Disaster Assets Net Exercise

Following on from the training I spoke about in my last post, we ran an exercise to put the newly learned skills to practice.

We split everyone into teams, leaving myself and one other person as Net Control.  The teams dispersed into separate rooms, each taking a radio with them.  They also took an information sheet and three cards, each naming an "asset" they might have that someone else will need.  

For instance, the First Aid station had a card saying "Patient report", which was needed by Incident Command. 

Using the Net format, each team had to ask over the radio for the items that they needed, deliver the assets they had as directed by Net Control, and report back when an asset was delivered to them.

The information sheets each had a description of the scenario, a personalized example of how to request a specific asset, and a list of "haves" and "needs".

Who had What

We had five teams, not counting Net Control, and each team had three assets. I put a lot of effort into making it at least reasonably realistic, and not having any repeated teams.  Note this is my draft list, the final list was edited some by MRC leadership for the actual event.

Incident Command has

  • Volunteer assignments (needed by Volunteer Reception)
  • Maps (Logistics)
  • Weather Forecast (Field Unit)

Field Unit has

  • Patient information (First Aid)
  • Damage Assessments (Incident Command)
  • Shelter Addresses (Volunteer Reception)

Logistics has

  • Gas (Field Unit)
  • New radios (Volunteer Reception
  • Gloves (First Aid)

Volunteer Reception has

  • New Medical personnel (First Aid)
  • Current count of volunteers (Incident Command)
  • A Driver (Logistics)

First Aid has

  • Medical Supplies (Field Unit)
  • Spare Backup Generator (Logistics)
  • Injury Report (Incident Command)

After Action Report

The exercise was a big hit, with many people saying they enjoyed it.  There are a couple of changes I would make if I ran it again.

First of all, I would make sure I told everyone to turn their radios on, and explained that NCS would be announcing the start and end of the exercise.

Secondly, I'd make a couple of changes to the master sheet I had.  Rather than formatting it as above to show who has what, I would change it to show needs instead: Incident Command needs Damage Assessments from Mobile Unit, Current Count of Volunteers from Volunteer Reception, and an Injury Report from First Aid.  That would make it easier to keep track of who is calling for an asset.  I'd also add columns with spaces for the "requested" and "delivered" times, as I had to double check that a couple of items were delivered before we ended the exercise.

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