Examples Of How To Insert A Figure With A Caption

Hurricane Katrina has destroyed several of the core communications infrastructure in the area. The storm made it harder for 911 emergency call centers which disturb local emergency services. A great majority of people lost phone service, broadcast communications were also affected. Even through state, federal and/or local agencies had communications plans in place, the plans were not enough to respond efficiently to the storm. The available communications were not fully utilized due to the fact that there was no national or state wide communications plans to incorporate them. The local, state, federal governments haven’t really completed an extensive strategy to improve operability and telecommunications for emergency responders. The Department of Homeland Security should come up with an emergency communications strategy if a disaster like Hurricane Katrina would happen again.

In the Disaster in Franklin County simulation (Regents of the University of Minnesota [UMN], 2006), there were several key personnel in the incident command team. This concept is utilized in real disasters when the Public

Crisis information during Hurricane Katrina was immediately available through mass media; television, radio, the emergency broadcast system, and social media. During emergencies, the importance of our country’s communications systems becomes clear. These

Supplies could be needed in one area, but without communication that area might not be able to reach out for those supplies. Communication amongst first responders is important for information sharing, so that information can flow between different jurisdictions and agencies. When looking at the efforts of first responders, communication is the one constant variable, which without communication all efforts would be in vain. (Newman & Clarke, 2008) The National Incident Management System (NIMS) places an emphasis on the importance of communication when dealing with response efforts. The National Incident Management System shows how having a unified command systems can benefit the response efforts to disaster. However, without proper and efficient communication, a unified command system cannot proceed efficiently.

Getting a staff together to bring in useful information to plan for the release of the information to the news media is a great way to enhance communication to the public. The media will then get the information out to the public by ways of News releases, web sites, news conferences, newspapers and other social media (Hicks, 2012). The advantages of using these types of media are they quickly allows for the public to know what type of crisis has happened, and what kinds of precautions are being taken to ensure their safety. If there were to be any fatalities caused by the crisis event(s), these types of avenues also will give information on that. Some disadvantages can be unreliable technology of the citizens that will not allow for them to get access to the information that is being released by the media, such as no television, computer is not working properly, or they don’t received the local newspaper to be able to read it, etc.

The emergency events caused by infectious disease, natural or anthropogenic causes with the potential to overwhelm or otherwise disrupt routine local capacities due to their timing, scale or unpredictability should be communicated properly and routinely which requires rapid knowledge transfer and uptake (Khan et al., 2017, p. 2).

The “need to know” system is an outdated and inefficient way of sharing information, both within a single agency and when it comes to interagency cooperation. The “need to share” system is a much more logical way to go about disseminating intelligence of all variations. The “need to share” system theoretically mandates the interagency sharing of information that is pertinent to national security , and operational success, thus paving the way for much more efficient operations between the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), as well as other federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies. If I were in charge of the DHS I would put into effect a long term interagency liaison program, that would be aimed at the sharing

During this event, it was unclear who or what organization was accountable for public safety during this event. As a result, there was ambiguity of authority regarding who was in charge of public safety leading up to the collapse (Witt Associations, 2012). The ambiguity of authority and lack of a formal protocol created uncertainty and confusion. The ISFC had set up a system to communicate weather forecasts, but the distribution of messages was limited to ISFC personnel and did not include contractors or public

Barrett (2011) provides a list of questions to consider when developing a policy. The list includes identifying the audience, purpose, message, medium/forum, communicator, and timing. Following Barrett’s (2011) system, Draper City’s proposed Emergency Communication Policy

Collaboration involves various groups or groups of people working together to accomplish a desired outcome. It is a bit like teamwork. By strengthening connections during an emergency crisis, you have the ability to be more effective, faster, produce more, and have more personnel available. Collaboration offers more innovation and experience to a situation. This paper will discuss the roles of those that were involved in the collaborative efforts of FEMA. The basic reasoning for this paper is to provide knowledge and understanding the experience of emergency management and collaboration that took place during Hurricane Sandy.

Still in control of television and their own company websites, they are no longer the sole controller of information. Per Mangeri, all organizations “must be sure to maintain the capability to communicate valuable information about evacuation, sheltering, and other important disaster response and recovery information to the entire community”. This statement previously meant the PIO would prepare to communicate in different contexts to the community. Now, it must also include various forms of social media being utilized by the different generations of media consumers. For example, most organizations have incorporated a social media component to their messaging. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have all become critical avenues to connect people with those delivering critical messaging. Facebook Safety Check is a program to help mitigate the panic that ensues during a crisis. Facebook users can now show themselves as being “safe” during an incident. This allows family and friends to be informed of their loved one's status without having to further burden the responding emergency services. In addition, the responding emergency services themselves can disseminate the desired information. This can vary from weather advisories to critical incidents. In addition, the Code Red System, available to first responder is an immediate reversal of the 911 system, which calls and notifies citizens

Today’s technology has enabled communication to various parts of the world a 24-hour service, which means that, in any emergency response circumstance, there will always be a continuous claim for information (Haddow & Haddow, 2013).

During emergencies, the importance of our country’s communications systems becomes clear. These communications systems include the wire line and wireless telephone networks, broadcast and cable television, radio, Public Safety Land Mobile Radio, satellite systems and increasingly the Internet. For example, in an emergency, we may dial 911, call our family members to make sure they are safe, and turn on our televisions and radios to get breaking news and important updates (FCC, 2012).

This emergence of social media has also changed emergency management and disaster response. Emergency management as a whole is fairly new, only creating widely recognized, integrated emergency management systems beginning in the 1970s. Furthermore, at this same time people realized that the effects disasters have on the communities they strike can be mitigated by the creation of disaster plans ahead of time, proper disaster response training, and the efforts of human actions in these situations. Because social media has enabled mass amounts of instant information sharing, it allows not only locals and disaster response teams to help with the management of crises, but also many remote citizens.

CNA, a research facility, partnered with the National Emergency Management Association to provide research and information on the public’s expectations about emergency management’s use of social media. Before this research, the data about this connection was only done with case studies and unreliable accounts. CAN used a survey in this research to see how people felt about social media in connection with emergency management. The results found an positive approach. Many people in emergency management agencies, on local and national levels are very familiar with social media. It is usually the larger websites that are more widely known. Sites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, are widely known and publicized. There are however many other social media sites that are not as widely known that are even more useful to nationwide security and communication such as crowdsourcing and Nixle and these are not as widely known (Su, Wardell, & Throkidsen, 2013). So while people in emergency management