October 19, 2005

BY INVITATION

Needed: A Resilient System for Disasters and Catastrophes

Addition of University of North Carolina at Charlotte and Saint Louis University Promises Enhanced Athletic Competition and Increased Visibility

BY JOHN R.HARRALD, DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR CRISIS, DISASTER, AND RISK MANAGEMENT

Hurricane Rita caused a major disaster, Hurricane Katrina caused a catastrophe. The difference between the two was a matter of the scale of the natural phenomena, the size and vulnerability of the population at risk, the preparedness of the public and government, and the effectiveness of decision making prior to and during the crisis stages of the event. Henry Quarantelli, the founder of the University of Delaware, has pointed out that a catastrophe and disaster are qualitatively different. A catastrophe such as Katrina damages the physical infrastructure systems, government systems, and social systems to the extent that local officials cannot function and mutual aid from neighboring communities and states is impossible.

It is a legitimate question to ask after Katrina if the National Response System created since Sept. 11, 2001, is sufficiently resilient to ensure an adequate response to and recovery from a catastrophic event. Resilient systems avoid catastrophic failure by “failing gracefully,” allowing time to adapt to unanticipated conditions and to recover system functions. The National Response System, consisting of organizations, plans, systems, technology, and people, could not adapt to unprecedented challenges and failed catastrophically during Hurricane Katrina. This failure increased the mortality and suffering caused by the storm and has provoked intense criticism of leaders and response organizations. Responding to media reports of failures of leadership, political forces are mobilizing to fix the perceived problem prior to understanding the reasons for the failure of the system. Individual failures such as the inability to comprehend the reality presented by Katrina, the lack of critical competencies, and poor decision making occurred at all levels. However, we must separate these individual failures from system problems such as failure of information management, total failure of critical infrastructure systems, poor organizational coordination, and inadequate organizational capacity and capability.

We must also recognize that the response to and recovery from a catastrophic event cannot be successful if only emergency managers and first responders are prepared. If the only people who know emergency management plans and processes exist are the emergency managers, we will fail. A military commander has been quoted as saying that, “we needed a Search and Rescue Plan” post Katrina — obviously unaware of the National Search and Rescue Plan and the National Response Plan’s Urban Search and Rescue support function annex. Effective communication with elected and appointed leaders, with non-emergency management forces mobilized during the crisis, and with the public requires pre-event collaboration, communication, and education.

The President and others are proposing to move the responsibility for the preparedness and response to catastrophic events from the Department of Homeland Security to the Department of Defense. The militarization of homeland security and emergency management is a dramatic step with historic consequences. The proposal assumes that civilian emergency management cannot effectively deploy and manage military assets, and that military forces are capable of effectively and efficiently providing rescue and relief services. The military can maintain command and control during times of chaos, move resources rapidly, occupy and hold territory, and sustain itself in adverse environments. They are not trained or structured for the complex task of intergovernmental coordination and collaboration needed when preparing for and responding to extreme events. Ultimately the response to and recovery from a catastrophic incident is about preserving life and property, sustaining the community, recovering the regional society and the economy, and mitigating the impacts of potential future disasters. These roles require federal, state, and local collaboration and leadership. Our military forces are designed and structured to project force anywhere in the world where needed. They can provide invaluable assistance to civil authorities during times of domestic crises, and this assistance is critical during a catastrophic event. This is not a time to attempt a simple fix by re-assigning responsibilities; it is a time to establish necessary competencies, systems, and relationships that will ensure that the next time a catastrophic event occurs we do not simply repeat the same mistakes with different people or organizations in charge.

A complete, independent review of the performance of the National Response System during both Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita is required before we attempt to restructure the system. The review must examine the assumptions, capability, and capacity of the existing system and must be conducted beyond the reach of political interests and control. Perhaps the only organization with the prestige to convene such a review and the ability to select unbiased experts to conduct it is the National Academy of Sciences. We cannot accept that what we witnessed during Hurricane Katrina represents what we should expect from a National Response System. We also must not dismiss the system and ignore the years of collaboration that produced it without identifying both individual and system failures. Let us first understand what things we did wrong and what wrong things we did.

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