Exercises 2012-2013
Operation Gentle Voice LA
Los Angeles,November 17, 2012
Operation Gentle Voice LA is a continuation in the language interpretation exercise series that began in July in Washington, DC. BU HEM students role-played citizens seeking a flu vaccine where English is there second language, some the languages spoken were Mandarin, French, Spanish and Creole.
Boston University Healthcare Emergency Management partnered with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and their Medical Reserve Corps alliance to conduct Operation Gentle Voice. Please reference the exercise clip below of BU HEM Student, Dr. Nasi Huang participating in a Mandarin discussion with Kristine Makita, an LA County Public Health Nurse. Several prospective BU HEM students attended the exercise.
Operation MOM
Operation MOM was a collaborative effort joined by Mayor Alex Morse and the Local Emergency Planning Committee, Holyoke Medical Hospital representatives, a team of Holyoke emergency responders and BU HEM program graduate students.
John J. Burke of Boston University’s Healthcare Emergency Management program led a hybrid emergency exercise today at Holyoke Community College; a college Mr. Burke’s grandfather was the first president and founder of. In a collaborative effort, the exercise focused on “Managing Our Message” (M.O.M) during an emergency crisis by utilizing social media tools through Twitter, Facebook, and Gmail.
In the exercise, BU HEM students mobilized and managed a Joint Information Center (J.I.C) where they disseminated pertinent information from Mayor Morse, local emergency responders, and Holyoke Medical Hospital representatives about the crisis to concerned citizens. The J.I.C. also received tweets, FB messages, and emails from the public, and responded with the appropriate information as it was released to them. As close to real world simulation as possible- provided with limited information, mock press releases held by Mayor Morse, Holyoke Medical Hospital officials, and local emergency responders, and updates from local citizens on the ground using social media to report the incident, the JIC worked on managing the most effective message possible during the emergency crisis.
Catch coverage of the exercise on Channel 3 News, Springfield.
Operation Mega Mess
On September 18, 2012, the Boston University Healthcare Emergency Management Program in cooperation with the Sandwich Fire Department conducted a “hybrid” TTX for the Tri-Epic Hospital Coalition of Central Massachusetts. The incident was a mass casualty bus accident that tested the interoperability of public safety resources, surge capacity and decontamination at Harrington Hospital and coordination of statewide ambulances task forces. The exercise was a great opportunity to share information and provided the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) with feedback on the new ambulance task force communication system.
Operation Curious George
BU HEM students participated in Operation Curious George at the BU HEM classroom on April 17, 2013. The students established an Animal Shelter from scratch including real time registration utilizing GOOGLE DOCS in which personnel could see real time registration under the direction of BU HEM student David Silver. The also provided virtual security with multiple security feeds to the command center and provided Animal Medicine and Research as requested. The students ended up “sheltering” (5) pets including 3 dogs, 1 cat, 1 platypus, 1 lizard and 1 domestic pig.
Operation Family Center
BU HEM students participated in Operation Family Center on April 18, 2013. Student Nina Kabiri was in charge of the group who exercised the Family Support Center plan for Cook’s Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth, Texas. The plan was written by 2012 BU HEM graduate Simon Chernack (BU ’12), an Emergency Management Specialist at Cook’s Children’s Hospital, and allowed for many features including Family Center Support Branch, Case Management, Support Services, Family Tracking and External Relations to be exercised in real time. BU HEM support staff acted as role players as parents of NICU babies who were sheltering in place after an F2 tornado.
Operation Remote Control
Operation Remote Control was the first virtual WEB EOC exercise conducted by the BU HEM program on April 9, 2013. The scenario was an 8 city terrorist car bombing attack and BU students needed to be tracked and their status obtained by the Graduate Medical Sciences office. The BU GMS Office participated from the BU Emergency Operations Center while BU HEM students participated from areas including California, New Mexico, Texas, New York and Toronto, Canada. The exercise was a great success and will be replicated in the future in several Medical School offices. All BU HEM students now have working access to WEB EOC under the Healthcare Emergency Management Crisis Action Teams.
Operation Silver Streak
BU HEM students participated in Operation Silver Streak on April 18, 2013. BU HEM Student Kevin O’Neill was Operations Section Chief for the real time incident based on the 2012 Red Bull Stratos “Jump from Space”. The students were organized into units including, Research, Capsule Status, Weather, Aviation Tracking and Medical Services. The students watched in real time the jump from launch through landing planning for different contingencies including monitoring real time flight data in the area using flightaware.com and providing real time weather for the landing area.
Operation Stractions
BU HEM student David Silver (HEM 13) participated in a wildland fire research exercise in the Arizona based company Stractions on April 12, 2013. Mr. Silver along with BU HEM 2012 Graduate Simran Kaur (who is interning for Stractions) completed research on wildland firefighting and famine based logistics requests while BU HEM Associate Director J.J. Burke facilitated the tabletop exercise amongst participants. Also participating was Mike Olsen, CEO of Stractions, Ravi Bandalamruri, COO of Stractions along with Stractions development staff. The exercise was used to test the validity of the Stractions ELCYMS (Emergency Life Cycle Management System) which is a field based logistics and tactical computer program that would assist Incident Commanders in projecting supply and manpower requests for any given incident.
Operation Moose Tracks
This functional exercise tested the ability of the Fairbanks Memorial Hospital in Alaska to transfer patients (simulate) and information to the Boston Medical Center as part of a hospital evacuation. The exercise tested Information Technology, Communications, Patient Tracking and unescorted Pediatric patients and what the impact will be on the receiving facility. There was a total of 10 patients whose information was transferred virtually as well as preparation at the Boston Medical Center to receive an unaccompanied minor, and 2 foreign nationals. Both facilities in Boston and Alaska staffed their Emergency Operations Centers and Virtual Teleconference technology was used to bridge communications and video. The exercise continued in June as a second phase requiring BMC to activate their Family Support Center.
Operation Aurora's Legacy
On Dec 19th, Boston University Healthcare Emergency Management conducted a joint public/private sector Active Shooter exercise, entitled Operation “Aurora’s Legacy” at the Boston University Medical Campus. This is a continuation of our research into Active Shooter incidents. The exercise involved several private sector businesses testing new active shooter mitigation technologies. The exercise was used as both a learning tool and an academic endeavor as students from both the Methods of Incident Command System class and Medical Death Legal Investigation classes participated as part of their final examinations. It was also a continuation of a previous active shooter drill conducted at BU in the Bakst auditorium in 2010.