![[Daily Dunklin Democrat]](http://www.dddnews.com/images/nameplate-small.png){kind=small}
RSS
Print
Email link
Respond to editor
Post comment"Immediately following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, I tasked Department of Public Safety Director Mark James, SEMA and other state agencies to enhance the existing State Emergency Operations Plan and add a catastrophic event section to the plan to ensure our state was proactively preparing for future disasters," said Blunt. "We have made catastrophic earthquake preparedness a priority and have enhanced
our emergency planning, training and other initiatives to help ensure the safety of all Missourians who could be at risk in such an event."
The Catastrophic Event Annex calls for state agency responses including:
* At a 4.5 magnitude or greater earthquake, the National Earthquake Information Center (U.S. Geological Survey), Golden, Colorado will notify SEMA of the seismic event. SEMA will go to a Level 1 emergency status. Verifications will come from other sources such as St. Louis University or University of Memphis.
* At a 5.0 magnitude MoDOT will conduct land based damage assessment of bridges and roadways in the impacted area. MoDOT successfully inspected all bridges and roads in the St Louis and Southeast Missouri districts in response to the Mt. Carmel, IL 5.2 earthquake April 18, 2008.
* At a 6.5 magnitude the Civil Air Patrol will begin aerial damage assessment of roadway infrastructure in the impact area.
* At a 6.5 magnitude or greater key state departments/agencies will activate their plans for an earthquake response (i.e. aerial assessment of bridges and roads) and report to the SEOC.
* Two State Area Coordination Centers will be established to enhance state respond to impacted counties. Those centers will be in Region C for St. Louis and Region E for Southeast Missouri.
* The state will be divided into response tiers. The 47 counties are primarily located in Regions B, C, and E on the Eastern side of Missouri. Federal, State, Local agency and non-governmental disaster
organization responders will come from the Central and Western third of Missouri to assist the 47 counties.
* A Resource and Logistics plan has been approved. Missouri is in the process of updating its gap analysis, identifying shortfalls in all local and state equipment and other resources, and contractual support
necessary to resolve these requirements. This allows Missouri to accurately request needed federal resources for the earthquake response.
The Central United States Earthquake Consortium secured federal funds specifically to write regional plans and conduct regional exercises testing for the eight New Madrid Seismic states: Missouri, Arkansas, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana and Illinois.
During 2006, SEMA conducted a series of 5 regional earthquake tabletop exercises. The St. Louis, Hannibal, Cape Girardeau, Sikeston exercises focused on response. The Willow Springs exercise focused on sheltering and staging activities for Southeast Missouri. The regional exercises lead up to the Statewide Earthquake Exercise June 19-21, 2007.
In the spring of 2007, SEMA initially distributed local catastrophic plan templates to the 47 New Madrid risk counties and the city of St. Louis. The templates were distributed to the remaining 67 counties over the summer of 2007. SEMA conducted two officials' workshops at the State Area Coordination Centers in Region C and Region E for local officials.
In May 2008, state agencies met with their Federal Region VII counterparts during a catastrophic (earthquake) planning workshop in Jefferson City. The May workshop focused on meshing local and state
plans with regional federal partners. Currently, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Region VII in Kansas City is writing federal regional catastrophic plans to support the State of Missouri's earthquake response.
Between July - November, 2008, SEMA's earthquake program manager met with the 47 county emergency management directors to review their local catastrophic earthquake response plans and identify local resources for earthquake response. This December, the program manager will have regional meetings with county emergency management directors in the remaining 67 counties to review catastrophic plans and identify local resources.
SEMA continues to work with state agencies and the 114 counties to make sure response plans for Special Needs, Sheltering and Mass Care, Evacuations, and Pet Sheltering have a coordinated response.
Gov. Blunt has been instrumental in protecting Missouri from threats, either manmade or natural. Gov. Blunt created the Homeland Security Council to ensure proper homeland security plans are in place at both the local and state level and to examine how homeland security grant funds can best be coordinated and expedited. The Council placed the top public safety, homeland security, health, economic development, transportation, agriculture, natural resources, and private industry officials at one table.
In addition the governor introduced the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC), a 24-7 all hazards information center which collects, analyzes, and disseminates critical public safety information.
MIAC provides a public safety partnership consisting of local, state and federal agencies, as well as the public sector.
The governor championed Good Samaritan protection and signed a law which offers "Good Samaritan" liability protection to health care professionals from Missouri and other states who come to assist during a declared disaster in Missouri. The same legislation also allows the Department of Health and Senior Services to recruit, train and accept the services of citizen volunteers to dispense medication in a public health emergency under the supervision of a licensed health care professional.
