Emergency Management - Emergency Preparedness Guide

911/EMA Facility Augusta
Emergency Management

Emergency Preparedness Guide -Terrorism

The events of September 11th have demonstrated a greater need for preparedness and vigilance against terrorist attacks. During a terrorist event, you would need to rely on your local police, fire and other emergency office for instructions. Also, be aware that during a terrorist event, as with any other emergency, you may be without services you typically depend on. Services such as electricity, telephone, natural gas, gasoline pumps, cash registers, ATMs, and the Internet may not be available. Fortunately, you can prepare for a terrorist event in the much the same way you would prepare for other emergency events.

Possible Types of Terrorist Events

Chemical Terrorism
Biological Terrorism
Nuclear Terrorism
Radiological Dispersion Device (RDD)

Chemical Terrorism

Preparation and response to a chemical terrorist incident is not unlike that of a similar hazardous materials emergency. Be aware however that a chemical attack may employ the use of bombs or vehicles, such as boats or airplanes, to spray or release the chemical agents into to the air.

Preparing For Chemical Terrorism

Choose an internal room, on the highest level or your home, to shelter in. Preferable this should be a room without windows.

Be sure that your emergency kit includes scissors, duck tape, and plastic sheeting.

Cut and measure the plastic sheeting in advance to save critical time in the event of an incident.

During A Chemical Terrorist Attack

Remain Calm. If you are instructed to remain in your home or office building, you should:

Close doors and windows.

Turn off all ventilation, including furnaces, air conditioners, vents, and fans.

Seek shelter in an internal room and take your disaster supplies kit.

Seal the room with duct tape and plastic sheeting.

Listen to your radio for instructions from authorities.

If you are caught in or near a contaminated area, you should:

Move away immediately in a direction upwind of the source.

Find shelter as quickly as possible.

After A Chemical Terrorist Attack

Do not leave your shelter and stay indoors until authorities announce you can do so. If you or some else has been affected by a chemical agent immediate medical attention is required. If medical help is not available, you can decontaminate yourself and assist others by following these guidelines.

Use extreme caution when helping others who have been exposed.

Remove all clothing and other items in contact with the body.

Contaminated clothing normally removed over the head should be cut off to avoid contact with the eyes, nose, and mouth.

Put contaminated clothing and items into a plastic bag and seal it.

Decontaminate hands using soap and water.

Remove eyeglasses or contact lenses.

Put glasses in a pan of household bleach to decontaminate them and then rinse and dry.

Flush eyes with water.

Gently wash face and hair with soap and water before thoroughly rinsing with water.

Decontaminate other body areas likely to have been contaminated. Blot (do not swab or scrape) with a cloth soaked in soapy water and rinse with clear water.

Change into uncontaminated clothes. Clothing stored in drawers or closets is likely to be uncontaminated.

Proceed to a medical facility for screening and professional treatment.

Biological Terrorism

Biological agents are toxins or organisms that are divided in the three separate types. Viruses, Bacteria, and Toxins. Biological agents can be dispersed by spraying them in to the air, infecting animals, person-to-person contact, or contamination of food and water.

Specific information on biological agents is available at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Web site, www.bt.cdc.gov.

Preparing For Biological Terrorism

Check with your doctor to make sure that you and your family are up to date on all your immunizations.

Install a High Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) filter in home to filter out particles in the 0.3 to 10 micron range. This will filter out most biological agents.

During A Biological Terrorist Attack

Public health officials may not be able to tell you what to do immediately following an incident. Time will be needed to determine what the illness or substance its, how it should be treated and who is in danger. Listen to your radio or television for news and information for signs and symptoms of exposure, areas in danger, if medication or vaccinations are being distributed, and where you should seek medical attention should you become ill.

If you become aware of an unusual and suspicious substance nearby:

Move away quickly.

Wash with soap and water.

Contact authorities.

Listen to the media for official instructions.

Seek medical attention if you become sick.

If you are exposed to a biological agent:

Remove and bag your clothes and personal items. Follow official instructions for disposal of contaminated items.

Wash yourself with soap and water and put on clean clothes.

Seek medical assistance. You may be advised to stay away from others or even quarantined.

After a Biological Attack

It is important for you to pay attention to official instructions via radio, television, and emergency alert systems.

Nuclear Terrorism

The danger of a massive strategic nuclear attack on the United States is predicted by experts to be less likely today. However, terrorism, by nature, is unpredictable.

If there were threat of an attack, people living near potential targets could be advised to evacuate or they could decide on their own to evacuate to an area not considered a likely target. Protection from radioactive fallout would require taking shelter in an underground area or in the middle of a large building.

In general, potential targets include:

Strategic missile sites and military bases.

Centers of government such as Washington, DC, and state capitals.

Important transportation and communication centers.

Manufacturing, industrial, technology, and financial centers.

Petroleum refineries, electrical power plants, and chemical plants.

Major ports and airfields.

Minimize You Exposure

Distance yourself from the area. This could involve an evacuation or orders to remain in doors.
Shielding yourself from radiation. The more heavy or dense the material is between you and the radiation source the better. Move to your basement or an interior room.
Most radioactive material looses its strength quickly over time.

Remember that any protection, however temporary, is better than none at all, and the more shielding, distance, and time you can take advantage of, the better.

Preparing For Nuclear Terrorism

Find out from officials if any public buildings in your community have been designated as fallout shelters.

If none have been designated, make your own list of potential shelters near your home, workplace, and school. These places would include basements or the windowless center area of middle floors in high-rise buildings, as well as subways and tunnels.

If you live in an apartment building or high-rise, talk to the manager about the safest place in the building for sheltering and about providing for building occupants until it is safe to go out.

During periods of increased threat, increase your disaster supplies to be adequate for up to two weeks.

