Maps prepared for the drill designate neighborhoods without electricity or natural gas or areas requiring relocation of residents. Operation Alaska Shield will involve layers of local, state and federal agencies rehearsing what might happen in the first 24 hours following a 1964-type quake. "They're needed for things like evacuation orders," he said. Immediately to his right is a chair for a municipal attorney. Blue vests designate the "traffic" crew that handles damage assessment and forms what Spillers called "the common operating picture." Personnel from local utilities will wear purple.Īt the main desk is a red vest for Spillers. In an emergency, representatives of area hospitals will sit together in one section, public safety people in another, community service providers in another.Ĭolor-coded vests are folded over the tops of chairs. They provide education and outreach, work on a revision of the city's emergency plan, and, several times a year, get involved with what Spillers called "smaller things, like fires that displace 25 people or more."Įarlier this month, the center's main response room sat empty, as it does most of the time.Īround the room are more than 30 computer-equipped work stations arranged in clusters. The staff of the Office of Emergency Management share the Emergency Operations Center building on E Street with United Way offices and police and fire backup dispatch centers. He'll be in control of the room during Operation Alaska Shield on Thursday. The 50th anniversary of the 1964 Good Friday earthquake will be a busy day for Kevin Spillers, the city's emergency management director. The details have been extrapolated from estimates issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and maps outlining major earthquake scenarios in advance of a statewide disaster preparedness drill planned in Alaska over the next several days. Those whose homes remained intact had no gas, electricity, running water or sewer service. Some 42,000 people - and 19,000 pets - were homeless. The broken streets were clogged with cars as frantic parents tried to reach their children. Cellphone users couldn't get a dial tone. In one, three people were reported dead and 55 were trapped. Every parking garage in downtown Anchorage had collapsed. Going north, the only way to cross Eagle River was the inbound Glenn Highway bridge. Parts of the Seward Highway and Alaska Railroad tracks sloughed into Turnagain Arm, cutting off travel south. The airport's tower still stood, but was unmanned because of structural damage. Landslides at Point Woronzof buckled the north end of the runway at Stevens International Airport. Oil tanks ruptured and the docks were evacuated. The cranes at the Port of Anchorage fell into Knik Arm. Another 6,000 sustained serious injuries. Five hundred and thirty people died during the four minute quake. on April 1, 2014, a 9.2 earthquake struck Anchorage.
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