- What are the most serious hazards your community (or organisation) faces?
The most serious hazards Lower Hutt faces are earthquake, tsunami and flooding. - How would your community (or organisation) respond to the most significant hazard now?
The community knows the drill. If an earthquake is long and strong, they know to get gone. One of the issues however, is that the main arterial route, State Highway 2 (SH2) could be blocked. This means that for people in the coastal areas of Petone and Eastbourne, accessing higher ground is best achieved by foot as the residential roads cannot accommodate the amount of cars.
For the Petone residents, they would need to cross SH2 to get up the western hills, but through heightened awareness many neighbours have agreements to car share/take those without cars/unable to drive (and thus reduce the amount of vehicles on the roads).
The mobile phone civil defence alert system is practised annually, and many people know to listen to the radio for information (and own battery powered radios for this purpose). - What issues would come from that Response or Recovery?
As ever, the issues that arise for such an event are that during the day, families are not together, so we have to trust that our childrens' schools and colleges will look after the youth (again, regular practices give us confidence).
Every business and employer is aware of obligations to staff, and staff are encouraged to get to know their colleagues who live close by - to reduce the number of people relying on themselves.
Access to grab and go bags is essential - as is the working together for the community good. For example, those moving to higher ground will be mainly reliant on local residents as there are few civil defence halls.
At night, disorientation, lack of suitable clothing and being unable to locate pets will also add to the stress.
Key issues at any time of the day are shelter, access to sanitation, food, warmth, and medications, and welfare provision.
People with additional needs, elderly, and those with English as a second language, need support ahead of time.
It's dawned on me, as working my way through the modules that activities such as the Big Shake Out are scheduled for the daytime.
I don't think there's ever been a night time exercise planned or practised locally, regionally or nationally. It does bring home the need to volunteer when emergency practices are put in place.