Local damage assessment plays a critical role in your community's response and recovery following a hazard event.

The information gathered by the damage assessment response team provides a snapshot of the situation detailing the extent and location of damages.

This information is evaluated to determine the needs of the survivors and the community as a whole. Thus, the damage assessment sets the tone for the entire response operation and drives the recovery process.

Damage assessment helps your community set priorities for response activities such as search and rescue, as well as for recovery operations such as removal of storm debris and rebuilding or repair of infrastructure.

It also helps identify needs for additional resources from local, State, and Federal agencies and provides some of the documentation necessary for applying for these avenues of assistance.

Damage assessment can also help you identify mitigation opportunities and create a mitigation plan that will make your community more disaster-resistant for the next hazard event.

When a disaster or major emergency occurs, damage assessment must be done quickly and accurately, to reduce the impact on people and identify resource needs. This information enables the direction of emergency response personnel and resources to the most appropriate areas and helps identify the need for additional resources.

The purpose of this course is to build local capacity for damage assessment by enabling you to develop or refine a damage assessment program for your community. In this course, you will acquire the knowledge and skills you need to be able to conduct rapid and effective damage assessments in order to save lives, to protect property and the environment, and to begin the process of recovery and mitigation.

In this lesson, you will learn about the importance of local damage assessment. Information gathered during damage assessment identifies needs, helps set priorities, and drives response and recovery actions.

This snapshot of the extent and location of damage provides information for the public as well as documentation necessary for the pursuit of additional resources from contracts and mutual aid and/or from State and Federal agencies. The thoroughness and efficiency of the damage assessment process sets the tone for the entire response/recovery operation because it provides information about the impact of the event on the entire community.

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Define the purpose of damage assessment.
• Define basic terms related to damage assessment.
• List critical infrastructure in a community.

Damage assessment is a process to determine the severity and magnitude of a disaster or other emergency on the public and private sectors in your community. It helps provide information to the community about the extent of the damage. Before developing a plan for your community, consult any damage assessment plans or guidelines that your State or other governing bodies may have already developed.

Damage assessment response teams are dispatched throughout the community to efficiently and accurately quantify the damage and estimate repair costs and impact on the community with a focus on degree of damage in terms of habitability and property value, as well as the impact on critical infrastructure and key resources (CIKR).

Teams may have to go out more than once if an area is not accessible during the initial assessment or if the need for further assessment arises due to additional impacts to the area. The information collected during damage assessment is used to determine not only where to direct resources, but also to determine if local resources will be sufficient to respond to and recover from the event or if contracts and mutual aid agreements will need to be activated and/or if State or Federal assistance will be needed. Click this link to access the information presented on this page in a new window.

Magnitude is a measure of the strength of a hazard event. The magnitude of a hazard is usually determined using technical measures specific to the hazard. For example, the Enhanced Fujita Scale is used to measure the magnitude of tornadoes so that there is a common language, such as when someone refers to a tornado as EF-3. The magnitude of hurricanes is measured by the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale which provides consistency; thus, a category 3 hurricane is the same regardless of location. Earthquake magnitude is measured with the Richter Scale, and intensity is measured with the Modified Mercalli Intensity (MMI) Scale. All of these scales are damage severity measurements based upon analysis of previous catastrophic events.

Additional information about magnitude scales is available in the Toolkit.

Critical infrastructure and key resources are the components that are necessary for the health and welfare of the population of your community.

These components include 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.

It is important for all those involved in damage assessment to use a common vocabulary. Some basic terms you should know are:

• Hazard
• Vulnerability
• Risk
• Individual Assistance (IA)
• Public Assistance (PA)

Remember, you can refer to the glossary at any time during the course for these and additional terms.

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A hazard is something that is potentially dangerous or harmful. It is often the root cause of an unwanted outcome. Hazards may be categorized as natural or as adversarial/human-caused.

• Natural hazards are caused by natural events that pose a threat to lives, property, and other assets. Examples include hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornadoes.
• Adversarial or 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 releases, major computer system failures (e.g., 911 system), terrorist attacks, and riots.

Vulnerability is a description of how exposed or susceptible an asset is to damage. Vulnerability depends on an asset’s construction, contents, the economic value of its functions or services, and replacement/repair costs.

The vulnerability of one element of the community is often related to the vulnerability of another, and a hazard may cause indirect damages in addition to the damages that are caused by the direct impact. For example, many businesses depend on uninterrupted electrical power – if an electric substation is flooded, it will affect not only the substation itself, but a number of businesses as well. A refrigerated warehouse may lose its entire inventory and suffer severe economic losses as a result of the power failure. Often, indirect effects can be much more widespread and damaging than direct ones.

Risk is 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 is often expressed in relative terms such as a high, moderate, or low likelihood of sustaining damage above a particular threshold due to a specific type of hazard event. It also can be expressed in terms of potential monetary losses associated with the intensity of the hazard.

Individual Assistance (IA) is funding or direct assistance to individuals, families and businesses in an area whose property has been damaged or destroyed and whose losses are not covered by insurance. It is meant to help with critical expenses that cannot be covered in other ways. This assistance is intended to assist a community in restoring damaged property to as near its condition before the disaster as possible. Whenever feasible, efforts should be made to rebuild in a way that makes the community more disaster resistant, through mitigation activities.

While some housing assistance funds are available through FEMA’s Individuals and Households Program, most disaster assistance to individuals from the Federal government is in the form of loans administered by the Small Business Administration (SBA).

Public Assistance (PA) is reimbursement and emergency assistance provided to State, Tribal, and local governments and certain types of private non-profit (PNP) entities from the Federal government.

Through the PA Program, FEMA provides supplemental Federal disaster grant assistance for debris removal, emergency protective measures, and the repair, replacement, or restoration of disaster-damaged, publicly owned facilities and the facilities of certain PNP organizations.

The reason behind emergency management is quite simple: assure the Continuity of Government (COG) and Continuity of Operations (COOP). Government and community services need to function uninterrupted as much as possible. This should be a priority for restoration during and after an event. It is also important for those involved in damage assessment to understand the continuous process of emergency management. While the process outlined is quite generic, the actions taken are specific to the threats and vulnerabilities identified in each community.

• Preparedness
• Protection
• Prevention
• Mitigation
• Response
• Recovery

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Preparedness refers to the 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.

Preparedness activity includes developing a comprehensive damage assessment plan and training based on the predetermined priorities identified in the risk assessment and/or vulnerability assessment. For example: If there is flooding in your community, how will this affect bridges in low lying areas? As part of your community’s preparedness, you need to determine what actions need to be taken to be prepared for this event.

Protection refers to capabilities necessary to secure critical infrastructure or key resources against acts of terrorism and manmade or natural disasters. It requires coordinated action on the part of Federal, State, and local governments, the private sector, and concerned citizens across the country.

Protection capabilities include, but are not limited to:

• Critical infrastructure protection
• Defense against WMD threats
• Defense of agriculture and food
• Protection of key leadership and events
• Border security
• Maritime security
• Transportation security
• Immigration security
• Cybersecurity

Protection is an elevation of awareness and understanding of threats and vulnerabilities to your community’s critical infrastructure and key resources.

Damage assessment planning contributes to the protection of the community and its assets, particularly through effective coordination among multiple agencies and jurisdictions.

Prevention refers to those capabilities necessary to avoid, prevent, or stop a threatened or actual act of terrorism. Prevention capabilities include, but are not limited to:

• Information sharing and warning
• Domestic counterterrorism
• Preventing the acquisition or use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD)

An example of prevention activity that the damage assessment planning team will be involved in is identifying vulnerabilities in the community, such as an unsecured water treatment facility.

Mitigation refers to those capabilities necessary to reduce loss of life and property by lessening the impact of disasters. Mitigation capabilities include, but are not limited to:

• Community-wide risk reduction projects
• Efforts to improve the resilience of critical infrastructure and key resource lifelines
• Risk reduction for specific vulnerabilities from natural hazards or acts of terrorism
• Initiatives to reduce future risks after a disaster has occurred

Although you should continually be evaluating ways to make your community more disaster-resistant, the period after a hazard event provides opportunities for mitigation actions to be implemented. Funding may become available, and it may be easier during this time to get buy-in from decision-makers to conduct mitigation activities.

The damage assessment response team can identify opportunities for mitigation following a hazard event. When you’re conducting damage assessment, consider what your community can do to make vulnerable critical infrastructure and key resources more damage-resistant. For example, power lines can be buried or the height of bridges can be raised.

