Civil Contingencies - Previous Exercises
Exercise Argus at The Platform 030310
Project Argus - The Platform, Morecambe 3rd March 2010
Project Argus is a national initiative run by Counter Terrorism Security Advisors. It has been held in various Lancashire towns but the last event in the Lancaster District was in July 2007.
The City Council, the Arndale Centre, Morecambe and the Northern Division of Lancashire Constabulary hosted an Argus exercise at The Platform on the afternoon of 3rd March and a number of local retail businesses participated. The exercise makes very effective use of an audio visual simulation of a terrorist incident and explores how businesses can protect themselves and their customers and, in the event of an incident, care for people when the emergency services are severely overstretched.
Working together to deploy heavy equipment
Argus events are always thought provoking and challenging but still enjoyable and it is hoped that it will not be too long before we can host another in this area.
Beachmaster Counter Pollution Training and Exercise 2nd/3rd March 2010
As in September 2007, the City Council again hosted a two day Maritime and Coastguard Agency Beachmaster training event. The first day was classroom based in Lancaster Town Hall and the second a practical exercise at Conder Green near Glasson Dock. The thirty nine course participants were from Lancashire coastal authorities including Lancaster, Wyre, Blackpool, Fylde and West Lancs councils together with officers from the Marine Fisheries Agency and the Environment Agency.
Sealing boom deployed across incoming high tide on River Conder
The participants are training to be supervisors of teams working on clean up operations and one aspect of the course is that they have to move heavy equipment so that they have an understanding of what they may be asking their staff to do in arduous conditions.
As part of the exercise a sealing boom was deployed across the River Conder as it would be in a real incident to catch any floating oil on an incoming tide and protect the sensitive marshland behind. Course delegates worked with contractors from Braemar Howells to deploy the booms and learn about the other oil recovery equipment that would be available to use in an actual emergency.
Exercises Broadsword and Fassbinder
In January 2009 the Northern Division of Lancashire Fire & Rescue Service organised some live training and exercise sessions for their divisional retained fire-fighters and invited the Council’s Emergency Incident Officers to take part.
The first event, on 10th January, was Exercise Broadsword, based on a chemical spillage at the SRM reprocessing site at Heysham. Mark Bartlett and John Toder attended as Duty Emergency Incident Officers and worked through the various issues that would arise in incidents of this nature. These include, evacuation of nearby residents, advice to clear areas such as the nearby golf course, environmental protection issues and anything else where the Council may be expected to assist.
The following weekend Andre Hunt and Nick Howard took part in Exercise Fassbinder, dealing with another simulated chemical incident on the Lansil industrial estate in Lancaster. Nick is pictured reporting to the Fire Service’s mobile command unit from where through liaison with the Fire Incident Officer the appropriate response to the incident could be determined.
Both these simulated incidents involved injured casualties and were dealt with using Operation Merlin, a Lancashire-wide scheme to ensure an appropriate multi-agency response to any incident involving hazardous substances. All four officers felt the exercises were a useful refresher and reminder of the procedures to be adopted when working with the blue light services at incidents.
Mark Bartlett, Civil Contingencies Officer, said "We were grateful to Station Manager Alan Walker for inviting the Council to participate in these two exercises and hope that we will be able to take part in similar events in the future so that all the Council Emergency Incident Officers have this invaluable opportunity to experience live working alongside fire-fighters and their senior managers in a safe environment".
Nick Howard, Environmental Protection Manager, liaising with the Fire Service Command Team at Exercise Fassbinder, 17/01/2009
Exercise Cerberus
Although Rabies is not present in the UK at this time it is still widespread in many parts of the world, including some countries in Europe, and it is appropriate for agencies to plan their response should it be discovered in the UK. On 8th December 2008, the City Council was one of many organisations who participated in Exercise Cerberus, a cross border table top exercise for Lancashire and Cumbria agencies testing the response to a rabies scenario.
