some articles from the emergency response area

some articles from the emergency response area

by Heleen ter Pelkwijk -
Number of replies: 2

As you all know I am extremely interested in how the emergency response people train and last week in Lodz I found some articles on this.

The first one "Emergency response: Elearning for paramedics and firefighters" is very close to the environment where our extreme situation forecasters are dealing with in case of trouble.

And the second one "Using scenario's to develop Crisis Managers: Applications of scenario planning and scenario-based training" is not really devoted to simulations only, but gives you a view in the world of training people for extreme scenarios and the things that can go wrong.

The paragraph "A common SBT Process" from page 403-406 gives you some background you could take with you when you develop a simulator training in the nearby future.

Two things struck me in this second article:

1) On page 409 they are telling that they had exercised a case like hurricane Katrine a couple of years earlier...people then were telling them that this scenario was too extreme, so they didn't take something from that exercise with them...and a couple of years later it happened in reality. People from the Dutch traffic control had the same kind experience during an simulation exercise...and warned me for this some time ago. so please know this happens more often.

2) on page 413 they show why exercising together with your colleagues from an other service or customer is so important.

okay now I have to run to our online meeting..

Heleen

In reply to Heleen ter Pelkwijk

Re: some articles from the emergency response area

by Patrick Parrish -

Hi Heleen,

Thanks for these resources. Of course, disaster scenarios are a critical use of simulation because the risks are high and the events are infrequent, even if too frequent for comfort. 

In one of my last projects with COMET, I was involved in Tsunam-related training. The tsunami warning centers put on what must be some of the largest simulations, geographically, that exist. 38 countries participated in the last PacWave exercise, which is rather simple, but complex enough. The West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center creates a simulated tsunami event, produces and issues all the  normal products in the same timeframe as an actual event, including maps and seismic products, and those responsible for disseminating the products must do so, and disaster responders follow through motions of responding, short of notifying the public. In some areas of course, even the public practices evacuation measures. 

http://wcatwc.arh.noaa.gov/?page=exercises

We used one of these simulations as the basis of "Tsunami Strike" a scenario-based learning modules for middle-school kids. This was not a simulation in that the kids taking the module made no decision in response to the unfolding story, but the leraning content was grounded in the realistic event nonetheless. This can be found at: http://www.meted.ucar.edu/tsunami/strike/index.htm

The warning center simulation is an interesting example of a limited level of fidelity achieving the learning and practice goals, and the COMET module an example of something that uses simulation aspects, but is NOT a simulation because  no decisions are made by learners about the event. 

Pat

In reply to Heleen ter Pelkwijk

Re: some articles from the emergency response area

by Patrick Parrish -

One more example before I move to other things. In the Community Hurricane Preparedness module by COMET (https://www.meted.ucar.edu/training_module.php?id=566), there is a very nice decision making scenario that might be said to have a low degree of fidelity or verisimilitude or whatever that other word was that we were using . BUT, it actually provides a nice simulation of the kinds of decisions emergency managers have to make, using realistic data sources, and in a self-paced format. This is used in the national Emergency Management Inistituted official curriculum in the US. (see the Decision Making section of the module)

Pat