Response refers to those capabilities necessary to save lives, protect property and the environment, and meet basic human needs after an incident has occurred.

Generally speaking, effective planning (including practice through training and exercise) leads to an effective response.

Throughout the response activity, even after the initial damage assessment, additional damages can continue to be identified, the value of damages can still be determined, and mitigation opportunities can be identified. Keep in mind that some response activity continues as recovery begins.

Recovery refers to those capabilities necessary to assist communities affected by an incident to recover effectively, including, but not limited to:

• Rebuilding infrastructure systems;
• Providing adequate interim and long-term housing for survivors;
• Restoring health, social, and community services;
• Promoting economic development;
• Restoring natural and cultural resources.

The community actually begins the recovery process simultaneously with response efforts. In addition, the ongoing activities of preparedness, protection, prevention, and mitigation also occur during the recovery period. Keep in mind that this can be an ideal time to identify mitigation opportunities because of grant funding that can become available following a hazard event.

During recovery activities, evaluate repairs and reconstruction. Then update plans based on improvements to infrastructure or other facilities.

The value of critical infrastructure and key resources (CIKR) is based on the essential functions and services they provide, particularly following a hazard.

• Public Services
• Transportation Systems
• Lifeline Systems
• High Risk Facilities

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• Hospitals/medical centers
• Police and fire stations (public safety)
• Emergency Operations Centers
• Evacuation shelters
• Schools
• Community centers

• Airways/airports
• Highways and bridges
• Railways
• Waterways
• Mass transit

• Potable water
• Wastewater
• Oil/natural gas
• Electric power
• Communication

• Nuclear power plants
• Dams
• Military installations
• Chemical plants
• Industries

In this lesson, you learned how important it is for a community to conduct a thorough and accurate local damage assessment, in order to identify needs, determine priorities, and set the tone for the entire response and recovery. Remember, before developing a plan for your community, consult any damage assessment plans or guidelines that your State or other governing bodies may have already developed. You learned some basic terminology that is used for damage assessment, including the definition of critical infrastructure and key resources. Being able to identify the critical infrastructure in your community is important for planning an effective damage assessment program.

Click this link to view a list of all items provided in the Toolkit for this lesson.

In this lesson, you will learn about the differences between risk and hazard vulnerability assessments. You will learn the basic process for conducting these assessments and the information they provide to assist you in planning your response to an incident.

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Distinguish between risk assessment and hazard vulnerability assessment.
• Describe the information that risk and hazard vulnerability assessments can provide.
• Describe the process for conducting a hazards analysis.

Every community is different, so it is critical that you identify hazards that are most likely to affect you. By conducting risk and hazard vulnerability assessments, your community can be prepared.

Risk assessments provide information about what hazards are likely to occur in your community. Risk assessment answers the question, “What could happen to adversely impact the community?”

Hazard vulnerability assessments (HVAs) include information about how often each hazard is likely to occur, the area likely to be impacted, and how severe the impact may be. The HVA answers the question, “How and where could each hazard affect the community?”

It is quite likely that your community has already completed risk and hazard vulnerability assessments that merely need to be updated when new information is available or new hazards or vulnerabilities are identified. Be sure to coordinate your efforts with local emergency management and check your Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan (CEMP) or other community emergency plans. Much of the work may already have been completed.

Gregg Varner, Director of Solid Waste (retired), County of Charleston, SC

Knowing what your community is subject to get hit with, whether it’s hurricanes, earthquakes, whatever – you’ve got to know that kind of stuff so you can plan for it. And then once you know that, you take a look at your community, and all communities are different– everything is community-specific – when you take a look at those things, then you want to look at critical facilities. You want to especially know where things like hospitals and nursing homes are because they are a priority. They’re the kinds of places that public safety wants to get to, and those are the kind of priorities that you identify ahead of time, and then they can change based on the nature of the event.

Christine Walsh, Director of Operations, City of Beloit, WI

In order to establish priorities, we looked at our critical infrastructure and our key resources, so for example, main arterials going through the city, specific public facilities and grounds that we thought were key critical infrastructure. We looked at our traffic patterns; we also looked at environmental management – our city is divided by a river – and what happens if they have a flood. Then you need to look at, as well, your water, wastewater, utilities, transit systems – those are all critical infrastructure or key resources that every city depends on.

Each individual community, no matter how small, has to look at their critical infrastructure and the key resources that they have to be able to do the risk, vulnerability, and damage assessments.

John Chapman, Fire Chief (retired), City of Kissimmee, FL

After September 11th, every community in the United States did a hazard vulnerability assessment. It is surprising how many agencies did the assessment and then made it a secret. Our colleagues should not be operating in a vacuum; we need this information if we’re going to manage our communities safely and effectively. The vulnerability assessment is another tool for assessment, potential improvement, and overall safety.

As you’ve learned, risk assessment answers the question, “What could happen to adversely impact the community?” More specifically, risk assessment identifies and characterizes all hazards that may affect the community such as:

• Natural hazards
• Adversarial/human-caused hazards
• Cascading emergencies

Natural Disasters

Naturally occurring incidents such as earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and flooding that have occurred in the past or are likely to occur need to be included in your community’s risk assessment.

Adversarial/Human-caused Hazards

Dangers associated with hazardous materials facilities, such as oil or gas pipelines or nuclear power plants need to be considered as part of your community’s risk assessment. Industrial facilities may store large amounts of chemicals on their property, and even a small amount of hazardous materials can be an issue.

Funding for emergency management training related to hazardous chemicals may be available to your community under the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA), Title III. Consult the list of Resources in the Toolkit for more information about SARA.

Cascading Emergencies

Following an event, one incident can trigger another. For example, an earthquake could trigger fires from ruptured gas lines or a hazardous materials release at a damaged chemical facility. This cascade of events is something that your community should consider to prevent one incident from becoming multiple.

Functional Needs Populations

Functional needs populations include individuals who may be more vulnerable because of immobility or their inability to take protective action. These individuals can include children, the elderly, migrant individuals/families, tourists, non-native English speakers, mobile home residents, and inmates. It may also include those who have disabilities, who live in institutionalized settings, who are transportation disadvantaged, or who are from diverse cultures.

Although every community is different, there are some basic steps that need to be performed to effectively assess risks and vulnerabilities for the community. These common steps are shown on the graphic collectively as the Hazard Analysis Process. The next several screens will describe each of these steps in greater detail.

The first step in the hazard analysis process is to identify all the hazards that may occur in your community, such as hurricanes, earthquakes, or hazardous material releases. Look through newspapers and other historical records to see what events have impacted your community in the past and get information about frequency, magnitude, and extent of damage. Forecasters can provide information about what types of hazard events can be expected for the year. Other possible sources of information include reviewing existing plans and reports, talking to the experts in area, and gathering information from websites.

All subsequent steps in the planning process are built on the information gathered during risk assessment, so it’s important to be thorough. As you proceed, remember to keep records of what you’ve found and where you’ve found it.

After you’ve created a list of potential hazards, the next step is to narrow down the list to the most prevalent hazards in your area and develop hazard event profiles to document the unique characteristics of each hazard type. For each hazard, use historical data, existing plans and reports, and other available information to answer questions like:

• How often is this hazard likely to occur?
• What happens as a result of this hazard (e.g., high wind, flooding, etc.)?
• Where is it likely to strike?
• How large an area is it likely to affect?
• How long can it be expected to last?
• What time of year is it more likely to occur?
• How fast is it likely to occur?
• Does a warning system exist, and how much warning time is there?
• What is the potential for cascading effects?

You will use this data to compare and prioritize the risks according to frequency, magnitude, warning time, severity, and other special considerations. Be sure to document the findings and map the hazards to show the potential areas of impact for each hazard and the effects on your planning area.

Click this link to view a worksheet for comparing and prioritizing risks.

Click this link to see a sample Hazard Profile document.

During the third step in the hazard analysis process, which is also known as developing a Community Exposure Profile, you will determine which assets in the community could be affected by the hazard and create a list of those assets. Assets include buildings and infrastructure such as critical facilities and key resources, natural resource areas, businesses, and residences.

This inventory of existing buildings (number, type, value) and estimation of potential loss following known hazards helps determine actions during damage assessment. Knowing areas of weakness helps focus resources, particularly on vulnerable populations and critical facilities, which could impact recovery. It is important to know if there are hazardous materials at that location or if there are special response needs or even if special equipment is needed to respond to an event at that location. The HVA will help determine mitigation opportunities or corrective actions that can be designed or implemented to reduce the vulnerabilities and make the community more disaster resistant. Be sure to consult the Hazard Mitigation Plan for your community. The information included in it will help in completing your HVA.

