriate dissemination mechanisms (e.g., reverse 911, text messages to
mobile devices, traditional media, Internet, etc.). Thus, pre-test planning will need the involve-
ment of not only emergency managers but also social scientists with knowledge of how to
design such tests.
Because actual tsunami events are opportunities to test and exercise all components of
the tsunami program (including the technology, organizations, and people), evaluating these
events presents a good opportunity for learning. The beneits and requirements for such a
research and evaluation effort is further discussed in Chapter 4.
Conclusion:
Practicing evacuation procedures and protocols is important in order
to minimize confusion in future evacuations. Current efforts to practice evacuation
procedures and protocols include community-led evacuation drills, table-top exercises
among emergency management agencies to discuss response coordination, and
functional exercises to ield test interagency communication and coordination. The
committee concludes that the importance of these approaches varies based on local
conditions and the tsunami threat that communities face.
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Far-ield tsunami threats:
Evacuations will be managed by multiple agencies over
several hours; therefore, exercises involving agencies to discuss and test coordination
and communication are important to reduce the potential for confusion during a
tsunami. The NTHMP currently lacks guidelines on how to evaluate exercises, and there
