Janelle The sheet piling monster

Number 6 – July 2013
Hmmm, ok so this is our first newsletter for the year and it is already July - oops!
Firstly some changes around the EMTC office. Last year James Thompson was officially appointed as Team Leader for the Regional
Emergency Management Office. More recently I was appointed as the Training and Development Coordinator for the Canterbury Civil Defence
Emergency Management Group. With this position comes the management of EMTC. It is really what we have been doing for the last few
months, but guess it is now more “official”. Jan Wright has been doing a lot of the course coordination for us, which has been invaluable and as
part of the “seat swapping” she will take on the role of Course Coordinator. Most people will not notice any real changes and certainly you are
still welcome to contact any of us to discuss any aspect of training you would like help with.
We have some other “movement” around the office at the moment with the Fletchers contractors doing the second lot of sheet piling outside our
window - this is when they drive large metals sheets down into the ground to create a wall that then stabilises an area while they dig out the
earth. The latest hole is for a new sewer pumping station. Feels like a prolonged about 3.5 aftershock ….might need new fillings after this!
In this edition we are going to focus a little bit on Emergency Operations Centres - looking at the training we have delivered in the last few
months, Exercise Te Ripahapa, our debuts as film stars (not) and some exciting changes happening at a national level which we are involved
with.
Janelle
EMTC- Emergency Management Training Centre
PO Box 345, CHCH 8140 (03) 3714995
[email protected]
The sheet piling monster
www.emtc.ac.nz
EOC Training….
We are up to 28 EOC courses (Introductory or function specific) in the last year so thought we
would do a bit of a feature on this training.
EOC Summer School at Trentham – Feb 2013
Last year (2012) we ran an EOC Summer School (all our EOC courses in one
week) at Burnham Military Camp in conjunction with New Zealand Defence
Force. This was to support the newly formed Deployable Joint Headquarters.
This headquarters was subsequently moved to Trentham and we were again
asked if we could provide a Summer School. A really important aspect of these
training events is the development of relationship across CDEM and members of
the Wellington Regional Emergency Management Office and other partner
agencies were also invited to attend.
It was with some
trepidation that we let
Andrew , James and
John Pine loose with a rental car and accommodation at Trentham as they are all exmilitary and there was bound to be some mischief….they were however very well
behaved by most accounts and enjoyed spending some time with the two course
participants from US Army Pacific.
Another successful week of training with lots of stories shared (course related and
not!), things discussed and relationships forged.
Queenstown Lakes lifts its EOC game
April and May saw local authority and emergency services staff from the Queenstown Lakes district beavering away together on the full suite of EMTC EOC
training. The training was delivered by QLDC Emergency Management Officer, Jon Mitchell, back in his home town and relatively fresh from his previous role
of Canterbury Regional Emergency Management Office Manager and Planner.
The programme kicked off with 26 people participating in the two-day introductory EOC 2 training
in the QLDC primary Emergency Operations Centre (Council Chambers). Personnel form QLDC,
Waitaki and Clutha districts, Police, Fire, St John, and Community Health South, enjoyed a lively
time together getting to grips with the context and processes of an EOC for the first time or
applying their previous emergency response experience to a contemporary EOC environment, its
functions, roles, processes and tools. Comments in the course feedback included: “thank youfeel far more confident should the need arise” and “very knowledgeable - quality course”.
One-day, function-specific EOC 3 training on Planning Intelligence (2 participants), Operations
(12) and Logistics (10) followed. The venue for both Planning Intelligence and Logistics was the
multi-use St John base in Frankton. The function-specific training was also received very
positively. The varied practical EOC exercises in all of the courses were undertaken with
enthusiasm and creativity by all.
The value of EMTC’s policy of focusing on using experienced EOC personnel in the delivery of
EOC training was apparent in comments during the training and summed up on post-course
feedback, where Jon’s ability to add the compelling realism of his experiences in the Canterbury
earthquake and other significant responses was highlighted - “examples for topics were fantastic
and help to relate to the topic discussed”.
The training was still fresh in everyone’s minds when the QLDC EOC was activated as part of
Exercise Te Ripahapa on 29 May (more about this later in the newsletter). Not only did most of
the participants only have their recent training to fall back on, but the local scenario had them
establishing and running an Alternate EOC at the Queenstown Police Station, after the Primary
EOC was notionally rendered inoperable as result of the Alpine Fault earthquake, and the team
had to deal with all normal telecommunications and road access within and to/from the district
being severely compromised. The independent exercise evaluation, carried out by Dunedin City EMO Neil Brown, gave the multi-agency EOC team a highly
creditable report. Personnel with no previous EOC experience stepped up to functional manager roles to great effect.