Click this link to view a sample Community Exposure Profile.

During this step, create a map of assets in your community. Then, compare this asset map to the hazard map developed in the previous step to determine which assets could be impacted by each hazard.

Specify the areas most likely to be affected (e.g., the entire town, low lying areas, downtown, rural, highways). You can use a Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based approach such as the Hazards U.S. Multi-Hazard (HAZUS-MH) software to map your community’s assets.

An overlay can be produced by hand using a light table or through the use of GIS. As shown in the image, a map showing the location of the community’s assets can be produced by overlaying the base map for the community with a map delineating hazard area boundaries. This will help you identify which structures are located in more than one hazard zone and which areas of the community or state are more or less susceptible to different hazards.

You can learn more about HAZUS-MH and GIS by visiting the links provided on the Resources page of the Toolkit.

Consider the implications for response and recovery, based on how the following areas are expected to be impacted by the hazards:

• Populations/Demographics
• Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources
• Facilities

Be sure to document all of your findings, keep track of the inventory data, and update the inventory regularly. Click on the highlighted text to learn more about considerations for different categories of assets.

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Populations/Demographics

Including functional needs populations and locations is an important part of the community exposure profile. For each hazard, determine who could be impacted (e.g., all residents or certain neighborhoods/areas). If the hazard is likely to affect only certain areas, indicate those areas in the assessment so that resources can be allocated appropriately following a hazard.

These individuals may have additional needs before, during, and after an incident in functional areas, including maintaining independence, communication, transportation, supervision, and medical care. Knowing where these populations are located in your community is important so that additional measures can be taken as deemed necessary prior to and immediately following a hazard.

Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources

You must consider how each hazard could affect the critical facilities and infrastructure in your community. Remember, essential facilities are those that are necessary for the health and welfare of the population of your community. By including essential facilities, transportation systems, lifeline systems, high potential loss facilities, and hazardous material facilities as part of your community exposure profile, you can plan appropriate response and recovery actions to be implemented following a hazard.

Lifelines and infrastructure that should be considered include roads/streets, highways, services, potable water, and electrical systems. Keep in mind that damage to any of these systems could have severe detrimental effects to the community as a whole. For example, if a bridge is damaged, then emergency medical services, law enforcement, and firefighters may be unable to get to the people and places where they’re needed most.

Be sure to keep current information about critical facilities. Having a database of this information available will be useful when allocating resources following a hazard. You should have a list of the name and location of all critical facilities in your community. Other information kept on file should include the location of each facility (including GPS and/or National Grid System coordinates), contact information, and a note about any special response equipment that may be needed for that facility.

This assessment of critical facilities and infrastructure will help you determine priorities for allocating resources or activation of additional resources so infrastructure can be restored quickly after a hazard event. It will also help you determine potential costs for responding to and recovering from the hazard event.

Buildings

Determine what types of building (e.g., residential, commercial, and/or government) will be impacted by each hazard, and consider the implications. For example, if residential areas may be affected, the community may need more public shelters following a hazard event. Damaged commercial areas or government buildings may mean long-term economic or other impacts to the community.

Determine where volunteers and other personnel, such as those from State and Federal agencies, will set up, and identify distribution centers and staging areas. Also be sure to establish an alternate Emergency Operations Center (EOC) in case it is damaged or inaccessible during or after an event, or in case your current facility may be too small to handle a large number of people during a serious event.

The fourth step in the hazard analysis process combines the information from the previous steps to determine an estimate of expected losses from hazards. For the hazards you identified earlier that are most likely to affect your community, you should analyze losses in terms of people, buildings, building contents, critical infrastructure and key resources, and other important assets. Be sure to consider the following types of effects:

• Human needs
• Economy
• Environment
• Response Agencies

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about types of losses.

To analyze the losses, you will determine the extent of the damages and then calculate the loss from each hazard event. Be sure that you have the most current property values when you perform this estimation.

The estimation performed in this step enables you to determine which assets could potentially face the most damage and which hazard could bring about the greatest losses. This information will help determine where to focus resources following a hazard to try to lessen the impact on the community.

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Impacts on Human Needs

Consider the number of households who could be displaced, the number of individuals who may need public shelters, and the need for social services such as counseling or financial assistance.

Economic Impacts

Each hazard can have a different economic impact on a community. For example, if commercial or industrial areas are affected and businesses have to close, residents may lose their jobs. As a result, unemployment costs may rise or large numbers of your population may leave the community in search of work. As another example, if tourist attractions are damaged, the community could lose needed revenue from sales taxes paid by tourists, and businesses may be forced to close.

Planning for the economic effects of each hazard will help your community know when additional resources may need to be requested from the State or Federal level. It will also help your community plan for the economic recovery, which can be a long process depending on the severity of the hazard.

Environmental Impacts

When considering how each hazard could impact the community, remember to think about both short- and long-term effects to the environment. For example, if the sewer treatment plant is damaged, there could be major lasting effects to the environment and the area’s population if the sewer treatment plant begins pumping out untreated sewage directly into the waterways.

An environmental impact that is almost always a consideration after a hazard event is debris removal and management. Consider the amount of debris (in tons) that may need to be removed and whether additional resources will be needed to deal with environmental impacts.

Impacts to the Capabilities of Response Agencies

As a part of the Community Exposure Profile, list each agency and its anticipated roles and responsibilities. These agencies may include Public Works, Fire, EMS, Law Enforcement, Department of Environmental Protection, Mutual Aid, private agencies, and commercial enterprises. Determine what agencies and what additional resources are needed to respond to minimize the impact of each hazard identified during the risk assessment. Also consider how each hazard could affect the various agencies’ ability to respond to and recover from the event.

Identify measures you can take to protect the capabilities and resources of these agencies. For example, be sure to move utility trucks, ambulances, fire trucks, and other emergency response vehicles out of harm’s way (such as out of the flood zone) so they are not disabled by the hazard.

The FEMA publication 386-2, Understanding Your Risks: Identifying Hazards and Estimating Losses, provides guidance and worksheets for calculating losses. You can use HAZUS-MH to estimate vulnerability of each structure and determine estimated impacts of an incident. Professional engineers have a number of processes, books, and resources that they use to estimate damage. Damage estimates should be based on specific types of construction. For example, if a warehouse is damaged, they can look at information specific to warehouses, and the estimation differs from damage to another type of structure such as an office building.

You can learn more about HAZUS-MH and GIS by visiting the links provided on the Resources page of the Toolkit.

The estimation performed in this step enables you to determine which assets could potentially face the most damage and which hazard could bring about the greatest losses. This information will help you determine where to focus resources following a hazard to try to lessen the impact on your community.

Click this link to view a sample loss estimation form (review.c2ti.com/FEMA LCMS/IS0559/lesson2/assets/01_02_140.pdf)

After you’ve completed the four steps in the hazard analysis process, you are not “finished” with hazard analysis. You must ensure that members of the damage assessment response team and others involved in emergency management understand the community's risks and vulnerabilities. To this end, a scenario should be developed for each hazard that can be used to develop exercises for practicing response actions for actual events. You will learn more about exercises later in this course.

The HVA also requires maintenance. You should periodically revisit it to determine if it is still accurate. Ask yourself questions like:

• Do all of the hazards still pose a threat?
• Are there hazards not included that pose a potential threat?
• Does the risk assessment specifically consider the possibility and impact of cascading hazards?
• Are any profiles or other information missing from the risk assessment?
• Has the relative threat of any hazards changed since the assessment was done?
• Has new infrastructure been put into place?
• Have priorities changed?

Effective damage assessment begins with effective planning. Planning for incidents will allow you to respond efficiently with a thorough and accurate damage assessment. It is imperative that the damage assessment be done well. Poor damage assessment may weaken or delay the response effort, create inaccurate loss reporting, establish inappropriate priorities, have a negative environmental impact, delay the Presidential disaster declaration process, or result in denial of Federal recovery funds.

In this lesson, you will learn how to plan a damage assessment program. Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Identify potential members of the local damage assessment planning team.
• List common steps for planning a damage assessment program.
• List planning assumptions for creating a damage assessment plan.
• Describe guidelines for establishing local standards for damage assessment.

It is important for those preparing the damage assessment plan to understand what a plan is and what it is not. The plan should contain checklists and some basic Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), but it is not intended to prescribe specific details of exact reactions, because all events are different. It should contain methods for conducting damage assessment, but it is not intended to be followed like a script. Rather, managers and responders need to be able to make decisions based on the plan guidance and the situation assessment. It should specify the roles and responsibilities of the damage assessment response team members, as well as their assigned zones, but in a large event, these team members may be asked to perform beyond those specifications.

