Disaster Preparedness Plan-Safety Disasters Included/Excluded

Disaster Preparedness Plan-Safety

Disasters included/Excluded from Consideration

Personnel and Their Duties: Authority and Responsibility

Personnel Internal and Response Team

Interfaces to Persons both Internal and External to Your Operation

Response Plan and Procedures

Scenario of Events

Requirements for Response Team Activities

Communication and Documentation

References to Supporting Literature

This work will demonstrate the disaster preparedness plan for Asamado Airport, located on the outskirts of Anyname, Illinois, a rural airport in a largely agricultural community adjacent to the Chicago suburbs which house thousands of meeting sites as well as many homes and other destinations. Asamado is currently a non-towered airport with two paved runways that is experiencing increased traffic patterns due to the increasing dependence of the American public on General Aviation, as apposed to commercial flight. Asamado will also expand significantly over the next two years, extending the length of one runway and adding a third runway, in addition to the construction of a tower, to improve Asamado's ability to serve a proposed air taxi system currently in development by the GA field and NASA. ("Freedom of the Skies:" 37-49) The expansion is pending local government, pilot association, NTSB and FAA approval and will also encompass added manned hours for the airport as well as improved services, i.e. The building of a tower, the runway expansion and the added runway, a remodel of the current terminal with expansion to provide minimal retail offerings to passengers, pilots and crews such as a small lunch counter as well as a small retail shop, with local goods and services as well as convenience travel items. This work will describe a plan that encompasses the pending expansion of services at the Asamado airport, including existing and new staff and services. Tower construction will be the first to begin, slated for groundbreaking in the next three months and tower staff will be hired and trained through funding from the airport pilots association yearly fees and airport flight fees, and be housed in current facilities until slated tower completion in August of this year with all other expansions expected to be complete by December the following year.

Statement of Problem

As a result of the congestion that can be seen with regard to the large hub airports and large commercial carriers a new emphasis has been placed upon regional and small airports for use by those who wish to utilize a more convenient form of air travel, that is secure but does not require hours of lines and delays. The recent emphasis by the FAA and other air and travel organization on the need for security and safety at small airports reflects this and other fundamental changes in air travel after 9/11, in the age of heightened awareness of malicious terrorist intent as well as after recent natural disasters that left the whole country reeling and could potentially be effected by security and preparedness in previously unlikely aviation locations, such as small airports. Prior to 2001, and the global realization that security and preparedness are issues even for the smallest regional airports, most emphasis for such airports was limited and relatively informal.

St. John 96)

Yet, current FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) and DHS (Department of Homeland Security) regulations as well as the realization that there will likely be a greater emphasis on such airports in the future have combined to demonstrate a need for formal preparedness plans for disasters of both the manmade and natural kinds.

Karber 781-785)

Kaplan-Leiserson 66-69) Additionally many local and regional airports are disaster meeting locations for entire communities, hubs where everyone meets to determine the best coarse of action for regional and local evacuations, relief supplies such as food and water distribution locations, medical supplies and sites for airlifting critically ill or injured individuals as a result of disasters and must therefore be well staffed with properly trained individuals to respond to such incidence.

Disasters included/Excluded from Consideration

Disasters that are likely to occur include natural disasters such as regional, onsite or aircraft fires and/or collisions, power failure, individual medical emergencies (including one or more people) floods, earthquakes, heavy winds and biochemical and/or chemical hazards, such as spills are included as well as those that must be accounted for but are less likely to occur such as hijacking, terrorist attack and/or infiltration or intentional biochemical or chemical attacks either originating at this airport or as an attack on it.

Rationale for Included/Excluded Disasters

Included disasters have the real potential for occurrence at the airport, as some have occurred historically at either the airport or in the community, including floods, high winds, fires and regional power failure. Several other threats, though they have not occurred historically must be accounted for with regard to potential for occurrence, regardless of how remote, these include chemical and/or biohazard spill and high jacking or other terrorist activities.

Personnel and Their Duties: Authority and Responsibility

The ultimate responsibility for the emergency disaster preparedness plan function implementation will fall upon the director of the airport, who will in turn compile said plan with the assistance of a nationally recognized security consultant team from Chicago, and then review said plan with the Anytown City Council and the airports own small pilots association, consisting of pilots who frequently utilize the facility with a representative of two local pilots voted chair and vice chair of the association, with the airport director as advisor., who will then vote on the plan and/or alter the plan as it sees fit, with regard to dependence on local emergency medical and fire teams as well as on sight improvements that need to be made to the facility to implement the plan. Additionally, tower staff, which will consist of a two man team, in house twenty four hours a day, supplemented by the director during the 7 am to 5 pm shift, will act as first responders, by calling appropriate on call personnel and/or local emergency response teams when needs arise for such a response and by calling in appropriate on site staff, in the event of a local emergency, when needed.

