Emergency Preparedness in Vancouver

The City of Vancouver has an ongoing emergency preparedness program to strengthen the City's infrastructure, inform residents and train employees to deal with such events. Here are some of the initiatives the City is pursuing:

Public Information

Over the past four years, the City has distributed more than 400,000 pamphlets on how to prepare for an earthquake. These are available in six languages and can be obtained at community centres, fire halls, and at City Hall. You can also find Disaster Guides from the City of Vancouver, BC and Canadian Goverments here.

Emergency Shelters

In the event of a disaster, the City would use its 23 community centres, and the land around them, to provide emergency shelter, clothing, food and basic medical care to disaster victims. The City currently has about 800 trained volunteers who would help staff the shelters. 

Starting in 2000 the City is enhancing the capability to respond to emergencies by implementing improvements in the sheltering capability of its community centres. During a ten year programme the City will place special storage containers filled with emergency equipment and shelter supplies at designated community centre shelters. These will provide the core shelter supplies and equipment ready on site for immediate use during an emergency.

Urban Search and Rescue Team

The Fire and Rescue Services Department along with the City's Engineering Department has created a specialized rescue team for use in the City or any other disaster location in the World. The team consists of specialists who are also cross trained in a wide variety of other emergency and rescue disciplines. The team provides a 24-hour urban search and rescue capability in the event of a building or structural collapse.

To ensure full operational capability the team is fully self sufficient and is able to support any type of emergency search and rescue response requirement. Experts assigned to the team include doctors, fire fighters, police search specialists, engineers, logistics specialists, search dog masters, and rescue specialists.

The equipment used by the team is all state of the art and ranges from personal survival gear for the team members right on through to high tech search and medical equipment.

E-Comm

Regional 911 and police and fire dispatch systems for the City of Vancouver have been relocated into the purpose built E-Comm building that is a post disaster structure that can withstand significant earthquakes.

E-Comm -- Emergency Communications for Southwest British Columbia Incorporated -- is the emergency communications centre for southwest British Columbia, Canada. E-Comm provides 9-1-1 emergency service for the Greater Vancouver Regional District, the Sunshine Coast Regional District and the Whistler area, dispatch operations for the Vancouver Police, various RCMP detachments and fire departments, and a wide-area radio network for police, fire and ambulance personnel. E-Comm opened its doors on November 4, 1998 and began answering 9-1-1 calls on June 8, 1999. E-Comm is one of Canada's largest 9-1-1 call centres, averaging more than 3,400 calls per day.

In addition the City has built its Emergency Operations Centre within the E-Comm facility which ensures that it will survive a major disaster and be available to deal with the emergency. Equipped with state of the art systems, the primary role of this facility is to support the field units that are dealing with the emergency situation. 

The E-Comm building is located in the city of Vancouver in a state-of-the-art building designed to meet strict federal post-disaster building standards. It contains dual back-up power systems and emergency food and water supplies to operate self-sufficiently for 72 hours.

The E-Comm building location was chosen for a number of reasons: access to disaster response routes and the Trans Canada Highway, stability of the building site, and suitability for radio communications coverage.

The City is also a seat holder in the Regional Emergency Coordination Centre which is also located in the E-Comm facility, The RECC as it is known, is a central clearing house for information during a disaster or emergency. It would provide the link between Municipal governments and agencies in the hours following the disaster.

Seismic Upgrading of Bridges

An $11 million project to seismically upgrade the City's older bridges has been undertaken to ensure that these structures are less susceptible to damage from large seismic events.

The project included installation of special structural components to add strength and to prevent bridge components from becoming dislodged during seismic activity.

Burrard Bridge is one of the bridges on the list.

Seismic Upgrading of Buildings

The City has completed a seismic review of City-owned buildings and established priorities for gradual upgrading or replacement. The City has also completed a review of 1,100 privately-owned, older, multi-occupancy buildings. This study will help the City to establish response priorities and also to set policies for long-term upgrading.

Permits and Licenses will be taking the lead role in this area, with the hiring of a Seismic Specialist who will help assess and guide the City in its review of higher risk buildings and evolving seismic upgrading policies.

Drinking Water Transmission

To help the City of Vancouver water system withstand an earthquake, flexible water couplings are gradually being incorporated into the transmission lines. To improve the reliability of the City's radio control of its water and sewer systems in a disaster, the radio repeater station on Grouse Mountain has been replaced with an earthquake-resistant site.

Saltwater Firefighting Systems

To ensure adequate water for firefighting, the City has started a $40 million dollar project to build three saltwater pumping stations for the downtown peninsula and Kitsilano. Phase One of the project is complete, including the False Creek and Coal Harbour pumping stations. A grid of earthquake resistant fire mains now exists in the downtown peninsula and Phase Two of the project will have a dedicated line brought under False Creek into Kitsilano.

For better access to alternate water supplies for firefighting, the City has also built a drafting station on the Fraser River, at Gladstone Park. Additional sites along the Fraser River are also being examined.

 In 1991, the City, in conjunction with the Port of Vancouver and four other municipalities, bought five high-speed fire boats. Two are operated by the City and provide water-based firefighting capability.

Training and Planning

The City continues to participate in emergency exercises and also has an aggressive staff training program to ensure that staff are ready for their role in an emergency.

These emergency simulations have helped City departments identify weaknesses in their planning and coordination strategies.

Departments are regularly reviewing and updating departmental emergency plans to reflect the lessons learned. The City also offers specialized emergency management courses to selected staff on an ongoing basis. The GVRD has just approved participation in an emergency planning structure know as the Joint Emergency Liaison Committee (JELC) that will foster a more coordinated emergency planning and response between municipalities, regional districts, and provincial ministries.

Neighbourhood Program

Starting in September 2000, the Risk and Emergency Management division in conjunction with the Fire and Rescue Services Department will implement a neighbourhood program. Based on the principle of neighbour helping neighbour, it will offer emergency preparedness training to volunteer teams within each community.

Vancouver's Neighbourhood Emergency Preparedness Program offers a series workshops that will provide residents with information, training and skills to help them through an emergency.

More information about emergency and earthquake preparedness can be found on starting on page 23 of the White Pages of your Telus telephone directory or by calling the City's Risk and Emergency Management Office at 873-7700. The City encourages everyone to begin taking steps now to become better prepared, remember you could be on your own for the first 72 hours or longer following a major disaster.

For further information contact: Robert Bryan or Ron Martin, Emergency Planning Coordinators at 873-7700

ref: http://vancouver.ca/corpsvcs/emerg/citydoing/cityemergprep2.html