The damage assessment plan is a starting point providing the necessary guidance with the flexibility to react based on the event specifics and the result of assessment information rather than assumptions used in the planning process.

The basic elements that should be considered prior to an event include:

• Identification of all possible emergencies through risk assessment
• Evaluation of the impact of all risks to the community through a hazard vulnerability assessment
• Identification of public policy, legal issues, and ordinances
• Coordination of effort with all stakeholders participating
• Evaluation of available and needed resources, based on risk and hazard vulnerability assessments
• Evaluation of communication and public information procedures
• Understanding of public health and public safety issues
• Identification of training and exercise opportunities

Keep in mind that every community is different; therefore, the demographics and particular needs of your community must be considered when planning for damage assessment.

Narrator

The process of developing the damage assessment plan is as important as having the plan on the shelf. The research involved is invaluable, as are the relationships that are formed during the creation of the document.

Although there is not a standard process you must use, some common steps for planning a damage assessment program are shown on the graphic.

The first step in the damage assessment planning process is to identify the team responsible for planning efforts, including the coordinating agency or department that will be responsible for ensuring that the plan is created (and maintained). This responsibility often falls to the emergency management agency. However, other agencies, such as the building inspection agency, can also be considered to oversee this activity.

Next, you will need to identify the local damage assessment planning team members and assign their roles. The first role to be determined should be the Damage Assessment Coordinator, who oversees the entire damage assessment program.

The planning team may include a variety of stakeholders, who could be personnel from Emergency Management, public works and utilities, other first responders (e.g., fire, law, EMS), Voluntary Organizations Active in Disasters (VOADs), building officials, Geographic Information System and Information Technology (GIS/IT) teams, administrators from local schools (particularly if schools are used as shelters), representatives from critical/essential facilities, agents from nonprofit agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), local realtors and property appraisers staff, and/or the healthcare community.

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about identifying stakeholders.

After the planning team has been established, the members must gather a great deal of information in order to prepare for the rest of the damage assessment planning process.

The team must gather a great deal of information to consider when developing the plan such as:

• Risk and vulnerability assessment data
• Reports and analysis data
• Other existing plans
• Functional roles and responsibilities
• Jurisdictional responsibilities
• Resources
• Inventory of goods and supplies
• Forecasts and warning systems
• Maps and geographical boundaries

The success of the planning process will partly depend on the accuracy and amount of information obtained and readily used by local planners. While the information gathering may seem tedious, it is a critical step for a successful planning process.

Using information gathered during the previous step, you need to consider certain planning assumptions to be included in the damage assessment plan:

• Priorities: life, property, and the environment
• Resources: people, equipment, and tools
• Type of jurisdiction
• Need for additional resources or technical expertise (e.g., mutual aid, Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs), private resources, State/Federal resources)
• Warnings available
• Need for coordination between local agencies, neighboring jurisdictions, and Tribal governments (if applicable)
• Evacuation and sheltering (procedures and facilities) or other support
• Activation of emergency management
• Pre-identified risks and vulnerabilities (from the hazard analysis)

Planning assumptions can range from “The prompt and accurate assessment of damage is vital.” to “County resources will be available as indicated in this plan.” By including these and other assumptions as a part of your damage assessment plan, you document the starting point from which the plan is developed.

It’s important to identify, in the planning process, the zones that damage assessment response team members will inspect after a hazard event, so these teams will already be familiar with their zones and can rapidly deploy or be pre-positioned to conduct damage assessment.

In identifying zones for your damage assessment program, use the zones that already exist in your community and that are also used for hazard vulnerability assessments. For example, you could use public works snow plow zones or any other zones that your municipality has established. GIS layers could be used to help divide the area and to designate zones. Remember to take into consideration that some of these zones may cross jurisdictional lines.

Your plan should establish local, defined standards for damage assessment. These standards must be legally defensible and in accordance with any higher level guidelines and/or State requirements. They should also be in a readable format and be developed in accordance with recognized processes established by coordinating agencies and oversight agencies.

For example, the American Red Cross and FEMA use a 4-point system for evaluating damage assessment, as shown in the table.

If your community would like to use a more detailed system, be sure to provide a correlation to the 4-point system. For example, Manatee County, Florida, uses a 10-point damage assessment scale. It corresponds to the 4-point system, but provides more detail. Links to more information about these damage assessment scales are available in the Toolkit.

When establishing your local standards, be sure to design data collection procedures according to resources available. Your team should decide as a part of the planning process whether the forms should be in electronic or paper format. Remember, if you use electronic forms, you should always have paper backups available. Sample forms for each method are provided in the Toolkit, but they should be modified to fit the needs of your community. Make sure all team members have the most recent most accurate forms when you go out to do the damage assessment.

Click this link to view the Manatee County example 10-point scale. (https://review.c2ti.com/FEMA%20LCMS/IS0559/lesson3/assets/01_03_110.pdf)

Click this link for information about FEMA’s Preliminary Damage Assessment (PDA) 4-point methodology and how it corresponds to the damage states in HAZUS-MH. (https://www.fema.gov/use-hazus-mh-support-individual-assistance-program)

The damage assessment program may need to be modified from time to time, as new information becomes available, new infrastructure becomes a part of the community, new hazards are identified, and lessons are learned. So, part of the planning process is establishing procedures for maintaining the plan.

Changes in systems, policies, technology, resources, personnel, and risk/vulnerability require adjustments to the plan. These changes can range from documenting near misses as a means to evaluate effectiveness, to updating forms and data so you are ready when an event occurs. It is important to modify training and exercises so they suit current risk and hazard vulnerability assessment data. You should build in specific opportunities for periodic review (recommended at least annually) to ensure that your plan is always current. This will allow your team to respond in the most effective and efficient ways possible.

In this lesson, you learned about the steps for planning a damage assessment program. First, you must identify the local damage assessment planning team, including identification of the primary agency responsible for creating and maintaining the plan. This step also includes identification of a Damage Assessment Coordinator to oversee the program.

Second, members of the local damage assessment planning team gather information to be used in the development of the plan.

Third, you should determine plan components and assumptions such as priorities, resources (including the need for acquiring more resources), and the need for multi-agency or multi-jurisdictional coordination.

Next, you should identify damage assessment zones, using the same zones as are used for hazard vulnerability assessments. Then, you will establish local standards for damage assessment that are legally defensible and in accordance with any higher level guidelines and/or State requirements. Finally, you must establish procedures for maintaining the plan as changes occur and lessons are learned.

Click this link to view a list of all items provided in the Toolkit for this lesson.

The following resources were referenced in this lesson and are provided in the Toolkit.

Sample Documents:

• FEMA’s Preliminary Damage Assessment (PDA) 4-point methodology
• Manatee County, Florida, 10-point system for damage assessment
• Damage assessment forms

 

After you’ve developed a damage assessment plan, it will need to be exercised so you can verify that it works and so all who perform damage assessment will be familiar with the processes, methods, forms, and responsibilities in the plan. If the plan sits on the shelf and no one uses it until an actual hazard event, chances are high that no one will remember what the plan contains or understand how to work together effectively during the response.

In this lesson, you will learn about the types of training and exercises that you can use in your community and how they can help you in the development of your damage assessment program.

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Explain the value of training and exercises to a local damage assessment program.
• Define types of training and exercises.
• Identify resources for developing a training program for local damage assessment.
• List basic principles for effective training and exercises.
• Determine training needs for local damage assessment teams.
• Explain the value of after action reports as they relate to the damage assessment program.

Training and exercises allow your damage assessment response team to clarify the processes, procedures, roles, and responsibilities that will be required of them following a hazard and help them develop their individual performance while learning to work together as part of a multi-agency (and perhaps multi-jurisdictional) team.

The feedback and observations gleaned during the training and exercises will allow planners to see strengths of the program, as well as areas for improvement. This data can be used to find resource gaps and to improve the program. In addition to practicing processes, procedures, roles, and responsibilities, training provides occasion for team building which enhances inter- and intra-agency coordination.

The Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP) provides a national standard for all exercises. It is a capabilities- and performance-based exercise program that provides standardized policy, methodology, and terminology for exercise design, development, conduct, evaluation, and improvement planning. Your community can prepare teams to perform local damage assessment through discussion-based and operations-based training and exercises. You can learn more about HSEEP by visiting the link on the Resources page in the Toolkit.