Taking shelter during a nuclear blast is necessary. There are two kinds of shelters - blast and fallout. The following describes the two kinds of shelters:

Blast shelters are specifically constructed to offer some protection against blast pressure, initial radiation, heat, and fire. However, even a blast shelter cannot withstand a direct hit from a nuclear explosion.

Fallout shelters do not need to be specially constructed for protecting against fallout. They can be any protected space, if the walls and roof are thick and dense enough to absorb the radiation given off by fallout particles.

During a Nuclear Terrorist Attack

If an attack warning is issued:

Take cover as quickly as you can, below ground if possible, and stay there until instructed to do otherwise.

Listen for official information and follow instructions.

If you are caught outside and unable to get inside immediately:

Do not look at the flash or fireball - it can blind you.

Take cover behind anything that might offer protection.

Lie flat on the ground and cover your head. If the explosion is some distance away, it could take 3 0 seconds or more for the blast wave to hit.

Take shelter as soon as you can, even if you are many miles from ground zero where the attack occurred - radioactive fallout can be carried by the winds for hundreds of miles. Remember the three protective factors: Distance, shielding, and time.

After a Nuclear Terrorist Attack:

Decay rates of the radioactive fallout are the same for any size nuclear device. However, the amount of fallout will vary based on the size of the device and its proximity to the ground. Therefore, it might be necessary for those in the areas with highest radiation levels to shelter for up to a month.

The heaviest fallout would be limited to the area at or downwind from the explosion, and 80 percent of the fallout would occur during the first 24 hours.

People in most of the areas that would be affected could be allowed to come out of shelter within a few days and, if necessary, evacuate to unaffected areas.

Returning to Your Home

Keep listening to the radio and television for news about what to do, where to go, and places to avoid.

Stay away from damaged areas. Stay away from areas marked “radiation hazard” or “HAZMAT.”

Remember that radiation cannot be seen, smelled, or otherwise detected by human senses.

Radiological Dispersion Device (RDD)

Terrorist use of an RDD—often called “dirty nuke” or “dirty bomb”—is considered far more likely than use of a nuclear explosive device. An RDD combines a conventional explosive device—such as a bomb—with radioactive material. It is designed to scatter dangerous and sub-lethal amounts of radioactive material over a general area. Such RDDs appeal to terrorists because they require limited technical knowledge to build and deploy compared to a nuclear device. Also, the radioactive materials in RDDs are widely used in medicine, agriculture, industry, and research, and are easier to obtain than weapons grade uranium or plutonium.

The primary purpose of terrorist use of an RDD is to cause psychological fear and economic disruption. Some devices could cause fatalities from exposure to radioactive materials. Depending on the speed at which the area of the RDD detonation was evacuated or how successful people were at sheltering-in-place, the number of deaths and injuries from an RDD might not be substantially greater than from a conventional bomb explosion.

The size of the affected area and the level of destruction caused by an RDD would depend on the sophistication and size of the conventional bomb, the type of radioactive material used, the quality and quantity of the radioactive material, and the local meteorological conditions—primarily wind and precipitation. The area affected could be placed off-limits to the public for several months during cleanup efforts.

Preparing For A RDD Attack

There is no way of knowing how much warning time there will be before an attack by terrorists using an RDD, so being prepared in advance and knowing what to do and when is important. Take the same protective measures you would for fallout resulting from a nuclear blast.

During an RDD Attack

While the explosive blast will be immediately obvious, the presence of radiation will not be known until trained personnel with specialized equipment are on the scene. Whether you are indoors or outdoors, home or at work, be extra cautious. It would be safer to assume radiological contamination has occurred—particularly in an urban setting or near other likely terrorist targets—and take the proper precautions. As with any radiation, you want to avoid or limit exposure. This is particularly true of inhaling radioactive dust that results from the explosion. As you seek shelter from any location (indoors or outdoors) and there is visual dust or other contaminants in the air, breathe though the cloth of your shirt or coat to limit your exposure. If you manage to avoid breathing radioactive dust, your proximity to the radioactive particles may still result in some radiation exposure.

If the explosion or radiological release occurs inside, get out immediately and seek safe shelter. Otherwise, if you are:

Outdoors

Seek shelter indoors immediately in the nearest undamaged building.

If appropriate shelter is not available, move as rapidly as is safe upwind and away from the location of the explosive blast. Then, seek appropriate shelter as soon as possible.

Listen for official instructions and follow directions.

Indoors

If you have time, turn off ventilation and heating systems, close windows, vents, fireplace dampers, exhaust fans, and clothes dryer vents. Retrieve your disaster supplies kit and a battery-powered radio and take them to your shelter room.

Seek shelter immediately, preferably underground or in an interior room of a building, placing as much distance and dense shielding as possible between you and the outdoors where the radioactive material may be.

Seal windows and external doors that do not fit snugly with duct tape to reduce infiltration of radioactive particles. Plastic sheeting will not provide shielding from radioactivity nor from blast effects of a nearby explosion.

Listen for official instructions and follow directions.

After a RDD Event

After finding safe shelter, those who may have been exposed to radioactive material should decontaminate themselves. To do this, remove and bag your clothing (and isolate the bag away from you and others), and shower thoroughly with soap and water. Seek medical attention after officials indicate it is safe to leave shelter.

Contamination from an RDD event could affect a wide area, depending on the amount of conventional explosives used, the quantity and type of radioactive material released, and meteorological conditions. Thus, radiation dissipation rates vary, but radiation from an RDD will likely take longer to dissipate due to a potentially larger localized concentration of radioactive material.

Follow these additional guidelines after an RDD event:

Continue listening to your radio or watch the television for instructions from local officials, whether you have evacuated or sheltered-in-place.

Do not return to or visit an RDD incident location for any reason.