Alternate Reality II

I recommend this post from the blog Making Light. For added benefit, you can follow the link at the end of the post to take an online training that will make you personally more qualified than Michael Brown. (Well, ok, still more qualified. This is "Brownie" we're talking about...)

Well, what with this and that, some clever buggers came up with the Incident Command System as an answer. Like Herman Wouk once described the US Navy: A system designed by geniuses to be operated by idiots. ICS allows multiple agencies over multiple jurisdictions to work together and actually accomplish something useful. Wildfires don't wait while you get your act together.

Notice that the word "Command" is part of the name of the system. You have to take command early. How the first five minutes go can determine how the next five hours will go, and how those five hours go can determine how the next five days go.

ICS scales up and down as the situation develops. You always have a measurable objective or goal in a specific timeperiod. You put that goal in writing. That way you can track what's happened, and what's happening. Goals can change as the situation develops.

The ICS is based on three principles: First, somebody has to be in charge. One person.

Second, No one can keep everything in their head. In fact, experimental evidence (confirmed by years of experience) is that one person can direct three to seven others with five people being optimum.

Third, no man can serve two masters. You only get orders from one person, and you know who that person is.

As the author notes, this isn't new technology. We don't need to re-invent the wheel. And as for preparation:

One thing that Logistics can do prior to an event is figure out what all the need-to-have, good-to-have, and nice-to-have items are, and make out undated purchase orders for the lot of them. Put the purchase orders in a folder. Then, when the world is collapsing around you at two in the morning, and the mayor says "Anything! Anything at all! Say the word!" you just slap that folder into his hand and say "Start signing."

You have to have the system in place, everyone trained, reading off the same page, using the same terms. It's really good to find out in advance whether your radios can talk to the radios of the folks you need to coordinate with before the day you need to talk with 'em.

Several states have adopted the ICS as their standard. ICS is required by federal law in all HAZMAT incidents. Natural disasters, however, don't require ICS.

Right now, I'm told, Homeland Security, through FEMA, is trying to impliment ICS nationwide as NIIMS: National Interagency Incident Management System. And that might point out a problem: Notice the difference between "Command" and "Management."

If only we had a cabinet-level department with responsibility to make sure that we were ready for attacks and disasters, that could ensure that stuff like that was done. Wouldn't that be nice?