Click on the training and exercise types to learn more about each one.

Seminars

Workshops

Tabletop Exercises

Drills

Functional Exercises

Full-Scale Exercises

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Seminars

Seminars are discussion-based exercises designed to orient participants to new or updated plans, policies, or procedures in a structured training environment.

Workshops

Workshops are discussion-based exercises used as a means of developing specific products, such as a draft plan or policy.

Tabletop Exercises (TTX)

A tabletop exercise is a facilitated analysis of an emergency situation in an informal, stress-free environment. There is minimal attempt at simulation in a tabletop exercise. Equipment is not used, resources are not deployed, and time pressures are not introduced. Tabletops are designed to elicit constructive discussion as participants examine and resolve problems based on existing operational plans and identify where those plans need to be refined. The success of the exercise is largely determined by group participation in the identification of problem areas.

Drills

A drill is a coordinated, supervised exercise activity, normally used to test a single specific operation or function. It can also be used to provide training with new equipment or to practice and maintain current skills. Its role in your exercise program is to practice and perfect one small part of your damage assessment program and help prepare for more extensive exercises, in which several functions will be coordinated and tested.

Functional Exercises (FE)

A functional exercise is 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. The exercise tests multiple functions of your damage assessment plan.

A functional exercise focuses on the coordination, integration, and interaction of an organization’s policies, procedures, roles, and responsibilities before, during, or after the simulated event. Functional exercises make it possible to examine and/or validate the coordination, command, and control between various multi-agency coordination centers without incurring the cost of a full-scale exercise. A functional exercise is a prerequisite to a full-scale exercise.

Full-scale Exercises (FSE)

A full-scale exercise simulates a real event as closely as possible. It is 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. Ideally, the full-scale exercise should test and evaluate most functions of your damage assessment plan on a regular basis.

Full-scale exercises are the ultimate in the testing of functions¾the “trial by fire.” Because they are expensive and time consuming, it is important that they be reserved for the highest priority hazards and functions.

Although the most effective training experiences you can provide are those that consider your community’s specific hazards and vulnerabilities, you don’t necessarily have to develop all-new training. When you determine that new, community-specific training is necessary, you don’t have to create it alone.

There are several potential resources available for training:

• FEMA’s Emergency Management Institute (EMI) (https://training.fema.gov/emi.aspx)
• FEMA’s Lessons Learned Information Sharing (LLIS) site (https://www.hsdl.org/c/llis-in-the-hsdl/)
• FEMA’s National Exercise Division (NED)
• State and local emergency management agencies and training offices
• Universities
• Voluntary agencies
• Consulting firms

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about courses offered by EMI and about the LLIS site.

You can find more information about training resources, including EMI and LLIS, by visiting the links on the Resources page of the Toolkit.

Click this link to access all of the information presented on this page in a new window.

Exercises must be capability/objective-based, well-designed, and planned if they are to be effective. Be sure to design your training and exercises to test your existing plans, policies, and procedures. The following characteristics are key to successful training and exercises:

• They must be based on relevant, true-to-life scenarios.
• They test all aspects of the plan.
• The questions and problems must be objectives-based and move from simple to complex.
• Evaluation should be focused on actions, not on individuals.

In other words, the exercises should challenge participants with real-life situations in a no failure environment. It is important that the focus of after action analysis is on what went wrong, and not who is to blame, because many of the best lessons are learned from failed attempts.

Remember to include damage assessment in broader, multi-agency full-scale disaster exercises as well, so that all team members can work together efficiently. Another useful practice is to encourage like training across multiple jurisdictions and agencies. Having similar training programs can help teams work together more efficiently following a hazard event.

Anyone involved in damage assessment needs to participate in the training and exercise program. These individuals may include:

• Community leaders and officials
• Emergency management
• Property appraisers
• Building inspectors
• Code enforcement officials
• Public works directors
• Public safety and other first responders
• Private agencies
• Volunteers

You should also provide training to anyone who could be called in as a “backup” to help your community with damage assessment.

Your damage assessment teams should receive training on established policies and procedures as well as equipment. You should review your damage assessment plan and determine any other areas in which your teams may need training.

Personal Safety

Data Collection

Equipment

Zones

Public Information

Reporting Requirements

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Personal Safety

One of the most important areas in which your teams should be trained is personal safety. Keeping team members safe during damage assessment is critical. They should know what to do to keep themselves and their fellow team members safe from harm. If personal protective equipment (PPE) is required, they must be trained on its proper use and maintenance.

Data Collection

Another significant area for training is the collection of data. Teams must know where to find the appropriate damage assessment forms, how to complete forms correctly, and what to do with the forms once they have been completed. If electronic forms are to be submitted, teams must be trained on the use of the equipment, and paper backups must be available.

Equipment

Teams must be trained on the use of any equipment they are expected to use, such as computers for submitting electronic forms, radios for communicating with other teams, and digital cameras for documenting damages. It is important to ensure that all members of the team know how to use the equipment properly. During response and recovery, things are too hectic for team members not to know how something works.

Zones

As you’ve learned, teams need to be aware of their designated zones and assignments prior to a hazard. Zone familiarization is important so that teams are aware of what their assigned zones look like prior to a hazard in order to be able to effectively identify damages. They should also be aware of all vulnerabilities that exist within their assigned area, including location of power lines, the type of construction used for the buildings in those zones, and the presence of any hazardous material.

Public Information

Damage assessment response teams need to be trained for dealing with the public as well as the media. Each community will need to set its own policies and train the teams accordingly.

Reporting Requirements

Damage assessment response teams should be trained to report life safety issues immediately. For example, team members should be trained on the procedures for reporting rescue needs.

Public works team members also need to be trained on the procedures for reporting serious injury or deaths. This unfortunate consequence of hazard events has to receive attention during training because the reporting of casualties needs to be handled promptly so that rescue or recovery and identification of the victims can begin.

So that all damage assessment team members are prepared for a hazard event, training should occur at least annually and in accordance with State and other exercise plans. Refresher training should be conducted prior to any anticipated event.

When scheduling annual training, you should consider the hazard for which the team is preparing. For example, for tornado-prone areas, training may be held in February or early March, just prior to the beginning of tornado season, so the information is fresh on the minds of those who participated in the training. If you live in an ice/winter storm environment, refresher training should be scheduled annually prior to the start of winter storm season.

Training should also be scheduled any time there is a significant update to the plan. Just-in-time briefings for the leadership should be held prior to teams being sent out so that they have the most recent information available when they need it most.

Through conducting training and exercises and evaluating the results, you can improve your damage assessment program. Two documents generated by the exercise team that will help are the:

• After Action Report (AAR)
• Improvement Plan (IP)

The damage assessment planning team should not merely take these documents and file them away. Instead, after action review meetings should be held with the team to go over the results.

When conducting after action reviews, remember not to place blame or point fingers. The focus of these meetings should be to celebrate successes and identify needs for improvement to the plan. This critical evaluation step leads to better preparedness of your program.

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about how documents generated by the exercise team can help improve the damage assessment program.

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After Action Report (AAR)

The AAR addresses opportunities for improvement of plans and procedures. The AAR can also be used in the development of exercise scenarios.

For example, if an exercise or an actual event demonstrates that there aren’t enough Public Information Officers (PIOs) available, then your next exercise could include a scenario in which one of your community’s PIOs was injured and in the hospital, while another is out of town. In this way, you can test your community’s ability to respond to real-life challenges that may occur.

Improvement Plan (IP)

The IP takes the observations and recommendations from the draft AAR and resolves them through the development of concrete corrective actions. It is important that the focus of after action analysis is on what went wrong, and not who is to blame, because many of the best lessons are learned from failed attempts.

In this lesson, you learned about the importance of training and exercising your damage assessment plan. You learned about different types of exercises that can be used to practice the plan, facilitate effective inter- and intra-agency coordination, and clarify processes and procedures.

You learned who needs training, what training they need, and when they need it. You now have some resources for developing training and exercises. You also learned that after action review is critical to identifying areas for improvement and enhancing the readiness of your community.

Click this link to view a list of all items provided in the Toolkit for this lesson.

The following resources were referenced in this lesson and are provided in the Toolkit.

