adversarial/human-caused hazards: Include technological hazards (caused by the tools, machines, and substances used in everyday life) and intentional acts (caused by people attacking or damaging what is valuable in a society). Examples include hazardous materials release, major computer system failures (e.g., 911 system), terrorist attacks, and riots.
after-action report (AAR): Completed following training and exercise, this document addresses opportunities for improvement of plans and procedures.
agency: A division of government with a specific function offering a particular kind of assistance. In the Incident Command System, agencies are defined either as jurisdictional (having statutory responsibility for incident management) or as assisting or cooperating (providing resources or other assistance). Governmental organizations are most often in charge of an incident, though in certain circumstances private-sector organizations may be included. Additionally, nongovernmental organizations may be included to provide support.
cascading emergencies: Series of incidents triggered by an event.
Command and Management: A component of the National Incident Management System (NIMS) designed to enable effective and efficient incident management and coordination by providing a flexible , standardized incident management structure.
Common Operating Picture: Offers an overview of an incident thereby providing incident information enabling the Incident Commander/Unified Command and any supporting agencies and organizations to make effective, consistent, and timely decisions.
communications: The process of transmission of information through verbal, written, or symbolic means.
community exposure profile: Process during which a list is created of which assets in a community could be affected by hazards that may occur.
critical infrastructure and key resources (CIKR): Components necessary for the health and welfare of the population of your community. Critical infrastructure includes public safety services, health care, utilities, transportation systems, lifelines, and facilities that, if impacted by a hazard event, could result in high potential loss or release of hazardous materials.
damage assessment: Process for determining the severity and magnitude of a hazard event on the public and private sectors of a community.
debris: Scattered remains of assets broken or destroyed in a hazard event. Debris caused by a wind or water hazard event can cause additional damage to other assets.
demobilize: To return an incident resource to its original location and status in an orderly, safe, and efficient manner.
disaster: Dangerous event that causes significant human and economic loss and demands a crisis response beyond the scope of any single agency or service, such as the fire or police department. Disasters are distinguished from emergencies by the greater level of response required. Disasters require resources beyond those available locally.
drill: A coordinated, supervised exercise activity, normally used to test a single specific operation or function.
emergency: Absent a Presidentially declared emergency, any incident(s), human-caused or natural, that requires responsive action to protect life or property. Under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, an emergency is “any occasion or instance for which, in the determination of the President, Federal assistance is needed to supplement State and local efforts and capabilities to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, or to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in any part of the United States.”
Emergency Management: As subset of incident management, the coordination and integration of all activities necessary to build, sustain, and improve the capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, or mitigate against threatened or actual natural disasters, acts of terrorism, or other manmade disasters.
Emergency Manager: The person who has the day-to-day responsibility for emergency management programs and activities. The role is one of coordinating all aspects of a jurisdiction's mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery capabilities.
Emergency Operations Center (EOC): The physical location at which the coordination of information and resources to support incident management (on-scene operations) activities normally takes place. An EOC may be a temporary facility or may be located in a more central or permanently established facility, perhaps at a higher level of organization within a jurisdiction. EOCs may be organized by major functional disciplines (e.g., fire, law enforcement, medical services), by jurisdiction (e.g., Federal, State, regional, tribal, city, county), or by some combination thereof.
Emergency Operations Plan (EOP): An ongoing plan for responding to a wide variety of potential hazards.
evacuation: The organized, phased, and supervised withdrawal, dispersal, or removal of civilians from dangerous or potentially dangerous areas, and their reception and care in safe areas.
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA): Independent agency created in 1978 to provide a single point of accountability for all federal activities related to disaster mitigation and emergency preparedness, response, and recovery.
first responders: Those individuals who, in the early stages of an incident, are responsible for the protection and preservation of life, property, evidence, and the environment, including emergency response providers as defined in section 2 of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 101), as well as emergency management, public health, clinical care, public works, and other skilled support personnel (such as equipment operators) that provide immediate support services during prevention, response, and recovery operations.
full-scale exercises (FSE): A multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional, multi-discipline exercise designed to evaluate the operational capability of emergency management systems in a highly stressful environment that simulates actual response conditions. To accomplish this realism, it requires the mobilization and actual movement of emergency personnel, equipment, and resources.
functional exercise (FE): A fully simulated interactive exercise that tests the capability of an organization to respond to a simulated event. It is similar to a full-scale exercise, but does not include equipment. It simulates an incident in the most realistic manner possible short of moving resources to an actual site.
fusion centers: Collection points for gathering, processing, and sharing information related to any type of criminal or terrorist threat. These centers are a collaborative effort between local, state, tribal, and federal governments as well as private sector partners.
