State homeland security heads planning for a Category 5 Katrina-like hurricane or a terrorist attack on the nation’s capital shared strategies on how to shelter and feed to evacuees fleeing the disasters.
Providing food, fuel, medical attention and other necessities to residents from the Washington-Baltimore area was the topic that dominated discussions at a conference this week on emergency evacuation, which public safety officials from seven states, the District of Columbia and the federal government attended in Davis, W.Va.
The discussions came after National Capital Region homeland security officials repudiated a study from the conference claiming 7 million D.C. suburbanites will flee the area in the event of a major terrorist attack. The region has about 8 million people.
“We’ve been meeting and coordinating with the D.C. and Maryland people for the last five years. It makes sense to participate with West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Delaware,” said Janet Clements, the chief deputy state coordinator for the Virginia Department of Emergency Management.
She said a report released by a West Virginia University professor indicated that about 88 percent of people in the National Capital Region would flee in the event of a major terrorist attack.
And while that survey, and anearlier one from the University of Virginia, also found that most residents would stay put if ordered to shelter in place, the WVU poll also showed high levels of distrust of the federal government in disasters.
Swartzmiller acknowledged the likelihood of a disaster emptying the metro area is somewhat remote, but said planning is important.
“The world we live in today is just full of the unexpected,” Swartzmiller said. “What we’re doing is just trying to identify the unknowns.”
