Have you thought about an emergency plan?

By John Abularrage
Contributing Writer

Here in the Catskill Mountains of New York, I have generally looked forward to big storms, since they frequently produce some of the best snowboarding days of the year.

Although these large snowfalls can lead to power outages, typically, they only last a few days. But when Hurricane Irene came roaring up the East Coast at the end of August, it was a completely different story. Irene deluged us with 13 inches of rain in 12 hours, washing out entire roads and destroying homes and businesses. The hurricane also lashed us with 60 mph winds, blowing over trees and knocking out phone, cable and power lines.

The storm blew out electric service for more than a week in our region, and, of course, all our phone and Internet communications went down as well. For businesses in and near towns, cell phones provided a back-up to land lines, but out in the country, where we are, cell service is non-existent, so, while our back-up generator brought the computers back to life, without phone or Internet we were really isolated.

We were also not prepared for it. I learned quickly that what I most needed at the storm’s worst moment was a well-conceived contingency plan. We needed to have copies of the plan in every employee’s truck and home, as well as in the office. During this storm, though, when trees were falling over power lines and blocking roads, and while houses, bridges and businesses were being swallowed by rivers and streams, I didn’t have the plan. You can bet we’re working on one now.

When the lights went out

At the height of the hurricane, a state of emergency was declared in the area. Authorities requested that all non-essential vehicles stay off the roads. By the afternoon of Sunday, August 28, trees were down across the roads everywhere, trapping me within a half mile of my home and office. I needed to tell my crew members that work would be cancelled for the following day, but I had no way to reach them. If I had a contingency plan in place, my technicians would have known what to do without a phone call from me.

Fortunately, by nightfall the immediate roads were cleared, and I was able to drive to a nearby location that had cell reception to make the calls.

The morning after that first, worst day, with several counties at and beyond “disaster” stage, Irene left behind a wide path of debris and a whole lot of water in all the wrong places. What I most needed to do was to figure out how to deal with the aftermath.

While getting to town was still impossible, I managed to drive to the old wood mill around the corner, where I was managed to pick up a fully-unexpected 3G cell signal. I was able to set up a mobile office in the bed of my pickup. I had my MacBook with thumb drive for access to critical files, a Bluetooth earbud connected to my iPhone for voice communications and my iPad with 3G service for email and Internet. I was quite the vision of modern technology, contrasting with the centuries-old mill in the background.

The next thing I had to do was to get all of the office phone lines forwarded to our answering service, so people could contact us and receive personal attention. This took an hour and a half phone call, which I mainly spent on hold while banging out emails on the iPad.

When trucks from the local utility company showed up to establish their own command center in the parking lot, I asked whether they had any idea when we might get power back. “Say what?” they asked, jokingly. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” They weren’t kidding when they said that it would probably take at least two weeks, maybe three, and that restoring communications could take longer.

At that moment I realized that I had an entirely new set of circumstances to deal with. I quickly checked the Internet for updates on the status of the rest of the area and the extent of the damages. Wow! Could this all be true? Major bridges were washed out. Portions of local villages were literally washed away. Many folks lost their homes. I was thinking, “This only happens in far away places. It doesn’t happen here.”

Well, it did happen here. It was then that I started to give thanks that all I had to deal with was a tremendous inconvenience, while others were in much worse shape.

The next day, roads in my area were sufficiently open to have my crews back on the job. Field operations were pretty much back to normal. We were lucky, as the job sites we were on were accessible and had power restored to them. My new, mobile field office in the parking lot at the mill proved to be quite effective, but I knew that it was not going to be comfortable enough for two weeks or more.

My next choice was the local library, but they had lost Internet service. Coming to my rescue was an engineer we have done work for over the last 25 years. He offered desk space in his office. Wow, why didn’t I think of that? If we had a disaster plan in place, I probably would have known it!

On the following day, the new projection from the utilities was for all services to be restored by the weekend. I decided I could be comfortable and effective enough with my mobile office. All went quite well from there, thankfully, as I adapted to doing business from the bed of my truck and even enjoyed working in the sunshine.

All told, however, the entire affair with Irene would have been much more manageable if we had a written emergency plan in place prior to her visit. Such a plan would not only have made an unexpected calamity easier to deal with, it would have helped to ensure a timely and orderly resumption of business with minimal interruption to time-sensitive operations.

Creating an emergency plan

A good emergency plan would establish health and safety issues as first priorities, of course, such as prohibiting driving on flooded roads, staying away from downed utility lines and keeping off the roads during a state of emergency.

The next priority should be a communications protocol. It would be a good idea to record ways to communicate with key employees and to establish a hierarchy, in case some key people are not able to gain access to communications. Cell numbers, home numbers and email addresses of all personnel should be available to all employees.

Access to critical company information is another item that needs to be planned for. This typically includes technical files and contract documents, but contact information is of paramount importance. Normally, we back up all of our data files to an external hard drive that is kept off site. During this particular power and communications outage, we needed to transfer those files to a flash drive so that we had access to them remotely and didn’t need an external power source.

As I mentioned, a contingency business location can be of tremendous value in an emergency. This can easily be set up as a reciprocal arrangement with other professionals with whom you do business. It works both ways. If we had one in place during Hurricane Irene, we could have quickly and efficiently taken shelter from the storm.

All of these plans should be documented and distributed to all personnel in the company in written and electronic form for easy access. Ask for feedback from your employees. Their input can enhance the plan and help get everyone on board. Once the plan has been developed, ideally, you should test it (under non-emergency conditions), evaluate it and refine it.

Good night, Irene!

The best advice I can offer, based on what I’ve learned, is to be proactive. Put your contingency plan together before it’s needed. Lessons will still be learned in the wake of disaster, but, with a contingency plan, the pain and nuisance should be reduced.

I know that I wish we had a contingency plan in place before Irene came to visit. Over the past few weeks, we’ve instituted a preliminary plan. It’s still percolating, so if you have suggestions or questions, please let me know.

As a friend once told me, “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago; the next best time is NOW!”

John Abularrage is the owner and president of Advanced Radiant Design Inc., Stone Ridge, N.Y. He has been designing and installing radiant heating systems for more than 25 years.