Geographic Information Systems (GIS): The computer software application that relates physical features on the earth to a database to be used for mapping and analysis.
hazard: Something that is potentially dangerous or harmful, often the root cause of an unwanted outcome. Hazards may be categorized as natural or as adversarial/human-caused.
Hazard Analysis Process: Basic steps that need to be performed to effectively assess risks and vulnerabilities for the community. These steps include: identify hazards, profile hazards, inventory assets, and estimate losses.
hazard event: A specific occurrence of a particular type of hazard.
hazardous materials: Any type of material in various forms that might cause adverse health effects, serious injury, or death and/or cause damage to homes, structures, property, or the environment.
Hazards U.S. Multi Hazard (HAZUS-MH): GIS-based nationally standardized, loss estimation tool developed by FEMA.
Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP): A capabilities- and performance-based exercise program that provides a national standard for all exercises. For exercise design, development, conduct, evaluation and improvement planning, this program provides standardized policy, methodology, and terminology.
improvement plan (IP): A plan that takes the observations and recommendations from the draft after-action report (AAR) and resolves them through the development of concrete corrective actions.
incident: An occurrence, natural or manmade, that requires a response to protect life or property. Incidents can, for example, include major disasters, emergencies, terrorist attacks, terrorist threats, civil unrest, wildland and urban fires, floods, hazardous materials spills, nuclear accidents, aircraft accidents, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, tropical storms, tsunamis, war-related disasters, public health and medical emergencies, and other occurrences requiring an emergency response.
Incident Command System (ICS): A standardized on-scene emergency management construct specifically designed to provide for the adoption of an integrated organizational structure that reflects the complexity and demands of single or multiple incidents, without being hindered by jurisdictional boundaries. ICS is the combination of facilities, equipment, personnel, procedures, and communications operating within a common organizational structure, designed to aid in the management of resources during incidents. It is used for all kinds of emergencies and is applicable to small as well as large and complex incidents. ICS is used by various jurisdictions and functional agencies, both public and private, to organize field-level incident management operations.
incident management: The broad spectrum of activities and organizations providing effective and efficient operations, coordination, and support applied at all levels of government, utilizing both governmental and nongovernmental resources to plan for, respond to, and recover from an incident, regardless of cause, size, or complexity.
information management: The collection, organization, and control over the structure, processing, and delivery of information from one or more sources and distribution to one or more audiences who have a stake in that information.
infrastructure: Public services of a community that have a direct impact on the quality of life. Infrastructure includes communication technology such as phone lines or Internet access, vital services such as public water supplies and sewer treatment facilities, and includes an area’s transportation system such as airports, heliports, highways, bridges, tunnels, roadbeds, overpasses, railways, bridges, rail yards, depots; and waterways, canals, locks, seaports, ferries, harbors, drydocks, piers, and regional dams.
interoperability: Ability of systems, personnel, and equipment to provide and receive functionality, data, information and/or services to and from other systems, personnel, and equipment, between both public and private agencies, departments, and other organizations, in a manner enabling them to operate effectively together. Allows emergency management/response personnel and their affiliated organizations to communicate within and across agencies and jurisdictions via voice, data, or video-on-demand, in real time, when needed, and when authorized.
jurisdiction: Range or sphere of authority. Public agencies have jurisdiction at an incident related to their legal responsibilities and authority. Jurisdictional authority at an incident can be political or geographical (e.g., city, county, tribal, State, or Federal boundary lines) or functional (e.g., law enforcement, public health).
lifelines: Systems that provide for health and safety such as water, sewer, and electric.
magnitude: Measure of the strength of a hazard event. The magnitude of a given hazard is usually determined using technical measures specific to the hazard.
Memorandum of Understanding (MOU): Written agreement between departments/agencies that require specific goods or services to be furnished or tasks to be accomplished by one agency in support of the other.
mitigation: Activities designed to lessen the impact of disasters to reduce loss of life and property.
mobilize: To activate, assemble, and transport all resources that have been requested to respond to or support an incident.
mutual aid agreement: A written agreement between agencies and/or jurisdictions to assist one another upon request, by furnishing personnel, equipment, and/or expertise in a specified manner.
National Grid System: An alphanumeric reference system used for consistent and user-friendly spatial referencing, mapping, and reporting.
