Emergency Preparedness Training and Education

While raising awareness about security issues involves honing day-to-day vigilance about threats and vulnerabilities which can sometimes, as in the case of privacy protection, involve a silent, invisible event, raising awareness about emergency preparedness is an entirely different mission. Whether they involve a single individual collapsing from heart attack or back-to-back, levee-breaking hurricanes, emergencies are usually urgent, life-threatening, chaotic and changing so quickly and dramatically that it’s very difficult for any one person or agency to have a full, complete, well-informed picture about what exactly is going on, who is at risk, and what needs to happen to mitigate further harm to people and assets.

Plans are important. But in crises, pre-event training often proves just as, if not far more valuable. Hillard Heintze’s emergency preparedness training and education addresses a comprehensive spectrum of topics, including Department of Homeland Security threat conditions; types of emergencies; special kinds of risk such as hazardous materials risk, liability and foreseeable risk; the role and importance of the National Response Plan; the Incident Command System and National Incident Management System (NIMS); functional protocols; emergency response team roles and contact information; staff emergency roles; communications plan; annual orientation and training drills; initial assessments, alerts, notifications and protocol determination; emergency evacuation procedures; emergency management operations, among many other areas.