popular logistics

Donahue and Tuohy , in Lessons We Don’t Learn, identify recurring problems in emergency management which are identified – repeatedly – in “lessons learned” and “after-action” processes:

• lack of commitment to plans
• cached materials “often inadequate to meet actual need”
• mutual aid assets being counted by different agencies as part of their resource bases, creating a net overstatement of capabilities
• tracking systems for volunteers and donated resources are weak, causing assets to be underutilized
• “short shrift to pre-incident public education”
• inadequate followup on identified problems
• the use of simulated “table-top” exercises to the detriment of inter-agency field exercises – “agencies fail to derive perhaps the most important benefit of the exercise process: relationships with other agencies, jurisdictions, and disciplines”
  

Donahue and Tuohy note that “[t]he wildland fire community uses a very effective nationwide resource ordering and deployment system, but this approach has not been replicated by other disciplines.”

And, of course, inaction on the part of the public:

Even when directions are clear, received, and understood, some people do not have the wherewithal to follow them. As our incident managers acknowledged, some people just do not have the will to do as they are told. In the incident managers’ view, the public is generally complacent about preparedness. This is borne out by anecdotal evidence. For example, during the recent commemoration of the 1906 earthquake, National Public Radio reported, “Scientists agree that it’s very likely another big earthquake will hit the San Francisco Bay area in the next thirty years, but…many people in the Bay Area still live in denial” (April 18, 2006). Interviews with a number of citizens illustrated their point. Few had serious plans or any supplies to sustain them in the event of a major disaster. The lack of wherewithal or will on the part of the public presents a recurring challenge to governments that have not invested enough resources in emergency transportation and shelter.

Lessons We Don’t Learn, published in Homeland Security Affairs, a journal published by the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and Security.

We’ve only learned about the NPS and the Center recently; and we’re gradually working our way through the current and back issues. Thus far, immensely impressive. If one didn’t know - there’s no obvious military feel to the work, which is largely by civilians - but for a sensitivity to logistical and practical issues which, in my experience, are often found among American military officers.

The NPS work is tax money well spent - all the more so if their work gets widely read. Check out the journal, their Simulations, Games and Software page - and the Hastily Formed Networks project.