The Washington region’s response during unpredictable disasters like the 5.8-magnitude earthquake in August and last week’s flash flooding is still largely chaotic, officials said Wednesday. Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments officials did note that the region withstood a predicted event — Hurricane Irene — very well. The hurricane blew through on a weekend and with plenty of notice, allowing disaster response agencies time to coordinate with local governments and send up-to-date news on the storm’s strength.
But when it comes to sudden events, the response is inconsistent.
“The whole [point of a] response is to respond to the unexpected, and the date of the earthquake on Aug. 23, I think we failed,” said board member and D.C. Councilman Phil Mendelson at the MWCOG’s monthly meeting.
He added that once again, the region found itself in a massive traffic jam that day because of a lack of coordinated decision making. It is left to private businesses to decide whether to let workers leave early; meanwhile the federal government let each agency decide whether to send workers home the afternoon of the earthquake.
Board member David Snyder, vice mayor of Falls Church, added that using social media to get information out instantly still fails when wireless networks are down, as they were after the earthquake.
“We weren’t given good information for hours and those in our business community weren’t getting any kind of information rapidly with what they needed to do,” he said.
Merni Fitzgerald, chairwoman of the council’s committee on emergency preparedness, said chaos happens often because it is difficult to temper people’s instincts to reunite with their families — even if they are told to stay put. Officials’ warnings were also ignored by drivers who tried to motor on through standing water during last week’s flooding.
“If you don’t know what your school’s disaster plans are and you’re concerned about your children, you’re going to ignore that direction,” she said.
Families and individuals should form their own plans, which might include staying in place, Fitzgerald added.
“This reminds people that planning for this is important,” she said.