The exercise was preceded by presentations from Animal Health (formerly Government Veterinary Service), the Health Protection Agency and other agencies covering the latest knowledge and developments in tackling Rabies around the world. In the exercise itself a scenario unfolded based on the illegal importation of a dog from Eastern Europe. This was both realistic and challenging and it tested the responses of the various agencies.
Council officers from Environmental Health and Emergency Planning took part in the event alongside colleagues from other agencies who would be involved in the response to any outbreak. The learning and exchange of information at Exercise Cerberus will lead to an improvement in the City Council’s plans and preparations
Four Council officers participated in Exercise Argent, along with colleagues from other Lancashire coastal authorities, the Environment Agency and the emergency services. The exercise itself was a table-top format held at the Lancashire Fire & Rescue Service Training School near Chorley.
As with many exercises the scenario presented was ’stretched’ to ensure all participants were kept busy but this ensured there was valuable learning for the players, an opportunity to test the City Council’s own plans and the chance to make contact with counterparts in the various agencies. All this proved useful during the recent forecasts of storms in the North West and will do so again in the future.
Exercise Kent was a multi-agency multi-location exercise to test the off site plan for Heysham Power Station, as a condition of the nuclear site’s licence to operate. The City Council always plays a part in these exercises but this was also an excellent opportunity to test our new District Emergency Control Centre arrangements.
Many of the recent Council exercises have been "table top" based but Kent was a Command Post exercise, which means that the various agency control rooms were set up and received telephone calls that they had to action. There was no live activity outside these control rooms but to the participants it seemed very realistic as they received calls from the Exercise Team purporting to be from members of the public, elected members or other agency’s staff.
The exercise ran from just after 7.30am until 2.30pm. he District Emergency Control Centre was established in Lancaster Town Hall and to maximise opportunities a shift change took place at 11.30am with a new team that ran through to the closure.
The DECC teams had to record and action the various calls they received and also to interact with other Control centres looking at the information coming into the centre and considering their options to respond to the changing situation. Council officers were also located at Police Headquarters near Preston, in the Strategic Coordinating Group and in realistic Press Conferences, video of which was relayed to the staff in the DECC to add to the realism on the day.
With Council officers also acting in a liaison capacity at Lancaster Police Station and at the County Council Red Rose Hub centre near Preston the total number of Council staff taking part for all or part of the exercise totalled 30. The skills practised for Exercise Kent are of course transferable to other emergency situations and so this exercise has helped considerably to build the Council’s resilience. The formal debrief will take place in March and learning will be incorporated into the Council’s plans and procedures.
Exercise Kent - Final Report
Exercise Salvus - 9th January 2008
Exercise Salvus was held at The Platform, Morecambe on 9th January 2008 and was a multi-agency test of the off site plan relating to the SRM Chemical Works at Heysham.
Agencies taking part included the Police, Fire, Ambulance, Health Protection Agency, Environment Agency, Met Office, County Council, SRM and Lancaster City Council.
There were three tables of players, intended to replicate the Command and Control structures of a real event, namely the Forward Control Point near the incident, Silver Control at Lancaster Police Station and a table which operated as the Science and Technical Advice Cell. Mark Bartlett, Civil Contingencies Officer, was one of the exercise facilitators alongside colleagues from the Lancashire Constabulary and the County Council.
Acoustics aside, on one of the wettest and windiest days of the year, The Platform proved to be an excellent venue for the exercise and a scenario was developed involving a fire on site and a plume of smoke necessitating evacuation of nearby residents and close environmental monitoring of surrounding farmland and watercourses. In the afternoon the emergency response phase concluded and a recovery meeting was held to consider the issues that would surround the aftermath of such an event.
Although the safety arrangements at SRM are such that the scenario was considered to be a very unlikely event, by stretching circumstances in the safe environment of an exercise the arrangements for response can be thoroughly tested.
The City Council will continue to organise and participate in events such as this to ensure our own arrangements are as up to date as possible and that our staff, particularly those involved in the response to emergency incidents, have every opportunity to enhance their knowledge and skills.
