Officials kick off hurricane-preparedness program

01:00 AM EDT on Saturday, June 17, 2006

BY AMANDA MILKOVITS
Journal Staff Writer

CRANSTON -- The Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency unveiled its new emergency-operations center yesterday and kicked off the state's hurricane-preparedness campaign.

The former tired classroom at the headquarters the EMA shares with the National Guard had been transformed within three weeks into a computer-equipped center where the state's top emergency officials and the governor will manage the state during a disaster.

The open house was coincidentally held on the same day that the federal government released a report on national preparedness -- and listed Rhode Island as one of a handful of states with plans to adequately respond to disasters.

It also comes about a month before Rhode Islanders need to worry about hurricanes racing up the coast.

As Governor Carcieri praised EMA Executive Director Robert J. Warren and Adjutant General Robert T. Bray for months of work on disaster planning, National Weather Service meteorologist David Vallee, a native Rhode Islander, made clear why it mattered.

The younger generation hasn't seen the devastation that hurricanes such as Carol, in 1954, or the Hurricane of 1938 can cause, Vallee said. People were killed, buildings were smashed and washed away, streets flooded and people were left stranded.

In contrast, Hurricane Gloria, in the 1980s, a Category 1 storm, was an inconvenient mess that brought power outages and flooding. Now, though, the Atlantic Ocean is warming, which means more powerful storms for an overdue East Coast.

"Understand that hurricanes are a freight train," and can be in downtown Providence from the Carolinas in 12 hours, Vallee said. A hurricane to the west will bring heavy rains and flooding. If the storm made landfall in Connecticut, Rhode Island would get dangerous high winds and a storm surge that would wipe through the coastline and inland.

Vallee nodded to the posters nearby of evacuation maps of several Rhode Island communities which showed in graphic colors what land would be under water during a hurricane. The maps, which can be seen online at www.riema.ri.gov, show escape routes to higher ground in 21 cities and towns.

"I urge every one of you who live on the coastline to look at these maps," Vallee said. See whether you're in a flood zone, he said, and if you are, start preparing.

The American Red Cross of Rhode Island will host its first public forum on preparing for disasters June 28 at 6:30 p.m. at the William Hall Library, in Cranston, to teach people about building emergency kits and how to protect their houses, new Red Cross CEO, the Rev. John Holt, said.

The state is planning to release hurricane pamphlets with instructions on personal preparedness, and a map guidebook of the evacuation routes, shelters and hospitals within several weeks, according to the governor's office. "People need to understand they need to take responsibility for themselves," Carcieri said.

The official hub for managing the state during a hurricane, or any disaster, will be the new emergency center. The previous center was a woeful-looking room with scattered phones on scuffed tables. It had been criticized as insufficient in an after-action report on the Station nightclub fire.

The new center has 19 work stations with phones and laptops loaded with emergency-management software that the center would use to contact local directors in all 39 cities and towns. Three 65-inch plasma screens, plus two 42-inch TV screens in either corner, face the room.

The new center was completed by Flagship Security Systems Inc., of Whitman, Mass., in three weeks, at a cost of $232,000 -- paid for by homeland-security funds, said EMA planner Paul Crawford. Two more rooms are being renovated for additional operations officials. The entire project costs about $750,000.

The grand opening took place just days after the House Finance Committee killed a $20-million proposal to house a new state emergency operations center, E-911 system, and the state's computer center at the old Varley Building at the John O. Pastore Center.

The EMA had begun work on the emergency center in anticipation of using the room for at least two years until the Varley Building renovations were completed. For now, anyway, the room will be permanent.

amilkovi@projo.com / (401) 277-7213