Personnel Internal and Response Team

The trained air traffic control specialists (of which there will be 6 to cover all shifts with an overlap of two hours on shifts to ensure continuity) and director will receive additional training in emergency response protocol for fire, flood, earthquake, chemical and biohazard spills as well as training in airport security, through a national security advisory team of consultants.

Tower staff will implement a search protocol for general aviation aircraft that will respond to suspicious activity through directed and/or random searches of aircraft and content under the provisions of the safety in the skies act, with the responsibility to document such searches as well as contact local law enforcement agencies when further action is required, i.e. when contraband or dangerous prohibited items or compounds are suspected or found, only one individual from the tower will respond on the ground at a time, when needed to ensure incoming flight safety, especially in the event of suspension of flights and diversions are needed. All general aviation pilots will also be carefully screened by the director to ensure that they meet the requirements of the FAA and the NTSB for private pilots, through a yearly certification as well as a new pilot screening, this work will be done through the GA pilots association screening documentation as well as required flight hours for use of the facilities and small pilot association membership documents, for which pilots pay a yearly fee for membership as well as individual flight fees. The small pilot school on site will also allow all applicants to be screened, including a criminal background check initiated by the director of the airport, with final approval for application being a shared responsibility of the school instructors and the director of the airport and the pilot's association. All towers staff, terminal staff, refueling agents, the reception staff and retail operators will also be screened through criminal background checks and trained by the consulting team initially to recognize and respond to potential disasters and will then be responsible for updating such training with continuing education credits received from local emergency response team training facilities, airport fire, collision and disaster drills or off site training meetings at the local volunteer fire station. Tower staff, reception, refueling staff and airport mechanics will also be required to attend at least one airport security conference, with the director and tower staff every other year and the director will be responsible for updating information through direct written communications with all staff of both the airport and the flight school when national threats and protocols change. All permanent staff including director, tower personnel, retail personnel, airport mechanics, flight instruction personnel and refueling personnel will be responsible for attending initial and continuing education training as their department requires documented by the completion of a training review document annually, to be reviewed by the director, the Anytown City Council and the airports own small pilots association, consisting of pilots who frequently utilize the facility with a representative by two local pilots voted chair and vice chair of the association, with the airport director as advisor. The Director will be responsible for compiling a monthly and yearly calendar that will detail the continuing education credit offerings, which are approved by the airport for attendance by staff including both optional and required events, and any outside offerings identified by staff will require prior approval for the allowance of credit toward the yearly goal. Pilots are responsible for maintaining certification for pilot's license and utilization of facility and are subject to a separate review of documentation by the pilot's association chair and vice chair with all concerns to be submitted both verbally and in writing to the director of the airport, if concerns arise. The chair and vice chair along with the director will be responsible for compiling a list of eliminated pilot's due to failure to comply with requirements to reception and tower staff, to ensure that said pilots do not utilize facilities while out of compliance. The pilot's association chair and vice chair will also be required to attend biannual airport security conferences with the director and be aware of any changes in pilot regulations, as well as directly contacting pilot's who are not in compliance with regulations, and/or who have violated pilot protocol responsibilities (* see appendix) at the written urging of the director.

Interfaces to Persons both Internal and External to Your Operation

The tower operations staff will be first responders with the responsibility of contacting outside emergency assistance when they recognize the need to do so, as they have the best vantage point for recognizing potential disasters and are aware of calls from pilots and others with regard to such potential events. Terminal staff, including retail and reception staff will be responsible, during daylight operating hours as well as all hours when reception and retail areas are staffed, for reporting to the tower any need for ground EMS or further security screening of GA, aircraft, crews and/or passengers. The Director will respond on an on call basis to all incidents and will appoint coverage for such a need among the staff if unable to respond within 30 minutes. On site EMS equipment charge will be checked monthly by school and airport staff, during the monthly preparedness checks on all equipment including EMS and fire equipment, done by the local fire department in the presence of the director or his deemed representative at the appropriate locations, mapped (posted in each location) by director and approved by the pilots association representatives and the Anytown City Council. A daily checklist will also be posted in the tower, air school, terminal and the refueling station that will ensure that all emergency equipment is accounted for and present at the designated locations every day. An employee from each shift will be responsible for signing off the daily checklist of emergency equipment during one shift change in every 24-hour period.

Response Plan and Procedures

Scenario of Events

In the event of a recognized potential threat or event identifying staff will call tower staff via direct line to the tower and tower personnel will then call director, if not on sight and notify director if on site. Tower staff will separate if need arises to deal with potential threat as long as one tower staff member remains in the tower operating area at all times. Team will then respond as directed by the accepted protocol of the emergency, as noted below under specific threats.