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A general view of Exercise Salvus in The Platform, Morecambe
Exercise Conder – Salt Ayre Rest Centre - Friday 16th November 2007
Within Lancashire there is an overall contingency plan for the opening of Rest Centres in an emergency situation. A Rest Centre is a place where people who have been evacuated can go until they are able to return to their homes. Whilst they are there they are supported by the County and District Councils together with voluntary agencies such as the British Red Cross, WRVS, St. John Ambulance and several others. There are 42 Designated Rest Centres in Lancashire including 3 in the Lancaster City Council area, one of which is at Salt Ayre Sports Centre.
To ensure all the agencies are prepared for if a Rest Centre is activated the plan is regularly exercised at various centres around Lancashire. On Friday 16th November 2007 an exercise was held at Salt Ayre and over 60 people of all ages from the local communities acted as ‘evacuees’ from a supposed flooding incident. To be effective the exercise needed a large number of people to act as "evacuees" who were simply asked to present themselves and go through registration into the Rest Centre and thanks to the excellent turnout that objective was certainly achieved. Many of the evacuees had special needs such as mobility problems and some volunteers were given specific parts to play giving additional issues for the rest centre staff to deal with.
Council officers, social workers, the police and voluntary agencies worked together addressing various issues. The Council’s dog wardens were on hand to address any issues arising from family pets who accompanied their owners to the rest centre and Homelessness officers responded to various requests for accommodation, as they would do in a real incident. As usual the members of the various voluntary agencies performed essential roles in supporting the evacuees in terms of first aid, catering, and general care.
Exercise Conder identified a number of areas where slight improvements could be made to enhance the support to evacuated people but overall it proved that Salt Ayre’s facilities are suitable to be used for Rest Centre purposes and that the agencies are well trained to operate it.
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Exercise Conder: Images of "Evacuees" being processed in a multi-agency rest centre exercise.
Exercise Denny was the second day of a two day Beachmaster training course. Beachmasters take charge of a section of coast during pollution incidents and are responsible for a gang of staff who either try to protect the coast against pollution after an incident, or undertake appropriate clean up operations if the worst does occur. Their work is coordinated in a facility known as a Shoreline Response Centre.
Participants in this training were our Lancaster City Council officers from City Council Direct Services at White Lund together with colleagues from Blackpool, Wyre, Fylde and West Lancashire councils and a number of Fire-fighters, Coastguards and Environment Agency staff. As part of the exercise they had to deploy shore sealing booms, supplied by D. V. Howells who are contracted to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency to deal with coastal pollution incidents. These 20m booms are linked together intended to form a channel to funnel incoming pollution down to a point where it can be pumped into containers and safely disposed of.
This is very heavy manual work, often undertaken in appalling weather conditions, and great emphasis was placed during the training on Health & Safety and the need to consider the welfare of any staff deployed on this type of duty. The pictures show some of the equipment being deployed by the ’students’ .
As would be the case in a real life incident catering on the foreshore was supplied by the Salvation Army mobile kitchen who provided hot food for all the students.
Exercise Denny was a useful opportunity for the various councils to join together and learn about the various incidents that might occur and the methods and equipment available to deal with them. We all hope such an incident does not occur but it is important to be prepared and this exercise greatly assisted that process.
Exercise Brantbeck was held in the Banqueting Suite at Lancaster Town Hall on Thursday 6th September 2007.
The aim of the exercise was to test the Council Services’ Business Continuity plans that were completed earlier in the year. Almost 50 members of staff took part representing every Service. They were formed into five groups - Council Housing, Lancaster Town Hall, Palatine Hall, Morecambe Town Hall & White Lund Depot and finally a Business Recovery Group. Each of these tables was facilitated by a Business Continuity officer from another Lancashire Council with the overall event facilitation by Mark Bartlett and Bernard Kershaw, County Emergency Planning Officer.
The event was formally opened by Councillor Eileen Blamire, Cabinet Member with responsibility for Civil Contingencies.
