Emergency Preparedness and Response
Accidents and emergencies can happen anytime and anywhere. Is your organization prepared in the event of an accident? Have you identified the potential emergency situations that could arise from your everyday activities and operations? Do you have response mechanisms in place?
If the answer to any of the questions above is no, it may seem a daunting task to begin, but most organizations have some information that relates to emergency situations. You may want to examine the applicable environmental and/or health and safety regulations which often require a response plan or procedure (e.g. Spill Prevention Control and Countermeasure or Facility Response Plan). If your organization does not have any existing procedures, a good place to start is to examine your operations and/or process flow diagrams. Your significant aspect list can direct you to the activities and operations that pose the greatest risks. From this review, you can then identify the potential emergency scenarios that could arise from your activities and operations.
Once you have identified these scenarios you should begin drafting your response plan. How you respond to each situation will determine who is involved and what they will do. Once this is complete you will need to define roles and responsibilities. Inside your organization who is responsible for initiating a response to mitigate the environmental impact associated with the various scenarios? Do you need to contact anyone outside your organization (e.g. police, fire department, state environmental agency, or contractor)? Do you have the appropriate response equipment on hand?
Once you have identified the appropriate responses, you will need to communicate the roles and responsibilities and educate your personnel appropriately. Initial education, however, isn’t enough. A periodic test or “practice run” (e.g. monthly, annually) will help with your organizational preparedness in the event of an accident or emergency situation. Should an emergency situation occur you will want to evaluate the response and revise your procedures where necessary after the event.
Getting Started
- Have you evaluated your operations and activities to identify potential emergency scenarios?
- Determine whether any existing procedures address the various scenarios that have been identified.
- Identify the appropriate responses.
- Obtain proper emergency response equipment and train personnel.
- Test responses on a periodic basis.
- Conduct post-emergency response evaluation and revise procedures as necessary.