Resource Links:

• FEMA's Emergency Management Institute (EMI)
• FEMA's Lessons Learned Information Sharing (LLIS) site

Training Available from EMI:

• IS-120a, An Introduction to Exercises
• IS-139, Exercise Design
• L-146, HSEEP Training Course
• Master Exercise Practitioner Program (MEPP)
• Lessons Learned Information Sharing (LLIS) site

 

In this lesson, you will learn the operations of local damage assessment. This lesson recommends potential members and responsibilities for first-in teams. It also outlines the process for local workers responding to an event as part of the damage assessment response team. Finally, reminders are included about how response team members have considerations beyond damage assessment.

Upon completion of this lesson, you should be able to:

• Identify potential members of the local damage assessment response team.
• List types of information that should be included in pre-deployment briefings.
• Describe basic procedures for damage assessment.
• Describe special considerations for damage assessment response teams when dealing with the human impact of disasters.

Local damage assessment is a very important function within the disaster operation scenarios. What I would encourage you all to do as you walk out into your jobs to assess the damage, that you be always aware of the surroundings around you. One of the things I will mention is, as a safety and health professional with over 25 years of Federal experience, I was recently able to find information that was actually professionally illuminating to me dealing with the Tennessee floods, and what it amounted to was that as I was moving around in a vehicle just after the Nashville incident, I looked across at an elevated rise on the highway, and I’m looking at the tops of trees. Now, these trees are about 25-30 feet above the ground level that is surrounding us down below, and I’m seeing wooden pallets, like 60-pound pallets that actually would normally have materials such as barrels and drums that forklifts use to ship materials lying in the tops of the trees. I also saw metal debris. Once the waters have receded, as you’re walking down below, be cognizant of the hazards above. This was completely a surprise to me, even as a seasoned professional. So I encourage you to not take for granted what is underneath your feet, and most especially what could be above your head as you do your damage assessment. This is always to be considered, you as a precious resource, because you are the first people out looking at the damage, to actually keep yourself safe, and please report any issues that you consider of significance to your chain of supervisors so that others following in your footsteps can have this either remediated, removed, abated, or have people behind you avoid such a scenario.

Get out there quickly. Use the people that you have. In many instances there are already going to be people out there. There are going to be emergency responders. There are going to be firefighters potentially, and even think about things like sanitation workers. You know, after any event there is going to be waste everywhere; you still got to pick up garbage, and those people are going to be out there, they’re going to be working. It’s likely they have the ability to communicate. So you want to use them. So recognize that those people are out there, and don’t forget about them.

Then there is the idea of special consideration for people that you send out. And this is really, really important when it comes to the idea of their safety. For example, if electrical lines are down, how do you satisfy them, how do you tell people that are headed out to do damage assessment that if they head down a road, and there are electrical lines down, that those lines are no longer hot, they are no longer charged, and they are not going to be in danger? The sad fact is that from things like down power lines people die in this country almost every year. That doesn’t have to happen. So their safety is key, and the people that are a part of the team can help with that in every aspect of what they do and everywhere they go.

One key member of a damage assessment team may very well be a representative from the local power company. And those are the kinds of things you take into consideration. You have to look at how their ability will be to travel about, what their skills are, and what their ability is to capture information and how they get it back to the people that need it. When you look at that and when you put those people out there, their key role and their primary responsibility is to get that information and get it back to the people that need it. But they also may find themselves working in the role of a local emergency responder. They may very well come upon a situation where somebody needs medical help. Those people need first aid training; they need to have some minimal level of first aid with them. They are not intended to be emergency medical responders, and that’s not their job. But they may very well find themselves dealing with that kind of a situation, and they need to be prepared for that. Beyond that they need to have the ability to communicate to the people that they meet. They need to have some small level of handout with contact information, who to call, where to get it, and where to go for information.

Although the primary mission of the assessment teams is to deploy to quantify the damage done to your community’s homes, businesses and infrastructure, there is a human element that cannot be ignored if you want to serve the needs of the people. One is Field Intelligence, maximizing the team’s ability to gather information on immediate life/safety issues, debris, power, sewer, water, individual needs and an overall snapshot of what the teams see on the streets. This information, communicated to the coordinating authority as soon as humanly possible will enhance appropriate immediate response efforts to the community and will assist the policy makers in making enlightened decisions on recovery issues such as rebuilding infrastructure, post-disaster redevelopment and the other myriad of issues that will face your community for years to come. Another is even more immediate. The damage assessment teams may be the first authority figures that the public-at-large may see and will want their needs known and dealt with as soon as possible. Part of the pre-deployment briefing should include distribution of fact sheets, press releases and information on FEMA contact numbers, your local citizens information numbers, locations of disaster recovery centers, locations of point of distribution centers and mass feeding. The teams should take along bottled water for the survivors and other comfort items as available to give to the people they encounter. Doing due diligence to deal with the public in a calm and compassionate manner and gathering the field intelligence for the decision makers to consider can only lead to a much more successful response and recovery for your community.

When a disaster or other emergency strikes a community, first responders are generally deployed to address life safety issues such as conducting search and rescue, clearing entrance and egress routes, extinguishing fires, and providing medical services.

These “first-in teams” can be a valuable asset to your community’s damage assessment program by conducting preliminary impact assessments and reporting on life safety issues, debris, and other damages they observe while they are out in the community. While first-in teams are not a required part of a damage assessment program, they can be a valuable source of field intelligence for damage assessment and are therefore a recommended resource. They are already there, so it makes sense to use them to help gather information.

Some potential members of the first-in team are shown below.

Even if your community does not have a formal first-in team, local agencies and certain members of the community can still be excellent sources of information. For example, garbage collectors can help to identify hazards by reporting on road conditions or debris as they travel their routes; utility company workers can report on down power lines or debris issues that they encounter. These sources of information can be a great start for the damage assessment process. This information can be invaluable to other local response or recovery agencies.

Keep in mind that these teams will need to be trained in a manner that is consistent with the training provided to the damage assessment response teams, including participation in drills and exercises. A sample standard operating guide for first-in teams is included in your Toolkit. Reviewing this sample will help you identify some of the issues and assumptions you’ll need to consider when planning for your community.

Click this link to view the sample Standard Operating Guide.

The damage assessment response team evaluates and documents the physical damage caused by an event and its potential impact on the community. Because input from varying perspectives allows for a more thorough assessment of the damage in a community, the damage assessment response team should be composed of members from various groups and functional areas within the community. Frequently, there is overlap with those who helped develop the community’s emergency management and damage assessment plans.

Team members may include:

• Building inspectors
• Local government assessors
• Public works officials
• Code enforcement officials
• Firefighters
• Private engineers
• Amateur radio operators
• Volunteer Organizations Active in Disasters (VOADs) representatives

Responsibilities should be clearly designated so that efforts are not duplicated. To effectively coordinate efforts and compile information, a Damage Assessment Coordinator should be designated as the facilitator/leader of the process.

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about selecting the Damage Assessment Coordinator.

When the damage assessment response team is out in the community, members should be using the standards and procedures defined in the community's damage assessment plan to record information such as:

• Life safety issues/immediate needs
• Date and time of assessment
• Location
• Type of structure/infrastructure
• Degree of damage/volume of debris
• Comments

Remember, the team will use standards and procedures defined in your community’s damage assessment plan. The Toolkit includes sample forms that can be adapted for your community’s specific needs during the planning stage.

Click on the highlighted text to learn about each type of information the damage assessment response team should record.

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Life Safety Issues/Immediate Needs

Reporting life safety issues is paramount, not only to maintain the safety of the damage assessment response team members, but also that of individuals in the community. A life safety issue is any issue that presents an immediate hazard. Examples are live power lines, leaking chemicals, gas leaks, and wild animals. Follow your community's designated procedures for reporting life safety issues as soon as they are identified.

Any immediate needs issues should also be identified and reported. Immediate needs are defined as food, water, sanitation, shelter, need for Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM), etc.

Date and time of assessment

It is important to note the date and time you are conducting your assessment. Multiple assessments may need to be conducted following an event, and certain conditions, such as continued hazardous weather, may contribute to further damage. Documenting dates and times on assessment forms helps document the timeline of damage.

Location

Details about the location of the assessment need to be included. This information helps determine the perimeter of damage and helps locate the areas which received the most damage. That information can be useful later when planning distribution of resources.

Type of Structure/Infrastructure

Categories of structures can include single family dwellings, mobile homes, multi-family dwellings such as apartments or condominiums, public buildings, and commercial buildings.

Infrastructure includes lifeline systems such as utilities, roads, bridges, and public services.

Degree of Damage/Volume of Debris

The degree of damage a structure has sustained should be assigned a category based on the standards established in your community. The goal at this phase is not merely assigning a dollar amount to the damage, but rather getting an accurate description of the scope and magnitude of the damage. Rather than simply providing an estimated repair cost, information about the impact on the community should be included. Describe how the damage will impede, threaten, or prevent the community from functioning as it normally would. The estimated duration of the disruption and assistance required for recovery should be included as well.