Putting training into practice- Exercise Te Ripahapa
On the 29th May EMTC basically did nothing! This was the day of Exercise Te Ripahapa, a South Island-wide exercise based on a rupture of the
Alpine Fault near Fox Glacier by a magnitude 8 earthquake at 3am. EMTC only uses practitioners as trainers so this was an important day for us
to “walk the walk”, playing key roles in the Canterbury Emergency Coordination Centre (ECC) and at the Christchurch City Council EOC.
Although the scenario earthquake was at 3am, the ECC did not activate until 9am and we simulated the activities which would have occurred
during this time.
At the ECC, EMTC staff were involved as ECC Manager (Andrew), Ops Manager (Janelle), ECC Support (Jude), Planning/Intell (Josie) and Duty
Clerk (James K). James T was the South Island exercise director and was located in a tent in the carpark.
The exercise was the first time the ECC had been set up fully in our temporary location and while things were cosy and there is definitely some
layout improvements we can make, overall the facility served its purpose. It actually felt good to be back practicing the sharp end of emergency
management and you can’t help feeling that emergency management seems to be being taken a bit more seriously within all the agencies.
The end of an era for our EOC training packages?
The EOC training packages used by EMTC and owned by the Canterbury Civil Defence
Emergency Management Group were introduced in 2007 in response to a recognised need
within Canterbury for training which applied CIMS (Coordinated Incident Management System)
to the EOC environment. The origins were the Justice Institute of British Columbia training
packages which were modified to fit the NZ context. It was reviewed in 2010/2011 to
incorporate some learning from the response to the September and February Canterbury
earthquakes.
The two day Introduction to EOC package has been delivered 66 times since 2007 throughout
New Zealand with numbers for function specific and ECC training closer to 80 courses (78).
2186 people have attended training since 2007
In late 2012 the Canterbury CDEM Group participated in some meetings to discuss the
development of a national EOC training framework and accompanying training packages. We
are totally supportive of this approach with the earthquakes responses absolutely confirming
the need for highly trained staff to work in EOCs and the need for consistency in the application
of CIMS in the EOC.
We were subsequently involved in the development of the pilot introductory level course which
was delivered in Thames in May and are looking forward to being involved with the future
development of the intermediate and function specific training.
What this will mean for our current course is a bit uncertain, but realistically it will probably be
phased out in the next couple of years as this new collaborative work is implemented. It has
well and truly fulfilled its purpose and undoubtedly delivering the training throughout New
Zealand has given us some great opportunities, developed some strong relationships with
colleagues and other agencies and made us better CDEM practitioners.
Some photos of the first course delivered in 2007 @Timaru District Council
Lights, camera, action………
Some small video clips of the main EOC processes would be good and several people in course feedback forms
have suggested it ……yep
We could make them in the EOC using mainly EOC staff….yep
It would be lots of fun….maybe
Oh, by the way I have some really important meeting that day so can’t really be in it….what!
This was in fact a relatively protracted conversation over a few months between James and Janelle and you will be able to tell from the photos
below who was what part of the conversation! William Hurtes a PhD candidate from Canterbury University put together the script and kept us all
on track and we got most of the filming done on one day….apparently not bad for a pack of amateurs! The short clips are “in production” and all
going well will be incorporated into future EOC training….unless we never let it see the light of day 
Right, enough about EOC stuff-we have been doing other things as well….
Leadership Training for Response Teams
On 18 and 19 May fifteen member representing all our Canterbury Response Teams attended a three day Action
Orientated Team Leadership Course. This course was facilitated by SARINZ (Search and Rescue Institute of New
Zealand) on our behalf. A full on three days and the odd sleepless night with VERY positive feedback from all
participants. Loved the “Q:What did you like least about the course? A: the lack of sleep, Q: What did you like best
about the course A: the lack of sleep”
Watch out for more courses being offered later in the year….
A few shots of recent training…..
Caption this!
Please send caption ideas for this photo from the Leadership
training to [email protected]
EMTC T-Shirt up for grabs…
Please remember to contact us to discuss any of your training needs- we are more than happy to offer advice and ideas
Preparing for the Worst, by Learning with the Best
EMTC- Emergency Management Training Centre
PO Box 345, CHCH 8140 (03) 3714995
[email protected]
www.emtc.ac.nz