During the afternoon a scenario unfolded involving the discovery of wartime munitions, evacuation of buildings and then an extended loss of access to those buildings and the town centre continuing over several days before dealing with issues surrounding reoccupation. Chief Inspector Karen Simister from Lancaster Police Station also took part and advised the players on the likely police response to such an event.
The scenario was based on a real life event that affected Gloucestershire council a few years ago and, only the night before the exercise, BBC News reported that a wartime shell had been found in use as a door stop in a factory unit and this resulted in an industrial estate being completely evacuated and closed for 24 hours.
Closing the event, Peter Loker (Director Community Services), who had been a member of the Business Recovery Group table thanked all the participants but particularly mentioned the support the City Council had received from other Councils in facilitating the event.
The exercise fully achieved its aims in that it tested the plans and identified a number of areas where they might be improved. In particular it showed the absolute necessity for Services affected by an incident to communicate with the Business Recovery Group who would be coordinating the overall Council response. A review of all Business Continuity plans, based on Brantbeck learning, will now follow.
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Members of the Business Continuity Group, pictured Left to right:
Principal Auditor Bob Bailey, Civil Contingencies Officer Mark Bartlett and Director of Community Services Mr Peter Loker
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Members of Council Housing Services business recovery team.
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Project Argus - 11th July 2007
Lancaster City Council is taking every opportunity to develop its capability to respond to emergency situations. This includes attendance at exercises that are of direct relevance to this area.
Together with Lancaster District Chamber of Commerce and Lancashire Constabulary the Council organised a "Project Argus" event at Lancaster House Hotel on 11th July. The event was primarily aimed at managers from local businesses but there were also places for Council staff to take part and several officers took the opportunity to attend. Argus is a nationally developed simulated terrorist incident and participants had the opportunity to think through both how they could respond to such an event and also the preparations they could make now that would improve their ability to deal with such a situation.
Tracey Barradell, Transformation Manager from the Council’s Information Services said "A great informative session – delivered in an innovative way, which really keeps your interest. I came away with some really useful information about what to expect and what we’d need to do, in the event of a terrorist attack. I’d recommend that everyone attends!!"
Rupert Allison from Bay Radio was another participant and said afterwards "I found the "Project Argus" event at the Lancaster House Hotel very worthwhile and thought provoking. It has caused me to take another look at our business recovery plans and I will be encouraging other stations in the CN Group to attend any events in their area."
Marie Needham, Centre Manager from Morecambe’s Arndale Shopping Centre said "It was very interesting - the information the facilitator gave was very clear and he was obviously very knowledgeable in his field of work"
Over 60 managers and staff from local businesses and services attended the event and the feedback from them was uniformly excellent. Many acknowledged that they were unsure what to expect but that the event had exceeded all their expectations.
The Council will be looking for opportunities for exercises involving the Business Community in the future.
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Exercise Trinity - 7th December 2006
On Thursday 7th December the Lancashire and Cumbria Constabularies, together with the British Transport Police, organised a table top exercise at Hutton based on a rail crash occurring on the county boundary at Burton in Kendal. A realistic scenario involving environmental protection, the opening of rest centres and investigation of causes unfolded during the day. There were also presentation from agencies who would have a direct responsibility in the aftermath of such an event. The learning at this exercise was particularly useful to agencies when the unfortunate derailment occurred at Grayrigg in Cumbria on 23rd February 2007.
Officers from the City Council who took part included Peter Loker, Director of Community Services, together with Suzanne Lodge , Head of Health & Strategic Housing , Nick Howard , Environmental Protection Manager and Mark Bartlett, Civil Contingencies Officer. Peter Loker is pictured below on the ’Gold’ table with Superintendent Peter White and other members of the Emergency Services.
Events like this are excellent ways of both testing plans and learning about our own and other agencies’ roles and the council will continue to send staff to similar events in the future.
Exercise Brantbeck - 6th September 2007
Exercise Kent (Heysham Power Station off-site plan) - Wednesday 13th February 2008.
Exercise Argent (Multi agency response to coastal flooding) - Thursday 28th February
Exercise Denny - Beachmaster training - 18th September 2007