The volume of debris is a necessary measurement, as it is an integral part of the declaration process. It will also help determine the community's ability to manage the event or disaster and help evaluate if managing the event or disaster is beyond the means of the community.

Comments

The team should also include any other observations that do not fit into any other category. For example:

• How damages will affect the provision of essential services such as potable water, sewer disposal, etc.
• How damages will affect the business community
• The potential economic impact of the damage

Prior to damage assessment response teams going out into the community, they should be briefed about the current situation and what they might expect in the field, based on available information. For example, if the power company has confirmed that all power in an area is off, team members need to have this information so that they know that downed power lines in that area are not dangerous.

If teams have been pre-positioned, a briefing could be conducted over the phone, or via a web or video conference.

In particular, they should be briefed about potential safety issues they may encounter.

They should also be reminded of their specific roles and responsibilities as well as the reporting procedures. A clear communication of roles and responsibilities will result in smoother relay of information about the extent of damage across the community.

Remember, zones should be defined as part of your community’s emergency management plan, and teams should already be familiar with their zones. This zone familiarization is important so the teams understand what “normal” is for their assigned zones so they can more readily assess the damage to those areas. In particular, teams should be aware of the hazards in the community and in their zones that have been identified in the Hazard Vulnerability Assessment (HVA).

During the pre-deployment briefings, the damage assessment response teams will be deployed based on which areas were affected by the event. Giving each team an assigned zone ensures that all areas are assessed and efforts are not duplicated.

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about safety briefings.

All personnel assigned to the damage assessment team should receive a safety briefing as part of the pre-deployment briefing.

Issues discussed should include:

• Weather forecast
• Known or expected hazards
• Cautionary statements regarding being properly hydrated, using seat belts, etc.
• Any personal protective requirements such as use of safety shoes, reflective vests, hats or helmets, sunscreen, layered clothing, etc.
• Identification requirements
• Use of vehicle lights/warning lights as needed
• Communications plan
• Any other issues specific to the area

As part of the pre-deployment briefing, teams should understand the hazards they may face and what they should be looking for when conducting damage assessments. It is critical that life safety issues be reported right away, for the protection of the teams and the community’s citizens. Follow-up information should be reported to the EOC.

Damage assessment response teams should determine the perimeter of the damaged area, remembering to report only disaster-related damages and life safety issues. Damage that is not disaster-related should not be reported as such. This is one reason it is important for teams to be familiar with their zones prior to a disaster. If teams are not familiar with their zones, damages may be misreported. To some degree, inspectors should know what's in other zones, because they may need to fill in for someone else. Some zones may be so damaged that they require additional inspectors. For these reasons, cross-training on damage assessment zones is important.

At this stage, the teams will use a “windshield survey” approach to verify the extent and impact of the damage. They should assess physical impacts on:

• Structures
• Debris
• Utilities/lifelines/infrastructure
• Additional hazards

Click on the highlighted text to learn about assessment of physical impacts.

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Structures

Teams should get detailed information about structures in the assigned zone that have been affected by the disaster. Qualified damage assessment response teams should assess the structural integrity of damaged buildings and report unstable structures immediately. It is important to keep members of the community out of potentially unstable structures.

An important consideration for the community's recovery and for determining whether or not the affected area will be eligible for State and Federal aid is the need for temporary housing. Thus, it is important for damage assessment teams to provide information about the habitability of the homes that have been damaged. When conducting habitability assessments, teams should not focus on property value – only on whether residents can live in the structure.

Debris

Estimates of the volume of debris must be included in information that is submitted to the State as part of the declaration process. Information about the location of the debris should be included as well.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has developed specific techniques for calculating debris estimates. You can find more information in the Toolkit.

Utilities/Lifelines/Infrastructure

While out assessing damage, teams should determine areas that need immediate assistance because of damage to utilities and other lifelines (e.g., water, sewer, power). Hazards that pose a serious life safety issue, such as downed power lines, must be reported as soon as they are identified.

If your community uses the recommended first-in team approach, you will have been informed about any known power-related issues, because utilities crews should be on the first-in team. They can let others know that power is out and inform them of when it is safe to enter the area.

Additional Hazards

Damage assessment response teams need to be aware of additional hazards, such as those pre-identified in the HVA, so that they can report back on the state of those hazards. Other hazards that may be present are dependent on the disaster type and could include water-borne and vector-borne diseases, chemical spills, fires, wild animals, snakes, rodents, and even domestic animals that can become dangerous after they've gone hungry for several days.

Remember, your community’s standards for assigning damage ratings should be in accordance with FEMA’s 4-point system. That methodology for assigning damage levels is divided into four categories: affected, minor damage, major damage, and destroyed.

The affected category includes dwellings with minimal damage to structure and/or contents, when the home is habitable without repairs.

This category also includes homes that are inaccessible. Once accessible, the homes can be evaluated for a more accurate determination of the level of damage.

Minor damage encompasses a wide range of damage and is generally the most common type of damage. Minor damage exists when the home is damaged and uninhabitable, but may be habitable in a short period of time with home repairs.

To determine whether the rating of “minor damage” applies, consider whether the damages are less than the maximum Housing Assistance Repair Grant, windows or doors have been blown in, or if a backup of one foot or more of water or sewer in the basement exists, such as from furnace or water heater damage.

Also consider how much of the structure has been damaged. If it is less than 50%, it is classified as minor damage.

Major damage exists when structural or significant damages have been sustained, the structure is uninhabitable, and it requires extensive repairs.

To determine whether the rating of “major damage” applies, consider whether there is substantial failure of structural elements of the residence, such as the walls, roof, floors, or foundation.

Also consider whether the damages to the structure exceed the Home Repair Grant maximum. One foot or more of water in the first floor of a home with a basement also constitutes major damage.

If more than 50% of the structure has been damaged (but the structure is not a total loss), this is classified as major damage.

Destroyed means the structure is a total loss or damaged to such an extent that repairs are not economically feasible, and/or the structure is permanently uninhabitable.

Damages that cause complete failure of major structural components, such as collapse of the basement walls, foundation, or roof, are classified as destroyed.

Likewise, if only the foundation remains, or if the structure has been pushed off the foundation, this is considered destroyed.

When two or more walls and have been destroyed the roof has been substantially damaged, this is also classified as destroyed.

Finally, this rating may be used even if the structure is otherwise unaffected but will require removal or demolition. Examples include homes in imminent danger due to impending landslides, mudslides, or sinkholes, as well as beachfront homes that must be removed due to local ordinance violations as a result of beach erosion.

Information about the type and location of damage should be recorded. This includes mapping the damage in addition to providing a description. It should also include videos and/or photographs, when possible. It is important to keep accurate and thorough documentation because inaccurate or incomplete damage assessment information can cause inappropriate distribution of resources due to inaccurate setting of priorities. There could be increased negative environmental impacts. It can even result in a delayed or denied Presidential declaration of disaster.

During the planning phase, your community will have determined what forms will be used as part of its damage assessment procedures. These forms need to be completed correctly and efficiently so that information about the impact of the disaster can be reported in a timely manner. If your community is using an electronic method of recording data, there should be a backup plan in case of technological difficulties. It is advisable to have paper copies of the electronic forms available just in case.

The data recorded by local officials is then reported to state officials. The state compiles the local information into a report to be submitted to Federal officials often as part of a request for additional assistance via a declaration of disaster. Damage assessment response team members need to be aware of the policies and procedures defined in your community’s plan so that all necessary data can be reported.

HAZUS-MH can be a useful tool during this stage; FEMA will accept HAZUS-MH for preliminary damage assessment. GIS is another valuable tool for identifying the location of infrastructure and any associated damages. You can find more information about HAZUS-MH and GIS in the Toolkit.

The key to success is having an up-to-date damage assessment plan, the correct forms, and assessors that are properly trained.

Many times following an event, the damage assessment response team may be the first contact that the community has with any local government representative.

Members of the community may have many questions for you. While all questions must be referred to the Joint Information Center (JIC), you can provide some answers for the community members by being prepared with any pamphlets, flyers, booklets, or handouts that may help them better understand what to do following this event in regards to Individual Assistance (IA), locations of Points of Distribution (PODs), or even just relevant phone numbers of organizations or help lines that could provide assistance or more information.

