THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 20, 1995 TAG: 9508210164
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEVE STONE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 166 lines
Learn.
That's what emergency planners plan to do in the wake of their brush with Hurricane Felix.
In Hampton Roads and Northeastern North Carolina, officials will meet this week to assess their response and the public's reaction - all with an eye toward doing better next time.
And they hope residents will do the same - individually, as families and as businesses.
After all, ``There will be a next time,'' Jim Talbot, Norfolk's deputy coordinator of emergency services, said Saturday. So instead of being frustrated that they readied for naught, people should consider if they were ready, he said.
Some have likened the Felix experience to a fire drill - an analogy Talbot likes.
``We needed Felix to put us back on the right track,'' Talbot said. ``Mother Nature is giving us every chance possible to get our act together.''
His counterpart in Virginia Beach agrees.
``Regardless of whether we have a storm, people are going to have to deal with the threat about every two years,'' said Mark Marchbank, the emergency coordinator for the resort city. ``They have to make those decisions. If they don't, they will have to deal with their lack of preparedness.
``My philosophy is to treat hurricanes as a natural weather phenomena,'' Marchbank said. ``And the longer you live in Tidewater, the more likely you're going to have to deal with one.'' Felix ``taught us a lesson in the unpredictability of hurricanes.''
The questions are many: Did you have ample and proper supplies and insurance? Did you get everything done in time? Was the rest of the family ready? Did you know if you should evacuate and where to go if you did?
Similar questions will be asked on a larger level as planners assess the city, county, regional and state response to Felix.
``We won't concentrate on the right things that we did,'' said Charles Hartig, spokesman for Dare County, which includes the much of the Outer Banks. ``We'll focus on some weaknesses. . . . With every hurricane, every northeaster, we learn something new.''
One concern is traffic flow.
Plans are being pushed to widen U.S. Route 64 and work is already under way to widen North Carolina Route 168 to the Virginia line. Trouble is, Virginia has made no move to expand the road on its side.
``We're hopeful that at some point Virginia will get off its commonwealth and begin making the necessary improvements,'' Hartig said. ``That road is a tragedy waiting to happen.''
Despite those and other concerns, Hartig said officials are pleased with how things went.
``The public reacted in an excellent manner,'' Hartig said. ``We were able to evacuate upwards of 200,000 people in a period of 8 to 9 hours.'' He credits four things for what he termed an ``orderly, smooth'' evacuation:
The North Carolina Highway Patrol was able to channel a huge volume of traffic off the Outer Banks and out of the county.
Timely dissemination of information by Dare County officials.
Media efforts to educate the public about the threat and to relay critical information.
A county commitment to put ample resources into emergency planning.
``That enables us to operate a first-class emergency management department,'' Hartig said. ``We are very, very fortunate to have a cadre of really professional, experienced, knowledgeable individuals in control of our emergency operations.''
Hartig said that even the business community - which suffered losses estimated at upwards of $15 million - has been supportive of the county response, even though there was obvious disappointment at having to close for several days.
The downside of all the county's actions is the fear that some people may feel evacuation was unwarranted.
``The day after we moved everybody, the sun began to peek out and the weather improved considerably,'' Hartig said. ``We just hope people will recognize the potential for disaster and will evacuate when asked to do so.''
Officials cannot wait to make certain a storm will hit before deciding to clear the coast. ``We have to move people during daylight hours and prior to the arrival of tropical storm winds,'' Hartig said. ``There are a lot of trees in the woods; we can build more cottages. We certainly cannot recreate human lives.''
And what is most bothersome, he said, is that an estimated 20,000 people - most of them among the Outer Banks' 26,000 year-round residents - did not leave.
``In the event that this storm had intensified and made landfall, or even had it brushed Hatteras Island, our ability to provide essential services . . the best way we could, but many of our areas would have been flooded and we simply would not have been able to get emergency personnel into those areas.''
There was one place on the Outer Banks that was largely cleared out: Hatteras Island, where memories of Emily's 1993 visit are still vivid. ``She didn't even make landfall and she caused $8 million in damage and disrupted lives for months,'' Hartig said.
Up north in Virginia Beach, officials said preliminary assessments indicate there was good response to calls for voluntary evacuations, especially among visitors.
``The data we got back about occupancy levels'' dropping to 30 percent at Oceanfront hotels ``was promising,'' Marchbank said. If Felix had come in and evacuations were ordered, ``we had a reasonably good start.''
Marchbank said he was particularly pleased with improved communications among emergency planners and other city officials and the business community, especially those serving visitors.
``We need to treat them as a special group of people because they don't have homes and roots here,'' Marchbank said. A hope is that while tourists may be disappointed at having vacations interrupted, they'll remember that city officials kept them informed and made certain they were safe.
For his part, Norfolk's Talbot is pleased with public response and with the cooperation between the cities and the state and interactions with the National Weather Service Office in Wakefield.
But there are still issues to be addressed, he said.
``We've dealt a lot with preparedness,'' Talbot said. ``Now we need to spend more time on recovery issues and what we may be faced with some day: How do we handle all the debris? Where do we put up tent cities for displaced residents? How do we provide water and food? How do we cope with weeks without electricity?''
Each question and more will have to be answered, he said - now or later - because ``all these issues may become a reality.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photos
``Mother Nature is giving us every chance possible to get our act
together.''
Jim Talbot
``The public reacted in an excellent manner,'' Charles Hartig
Graphic
TAKING STOCK
Some questions people should consider in assessing their reaction
to Felix:
Communication: Did you and your family stay well informed or did
news of the storm's advance catch you off guard?
Planning: If you felt like the proverbial headless chicken,
trying to do too many things in too little time, reassess what you
did and when you did it. In particular, look at things that didn't
get finished and set a timetable for future use.
Delegation: In families and businesses, was a good job done in
spreading out responsibilities?
Supplies: If you were shopping for water, plywood or other
supplies and found the shelves empty, take that as a warning that
you waited too long to shop. Most emergency supplies can be
purchased at the beginning of hurricane season and easily stored.
Property: Have you cut those tree limbs you've been looking at
all summer? Is the roof of your home strong enough?
Location: The most critical question people should ask is whether
they made the right decision to leave or stay.
People living on islands, sandbars (Willoughby, Sandbridge, the
Outer Banks), along the immediate coast, in low-lying flood-prone
areas and in mobile homes should leave when a hurricane threatens.
Maps showing areas prone to flooding are available through many
public libraries and residents should use those to help make future
decisions of whether to stay or go.
Where to go: If you did leave or planned to, were you ready for a
stay in a shelter or had you made arrangements to go somewhere
inland? Did you know what route to travel, either to a shelter or to
get out of Dodge?
Insurance: Do you have enough coverage and the right type? And
did you know that you may have to wait 30 days for a new policy to
take effect?
KEYWORDS: HURRICANE FELIX AFTERMATH by CNB