Calendar updates

Well... it has been a while. The calendar of meeting dates and training was having a bit of a Google-wide hissy fit but it seems that the Google geeks have sorted that out now. The meeting dates for 2011 have mostly been entered into the meeting calendar now. EMO and Rural Fire meetings are yet to be added.

Things have certainly been busy in recent weeks with budget preparations and end of year wrap ups. I will be away for January so the blog is unlikely to be updated during this time.

Tune in again next year and I'll keep you posted on things such as the launch of the EMIS, training activities, relocation of the Group ECC, Ministry stuff and other interesting little tidbits.

In the meantime, remember that **it happens anytime, anywhere... be prepared for that. Keep some stuff in the car if your on holiday (nut bars and water), keep some cash handy for when the EFTPOS falls over and most of all, enjoy the summer!

Shane and the Emergency Management Team

Green RIG whereabouts

Many of you will know that the award winning Green RIG spends its time on the road educating our communities about environmental issues. In the recent theme change natural hazards have become more of a talking point. One wall of the Green RIG is dedicated to natural hazards.

The photo shows students learning about the effects of development in flood plains... something we know a little bit about.

The Green RIG team publish a calendar on the Green RIG website here. Over the next couple of months, the Green RIG will be in Palmerston North, Carterton and Wanganui.

Liquefaction... what does it mean for us?

Since the Canterbury earthquake, we have been fielding a few calls about liquefaction in our region. There have been a few good articles in local papers, but here is a small excerpt from our Risk and Responsibilities Report (the lifelines report).

'Liquefaction is the loss of strength of unconsolidated materials during shaking, with the expulsion of water. Heavy objects such as tanks may sink, list, or float if liquefaction of their foundation or surrounding materials occurs. Sandy layers, up to several metres below the ground may liquefy provided there is sufficient confining pressure, and may cause sand/water fountaining at the ground surface. Liquefaction is commonly responsible for lateral spreading along riverbanks. Unconsolidated, water saturated sandy material is a prerequisite for liquefaction, so areas prone to this hazard tend to coincide with those prone to amplification of shaking and settlement.'

In our region, it is the west coast strip that is most susceptible to liquefaction. The diagram also shows known earthquake faults.

Get Ready Week... underway already

OK, so we're a bit early... that's typical of us though!

This year's theme for Get Ready Week (formerly known as Disaster Awareness Week) is tsunami. That fits nicely with the national tsunami exercise on the 20th October. New banners have been made for our AirShelter and a CDEM Group tsunami brochure prepared and printed. We've bought survival items to display in the AirShelter and have the new video interviews with Kiwis who survived the Samoa earthquake and tsunami last year.

Next thing you know, Canterbury have a massive earthquake and a significant civil defence response. Closer to home, we have more than our fair share of rain resulting in evacuations, flood gate operations and an awful lot of soggy ground! We've now operated the new Makino and Moutoa flood control gates twice in two weeks. I think its a good guess that people will have questions about earthquakes and floods while we are out there in the community.

To help answer some of the questions, we dusted off the earthquake cubes from a couple of years ago. Each cube in the display (numbered 4-8) represents the amount of energy released in an earthquake. The very small cube represents a Richter scale 4 event and the big cube a Richter scale 8. We'll also be printing off some more Makino brochures for the Fielding display.

The Get Ready Week roadshow is in the following places...

5-7 October Levin at Horowhenua District Council

8 October Feilding in the Square

11 October Taihape New World

12 October Marton New World and Ohakune District Council Service Centre

13 October Palmerston North in the Square

14 October Danevirke at the Warehouse

15 October Wanganui as part of the Health Wellbeing and Fitness expo at the Memorial Hall

Doing our bit to help

A few familiar faces from Palmerston North converged on the National Crisis Management Centre to assist in co-ordinating the response to the M7.1 earthquake in Canterbury. Braden Austin was called in to undertake the role of Lifeline Utility Coordinator, Jock Robinson in logistics support and me (Shane Bayley) in planning/intelligence support. I don't think Jock even knew I was taking his pic.

As it happened, we bumped into other (former and current) CEG members from the Manawatu-Wanganui CDEM Group... Murray Mills in his Ministry of Health role and Stewart Brown from NZ Defence Force.

I left the NCMC yesterday morning to return home because of flooding so it might not have been much, but every little bit helps I'm sure. Making a professional contribution and gaining experience during real events is an important part of participating in the sector.

Working on the website

Well, it's taken a while but I've been working on the new CDEM Group website with Glen today. We are making progress and will be doing a 'soft launch' of the site really soon so that the Emergency Management Officers can have an opportunity to build on the content.

We are still struggling with a nice URL for the site and despite that fact that there have been a few good ideas floated, we are still stuck with www.mwcdemg.govt.nz I know - it's a stunner. If you have any cool ideas for a URL for the Manawatu-Wanganui Civil Defence Emergency Management Group - please, let us know.

We hope to do a launch of the site later in the year and will start promoting it as soon as we can.

Recovery Manager's Forum

Recovery Managers in the Manawatu-Wanganui CDEM Group will be given an opportunity to meet and discuss a range of recovery issues for the Group. In addition, some of the issues that will come out of Exercise Tangaroa can be discussed, even though two of the eight local authorities don't have any coastline.

Recovery Managers tend to be forgotten a little, or lumped in with Controllers when we do something for them. This forum will focus on recovery and the advances that have been made in recovery since the 2004 floods, which tend to be the benchmark around these parts. The forum will be on the 4th November, which is after Tangaroa and before the Ministry's Recovery Manager's Workshop in December.

Keeping an eye on river height alarms

Horizons Regional Council has for many years now been issuing river height alarms to subscribers through an automated telephone system. Recent developments in mapping capability have now enabled staff to monitor when and where the alarms are being dialed out.

The system is intended as an in-house viewer with low level alarms show up as a blue diamond, alarms that the Operations Duty Officer receives are orange triangles and alarms that the Emergency Management Duty Officer receives are red stars. At a glance, we can see where the areas of concern are.

In addition to this basic information, links within the 'fly-out' take you to the public hydrograph (visible to the public via the Horizons website) and a list of alarm level subscribers showing when they were called, whether they acknowledged the alarm or not and their name and telephone number (only available to staff).

This is the sort of technology that helps duty officers keep an eye on what's going on. I'll certainly be keeping this window open over the weekend.

Second wave of H1N1

This from MidCentral DHB:

New Zealand is experiencing the second wave of Pandemic A (H1N1) 2009. Influenza activity is continuing to increase, but so far it is looking more like a seasonal flu wave than the 2009 pandemic wave. Areas in which there were fewer cases and/or hospitalisations in 2009 appear to be experiencing higher rates than others regions so far this winter.

The great majority of positive influenza swabs are still either Pandemic H1N1 or influenza A – un-subtyped (most likely Pandemic H1N1). The nature of the virus remains unchanged and is still sensitive to antiviral medication.

Key messages in the NZ response continue to focus on:

• getting vaccinated against seasonal influenza which includes protection against swine flu: there is still time but act quickly
• washing and drying hands frequently, covering coughs and sneezes and staying at home if you are sick: a new media campaign has commenced
• phoning for medical advice early (GP or Healthline on 0800 611 116) for anyone with symptoms of influenza, to be assessed for antiviral medicine and other treatment, particularly if they have underlying health conditions. This is also important for pregnant women, who appear to be at particular risk of more severe illness.

Cases of influenza like illness in the Manawatu are still below baseline level although this has increased in recent weeks. Schools are currently reporting increases in absenteeism and they are being monitored weekly by Public Health.

For further information go to the MoH website.