Waterfront Emergency Response Meeting Minutes
THE TOWN OF NEWINGTON
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Established 1713
Office of Emergency Management
MINUTES OF MEETING
September 12, 2018
Waterfront Emergency Plan Workshop
There was a meeting on September 12, 2018 with Jane Hubbard to go over the draft Waterfront Emergency Response Plan and have a table-top exercise. A list of the attendees is attached to these minutes.
Jane Hubbard of Hubbard Consulting LLC opened the meeting by going over the draft copy of the waterfront plan. Jane said after going over the plan they will break out into groups of 4 to go over the series of questions that are addressed at different sections of the plan and then after that there will be a “round robin” with the four groups. The last half hour of the meeting will be used for questions and suggestions for changes to the plan if needed.
As the review of the plan Jane told the group that a little over a year ago the Town of Newington contacted her in response to a review of the state-level for the expansion of the SEA-3 facility and one of the requirements for the allowance of that expansion was for the town to develop a waterfront emergency response plan and public notification had to be a part of the plan. Jane said there have been several meetings to develop the plan and today is the day to look at the plan and see where we can improve it.
There was a review of pages 3 through 7 and 8 identifying some of the key facilities, those being SEA-3, Eversource, Sprague, and Little Bay Lobster and also identified some of the chemicals that are there. After the review of the draft went out we met with the town and the EPA and discussed some changes as far as the evacuation goes. The EPA and DHS recommended that the evacuation of approximately a half to one mile be expanded. Jane said there will probably be changes to the plan in the near future to include this last minute information and the list of hazards as they are now may change in the future also.
Existing local, state and regional plans and procedures of surrounding towns/cities and departments are listed on page 8. The police chief and fire chief will be provided digital copies of these plan.
Section 6 covers how the Town of Newington would organize under ICS. The first senior fire officer on scene would assume the role of incident commander. In an incident the OEM Center is here at the police department. There was talk about using DES’s Emergency Center at Pease if needed. There is an appendix covering the notification process. Appendix C covers general evacuation procedures. Appendix D covers traffic management. Jane said she created a website that is dedicated specifically to waterfront emergencies and it can be linked to the town, fire and police department websites.
The meeting adjourned at 12:00 p.m.