National Incident Management System (NIMS): A systematic, proactive approach guiding government agencies at all levels, the private sector, and nongovernmental organizations to work seamlessly to prepare for, prevent, respond to, recover from, and mitigate the effects of incidents, regardless of cause, size, location, or complexity, in order to reduce the loss of life or property and harm to the environment.
National Integration Center (NIC): Publishes the standards, guidelines, and compliance protocols for determining whether a Federal, State, tribal, or local government has implemented NIMS. Manages publication and collaboratively, with other departments and agencies, develops standards, guidelines, compliance procedures, and protocols for all aspects of NIMS.
operational priorities: Activities involving areas such as life safety, restoration and reconstruction of critical infrastructure and key resources, and protection of the environment.
preparedness: Actions taken to plan, organize, equip, train, and exercise to build and sustain the capabilities necessary to prevent, protect against, mitigate the effects of, respond to, and recover from those threats that pose the greatest risk to the security of your community. Preparedness is a continuous process.
private sector: Organizations and entities that are not part of any governmental structure. The private sector includes for-profit and not-for-profit organizations, formal and informal structures, commerce, and industry.
protocol: A set of established guidelines for actions (which may be designated by individuals, teams, functions, or capabilities) under various specified conditions.
public information: Processes, procedures, and systems for communicating timely, accurate, and accessible information on an incident's cause, size, and current situation; resources committed; and other matters of general interest to the public, responders, and additional stakeholders (both directly affected and indirectly affected).
public works: Organizations and individuals who make up the public/private infrastructure for the construction and management of administration, technical, supervision, and craft roles including: Environmental Services (Water Quality); Solid Waste; Animal Services; Water Treatment; Public Buildings and Parks; Telecommunications; Electric Districts; Digital Cable, Engineering, and Equipment Services.
recovery: The development, coordination, and execution of service- and site-restoration plans; the reconstitution of government operations and services; individual, private-sector, nongovernmental, and public assistance programs to provide housing and to promote restoration; long-term care and treatment of affected persons; additional measures for social, political, environmental, and economic restoration; evaluation of the incident to identify lessons learned; post-incident reporting; and development of initiatives to mitigate the effects of future incidents.
redundancy: The duplication of important components within equipment, infrastructure, or systems intended as a backup to improve reliability.
resources: Personnel and major items of equipment, supplies, and facilities available or potentially available for assignment to incident operations and for which status is maintained. Resources are described by kind and type and may be used in operational support or supervisory capacities at an incident or at an Emergency Operations Center
resource management: Efficient emergency management and incident response require a system for identifying available resources at all jurisdictional levels to enable timely and unimpeded access to resources needed to prepare for, respond to, or recover from an incident. Resource management under NIMS includes mutual aid and assistance agreements; the use of special Federal, State, tribal, and local teams; and resource mobilization protocols.
response: Capabilities necessary to save lives, protect property and the environment, and meet basic human needs after an incident has occurred
risk: The possibility of loss or injury. More specifically, it is an estimated impact that a hazard would have on people, services, facilities, and structures in a community. It is the likelihood of a hazard event resulting in an adverse condition that causes injury or damage.
risk assessment: Process of identifying and characterizing all hazards that are likely to occur in your community. Risk assessment answers the question, “What could happen to adversely impact the community?”
scalability: The ability of a system, such as communications and information management, to successfully adapt to larger situations with increased demands and complexity.
seminars: Discussion-based exercises designed to orient participants to new or updated plans, policies, or procedures in a structured training environment.
severity: Measure of the seriousness of the effects of a disaster.
stakeholders: Individuals or groups that will be affected in any way by an action or policy including businesses, private organizations, and citizens. They can provide input into the development, review, and implementation of the damage assessment plan, based on their participation in all aspects of a disaster.
supporting technologies: Any technology that may be used to support NIMS. These technologies include orthophoto mapping, remote automatic weather stations, infrared technology, and communications.
tabletop exercise (TTX): Activity that facilitates analysis of an emergency situation in an informal, stress-free environment
vulnerability: Description of how exposed or susceptible to damage an asset is. Vulnerability depends on an asset’s construction, contents, and the economic value of its functions.
workshops: Discussion-based exercises used as a means of developing specific products, such as a draft plan or policy.
Use the arrow keys to select answers for multiple-choice review questions or self-assessment checklists. Then tab to the Submit button and press Enter to complete a Knowledge Review or Self-Assessment.