Digital Extra: The Station Fire

Some of the consultant's suggestions are already being pursued, and others are deemed to expensive to implement at this time.

01:00 AM EDT on Thursday, August 19, 2004

BY MARK ARSENAULT
Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE -- State agencies agree with most of the recommendations of a consulting firm that studied the emergency response to The Station nightclub fire, but warn that putting some of the suggestions into practice would require money in the state budget.

Governor Carcieri in July directed state agencies to take a month to review the recommendations made by Titan Corp., a defense and homeland security consultant. The governor yesterday released an inch-thick report that recaps the recommendations from Titan and indicates whether state agencies agree or disagree with each suggestion. It also includes some short comments from the agencies.

The governor will gather agency directors, and others with a role in the state's response to emergencies, near the end of September for a summit "to begin to chart out exactly what steps the state needs to take," to address the recommendations in the report, Carcieri said in a statement.

Maj. General Reginald A. Centracchio, director of the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency, warned that some of the recommendations could be expensive.

"Many Titan report recommendations will require significant investments in funding and personnel," Centracchio wrote in a letter to Carcieri. "While we agree with many of these recommendations, implementation will necessitate significant public policy decisions regarding the allocation of limited state resources."

The Titan report offered 379 recommendations to improve emergency response in Rhode Island, also noting where the response went well at The Station, so that other states can learn from Rhode Island's experience.

The Feb. 20, 2003, nightclub fire in West Warwick taxed emergency responders and hospitals across the state. The fire killed 100 people and injured more than 200, many critically.

The owners of The Station, Jeffrey and Michael Derderian, are under indictment for manslaughter. Dan Biechele, the tour manager for the rock band Great White, who set off fireworks that ignited the club, is also under indictment. A number of civil lawsuits are pending.

Titan's examination of the state's response to the disaster concluded that communication was a problem the night of the fire -- ambulances with patients arrived at hospitals unannounced, emergency responders from different towns lacked the equipment to easily speak to each other, and a Nextel radio system to notify hospitals of a disaster wasn't used.

Despite those obstacles and outdated disaster plans, Titan praised fire, police and emergency medical personnel who repeatedly improvised around problems.

Many of Titan's recommendations relate to the state departments of Health; Mental Health, Retardation and Hospitals; the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency; and the state police.

Some of Titan's suggestions are already being pursued -- the consultant recommended that Rhode Island "proceed without delay" to buy a state-of-the-art mobile command post. The state has already asked for bids, which could be awarded by Sept. 30, according to the report released yesterday.

Other suggestions are going to take more time. For example, Titan advised Rhode Island to establish a statewide communication system -- which a local cost study had pegged at up to $80 million. "A statewide communication system is several years away, at best, due mostly to funding consideration," the report reads.

Titan's study took about one year. A team from Titan conducted more than 115 interviews and "group debriefings" of about 200 people who were involved in responding to the disaster. Consultants reviewed documents, plans, policies, emergency logs and newspaper articles. The Office for Domestic Preparedness, under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, paid for the study, which cost about $800,000.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the federal government paid for Arlington County, Va., to hire Titan to audit the county's emergency response to the attack on the Pentagon. Arlington created two staff jobs to review the recommendations and help fold Titan's 235 suggestions into the county's emergency plans.