Much went wrong with disaster drill
Communication problems led to
delays, mix-ups
By carolyn o’connell
Staff Writer

CHRIS kelly Sal Caruso, a Long Branch firefighter, checks the injuries of Tiffany Raviter, 14, a volunteer victim in the emergency drill conducted in the city last week.

The city-focused disaster drill in Long Branch did not go off without a hitch. City officials said communication between all the services was most problematic.

The city’s entire emergency services force and several outside agencies responded to emergency drills as part of a test of the area’s resources in the event of a true emergency.

The actual events of the drill were kept confidential to simulate a realistic response, according to Harry Conover, director of emergency management for Monmouth County.

The emergency management exercise was originally designed for the city’s Monmouth Medical Center and Riverview Hospital, Red Bank, which needed to conduct an external disaster exercise by Nov. 1 to fulfill a state mandate for accreditation, according to Mike Ruane, principal of the James Thomas Group LLC, headquartered in West Long Branch.

The James Thomas Group, a consultant for project management, emergency action planning and conflict resolution, was hired to coordinate and help evaluate the emergency crisis drill.

According to Ruane, it has been 20 years since the city participated in such an elaborate simulated disaster exercise.

The intent in conducting the exercise, according to Conover, is to make a crisis as real as possible to test the response of emergency operations and the surrounding hospitals.

The city’s emergency services were under the direction of Stan Dziuba, director of the city’s Department of Emergency Management.

Dziuba was responsible for coordinating the response of several city emergency departments, including the fire, the police, first aid and health departments; the fire bureau; and the Department of Public Works.

The initial problem in the scenario involved an unknown chemical spill that occurred outside of fire headquarters on Union Avenue. The second problem developed on Cooper Avenue when a house fire was complicated by an unknown powder and pipe bomb materials. The third problem occurred at Monmouth Medical Center when victims in one of the first scenarios walked into the hospital’s emergency room.

Normally the fire headquarters would be an emergency command center. The loss of that command center because of the "chemical spill" complicated the initial response to the disaster.

Along with city personnel responding to the disaster, other agencies taking part in the exercise were the Fort Monmouth Fire Department, the Monmouth County Health Hazmat Team and Monmouth Medical Center, specifically its Emergency Department.

"This was a great opportunity to get all city agencies involved and to transport live victims to the hospitals," said Kevin J. Hayes Sr., a city fire official.

The volunteer victims in the scenario were primarily students recruited from the city’s middle and high schools. About 25 of the students played a role in the first disaster because they were at fire headquarters visiting the firehouse at the time the truck carrying chemicals "crashed" in front of the building.

Communications broke down before the event even got started. The call placed to 911 regarding the truck accident was never dispatched by the Monmouth County radio room. It caused a lengthy delay in the drill which was meant to be conducted within a three-hour time frame previously planned by all the agencies. Because of the problems created by the late start, some steps that were to be part of the scenario needed to be eliminated.

"There was definite miscommunication with the county on the drill," said Hayes. "It was aggravating but did not hurt the drill."

When the call was finally placed to police headquarters, it was received by Lt. Gilbert Horrach as a pick-up truck, possibly carrying hazardous liquid, which had just crashed into a pole outside of fire headquarters, spilling the liquid; injuries were also reported.

The initial responder on the call was Sgt. Lyndon Johnson, who immediately closed off the area around the fire headquarters and set up a temporary command post at Third Avenue and Broadway, a safe distance away from the spill.

Johnson’s responsibilities, according to Horrach, were to set up the command post, redirect traffic and remain as support to the fire department.

Upon Johnson’s arrival, several kids were unconscious and injured from the fumes; also injured was Lt. Thomas H. McGlennon III, who at the time was stationed at fire headquarters.

While the event was ongoing, a second call, a reported explosion, required Johnson to relocate to Cooper Avenue and Ocean Avenue, where a house had been hit by lightning. There Johnson again set up another command post.

When firefighters entered the home, they found materials for making a pipe bomb, an unknown white substance, and six people who were trapped.

After entering the home, the firemen had to retreat once the explosives were found, according to Hayes. They then had to call in the New Jersey State Police Bomb Squad, the fire official added.

First Assistant Chief John O. Jones, who became incident commander at the house fire, called OEM officer Charley Shirley. Shirley was responsible for making sure that a decontamination site was set up to handle victims once the bomb squad secured the area.

The police, although first at the scene of both scenarios, retreated as the lead agency because the materials involved called for other agencies to secure the area. Police remained and served as backup to other responding emergency departments.

Horrach noted that the police department had a debriefing later that evening, which he said was a good exercise to expand on the department’s training.

"The officers did an extremely good job; all should be commended. They did everything they were trained to do," said Horrach. However, some important issues were recognized.

According to Horrach, the department is in need of additional equipment to deal with a hazardous material disaster. Also, officers learned they need to carefully analyze a scenario before rushing in and possibly becoming victims themselves or contaminating other areas and emergency personnel. Emergency personnel had to keep in mind that a hazardous spill must be treated differently than other crises. Normally moving quickly is one of the keys to saving lives, but the hazardous material situation calls for more caution before approaching a scene, Horrach said.

In addition, Horrach noted that radio procedures needed to be fine-tuned.

Dziuba said that for the next drill dispatching from one frequency instead of two would iron out some of the communication problems.

Because the time delay narrowed the three-hour window to perform the drill, every aspect of what would normally be done according to standard-operating procedures (SOPs)could not be done.

"In reality," said Hayes, "events such as these would take 15 hours to play out."

The saving grace, noted Hayes, was that this drill was not based or scored on timing. The intention of the drill was for personnel to perform their duties and to know what corresponding agencies to call to the scene.

But again, the miscommunication did have an effect on the timing which prevented some of the normal procedures from being carried out.

Hayes said that the SOPs did not reveal any deficiencies. What was revealed is that coordinating triage with decontamination was not properly organized and could use improvement.

The third crisis planned also had a few mishaps.

A group of people from the accident scene who had not been decontaminated made their way to Monmouth Medical Center for treatment. When they arrived in the emergency room waiting area, they were recognized by hospital security as possible victims of the scene, which involved a hazardous spill.

That prompted the hospital to be closed in order to secure the facility against any further contamination.

According to Dziuba, communication at that point became troublesome. Because the timing was off, the hospital’s procedures to secure the medical center’s perimeters as if it were a real disaster were not able to be followed through. In reality that would have taken several hours to do, while patients in ambulances would have had to wait outside the hospital.

Once it was clear that this was a simulation, the hospital reopened its doors to the incoming victims.

"In order for our operations in the hospital to run smoothly," said Patricia Gaughran, R.N., and clinical director of the Emergency Room, "we need to know as much as possible to make an educated decision. We were basically left in the dark."

Normally victims would be brought to a special room in the ER, noted Gaughran. But since the drill was delayed, and the hospital staff did not know when the victims were to arrive, staff members became occupied with real emergencies coming into the hospital.

According to Hayes, because of the way the drill ran, the hospital did not get a lot of updates. Normally there would be field communication with staff members of the hospital and the police department would use a direct access line to the hospital to report the updates.

"We did not plan that to happen in the drill. It became apparent that [Monmouth Medical Center] really needed that," Hayes said.

"The next drill, said Hayes, "will narrow the scope of the scenarios, making the incidents more in depth."

Dziuba added that the next drill will last five or six hours, starting with a table-top exercise before going into the actual procedures.

"What we also will be looking into to better our operations is a better mobile command unit in the event that the emergency headquarters command center is wiped out, as it was in this drill," said Dziuba.