Disaster planning

Emergency management (or disaster management) is the organization and management of resources and responsibilities for dealing with all humanitarian aspects of emergencies—preparedness, response, and recovery—in order to reduce the harmful effects of all hazards, including disasters.

If possible, emergency planning should aim to prevent emergencies from occurring, and failing that, should develop a good action plan to mitigate the results and effects of any emergencies. As time goes on, and more data becomes available, usually through the study of emergencies as they occur, a plan should evolve. The development of emergency plans is a cyclical process, common to many risk management disciplines, such as Business Continuity and Security Risk Management, as set out below:

There are a number of guidelines and publications regarding Emergency Planning, published by various professional organizations such as ASIS, National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), and the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM). There are very few Emergency Management specific standards, and emergency management as a discipline tends to fall under business resilience standards.

In order to avoid, or reduce significant losses to a business, emergency managers should work to identify and anticipate potential risks, hopefully to reduce their probability of occurring. In the event that an emergency does occur, managers should have a plan prepared to mitigate the effects of that emergency, as well as to ensure Business Continuity of critical operations post-incident. It is essential for an organisation to include procedures for determining whether an emergency situation has occurred and at what point an emergency management plan should be activated.

An emergency plan must be regularly maintained, in a structured and methodical manner, to ensure it is up-to-date in the event of an emergency. Emergency managers generally follow a common process to anticipate, assess, prevent, prepare, respond and recover from an incident.

Emergency management plans and procedures should include the identification of appropriately trained staff members responsible for decision-making when an emergency occurs. Training plans should include internal people, contractors and civil protection partners, and should state the nature and frequency of training and testing.

Testing of a plan's effectiveness should occur regularly. In instances where several business or organisations occupy the same space, joint emergency plans, formally agreed to by all parties, should be put into place.

Drills and exercises in preparation for foreseeable hazards are often held, with the participation of the services that will be involved in handling the emergency, and people who will be affected. Drills are held to prepare for the hazards of fires, tornadoes, lockdown for protection, earthquakes, etc.

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