Because the damage assessment response team members are on the “front line” of the disaster, they will be exposed firsthand to the human impact of the event. They may encounter community members who are injured, devastated by the loss of their property, or searching for friends, family members, or lost pets. Some may be mourning the death of a loved one. In addition, the disaster response team members may themselves have been personally affected by the event.

The human impact of disasters can be very unsettling and stressful for disaster response team members and may become overwhelming, particularly if they have suffered losses themselves. They need to be educated about recognizing the signs of stress and how to manage it. By managing stress levels and taking time to take care of themselves, the team members will be better prepared to help others during the deployment.

When debriefing disaster response teams to gain a better understanding of the physical impact of the disaster, supervisors should also be aware of the mental impact – both to the community and to the responders. Following an event, a community should be prepared for an increased demand for mental health services. The need for Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) should be acknowledged in emergency plans, and providers of mental health services, such as voluntary agencies, faith-based groups, and private agencies, should be pre-identified with contracts in place for support after a disaster.

In this lesson, you learned about local damage assessment operations, including the recommended members and responsibilities of first-in teams and damage assessment response teams, as well as some basic procedures for conducting local damage assessment. You also received reminders about considerations for damage assessment response team members that extend beyond assessing damage.

Remember, because all communities are different, specific procedures for damage assessment should be defined in your community-specific damage assessment plan.

Click this link to view a list of all items provided in the Toolkit for this lesson.

The following resources were references in this lesson and are provided in the Toolkit.

Resource Links:

• U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (debris calculations)
• HAZUS-MH
• Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

Sample Documents:

• Standard Operating Guide for First-In Teams
• Damage Assessment Forms

As you’ve learned, damage assessment activities drive the rest of the response and recovery actions. It is critical to collect accurate and thorough information and to maintain the appropriate documentation.

In this lesson, you will learn about methods for documentation and record keeping as a part of your damage assessment program. You will also learn how that data can be used after the event.

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Explain how damage assessment information is used after the event.
• Explain documentation and record-keeping methods for effective damage assessments.

The information collected by damage assessment response teams is used for many purposes. Immediately following an event, data provides essential information for decision-makers, which is used for setting response priorities and determining the need for staging areas (e.g., close to the damaged areas).

Damage assessment informs decision makers about repair and restoration needs for critical infrastructure and key resources, as well as impacts to response capabilities. This early information also provides needed data about the socio-economic needs of the community as far as housing, social services, and the like. Information about collection/disposal needs and debris estimates help you allocate resources and helps determine other planning priorities such as landfill life and debris disposal options.

All of this information feeds into the Preliminary Damage Assessment and is ultimately required as a part of the Presidential Disaster Declaration Process. It helps determine if your community has surpassed damage thresholds; is overwhelmed and is in need of additional resources; and the level of aid that may be needed – whether State, Federal, mutual aid, or contract resources.

From a more long-term perspective, the data can be used to determine areas of the damage assessment program that may be in need of improvement. In addition, the information can be used to help identify mitigation planning opportunities in your community, and it feeds into the Post Disaster Redevelopment Plan.

• Agencies’ ability to provide services
• The need for critical infrastructure repair/restoration
• New response priorities
• The need for and potential location of staging areas
• Socio-economic needs
• Collection/disposal needs
• Resource allocation
• Planning priorities
• The need for State and Federal assistance
• The need for mutual aid
• Areas for program improvement
• Mitigation opportunities
• Recovery priorities

The collection of information should be coordinated with different teams and agencies and at varying levels of government. You should collect information from damage assessment response teams, amateur radio volunteers, Community Emergency Response Teams (CERT), first responders, service providers, the media, and social networking. Remember, it is important to verify the information you receive, particularly with social media. It is important to collect accurate information. Be sure to coordinate with different teams and agencies at varying levels of government when collecting information.

Collect as much information as you can to document the damage. All of this information can be reported to the Damage Assessment Coordinator through the reporting system established by your plan, such as radio communication, collection of forms, and/or in-person debriefs.

The documentation of damage can be recorded on electronic or paper forms. Your collection of information should also include photographs and video if available.

Click on the links to view examples of damage assessment documentation methods.

Photo Documentation

Alternate Means of Data Collection

Photo Documentation

When you take photos of damage in the community, it is important to keep accurate records of where the photos were taken. One way to do this is to complete a location form and include it in the photo.

Alternate Means of Data Collection

Although your community's first-in teams (if used) and the local damage assessment response teams should be relied upon as the primary resources for gathering damage assessment information, do not overlook the wealth of information that can be provided by local residents.

Invite residents to submit damage photos to an email account or post them to your emergency management agency's social media sites. Better yet, provide an electronic form that can be submitted online to provide the degree of detail you need, with contact information so your agency can follow up for more information.

For example, after severe weather in the spring of 2011, the Indiana Department of Homeland Security used an online survey to collect damage information. Press releases were issued to area newspapers to ensure that the public was informed about this option. If you use this method, be sure to explain, in the press release and the survey instructions, the intended use of the information and make it clear that completing the form does not constitute an application for assistance. Verification of information is critical.

In December of 2010, a rainstorm ravaged the state of Maine on the heels of a snowstorm that had dropped a foot of snow just a week earlier, causing devastating floods across several counties.

In Washington County, 8 to 10 inches of rain fell in two days. Roads and bridges were washed away by the raging floodwaters.

The Governor requested a Preliminary Damage Assessment in response to the rainstorm, as the first step toward qualifying for a Presidential disaster declaration.

By the time site inspectors arrived in Washington County, floodwaters had receded and another snowstorm had rolled in. A blanket of snow more than a foot deep covered the ground, concealing crumbled pavement, washed out roads, and other damages.

In Washington County, Maine, damage assessment teams had taken photos and carefully documented the damages caused by the December rainstorm.

In fact, records from the initial assessment showed over 800,000 dollars in damages, bringing the per capita damages for the county well over the established threshold to qualify for Federal assistance.

However, although the impacts in Washington County were staggering, the state as a whole did not meet the per capita threshold to qualify for disaster assistance based on the rainstorm damages. The request for a Presidential Disaster Declaration was denied.

As one of his last acts before a change in administration, the Governor transferred 100,000 dollars from the State Emergency Contingent Account to help the affected communities. It would not be nearly enough.

Immediately after the new Governor was sworn in, he wrote a letter to the President in hopes of turning around the decision. Because the first declaration request was based solely upon the rainstorm damages, he requested a new assessment to include damages from the snowstorm that had occurred the week prior.

A new assessment was done in January, and new information revealed over 1.7 million dollars in damage from the two storms. In Washington County alone, infrastructure damages exceeded a million dollars.

This time, all the appropriate damage thresholds were met, and three counties in Maine, including Washington County, as well as Tribal lands located in Washington County, were declared eligible for Public Assistance.

This declaration made Federal funding available, on a cost-sharing basis, for emergency work and the repair or replacement of damaged facilities in the affected areas.

In addition, the state became eligible for Federal funding, through the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, to implement hazard mitigation measures to lessen the impact of hazardous weather events in the future. Close

In this lesson, you learned that damage assessment documentation and record keeping are critically important for identifying needs, setting priorities, and allocating resources. In addition, accurate documentation is required as part of the Presidential Disaster Declaration Process.

Damage assessment information is also used to improve the damage assessment program, identify mitigation opportunities, and drive recovery efforts – all of which contribute to a more disaster-resistant community.

Click this link to view a list of all items provided in the Toolkit for this lesson.

A link to the following resource from this lesson is included in the Toolkit.

Damage Assessment after the Paso Robles (San Simeon, California) Earthquake: Lessons for Emergency Management

Narrator:

On December 22, 2003, an earthquake registering 6.5 on the Richter scale shook the small city of Paso Robles. The damages to the community were severe. Total financial losses, along with the cost of debris removal and emergency protective measures, amounted to more than 226 million dollars for the county. Research done after the event studied the effects of damage assessment in order to identify lessons learned for the emergency management profession. The study documented 10 important lessons.

Lesson One: Damage assessment plays a vital role during the initial minutes and hours of disaster response operations. Seconds after the earthquake, firefighters began summoning additional emergency response personnel and activating mutual aid agreements from neighboring jurisdictions. This quick response is believed to have prevented many fires in those early hours after the quake.

Lesson Two: Damage assessment is crucial to the recovery phase of emergency management and is required before resources can be acquired and utilized for disaster assistance and rebuilding.

As one public official noted after the earthquake, “If you are looking for any State or Federal assistance, you need to be able to substantiate those numbers.”

Lesson Three: Although damage assessment is a dangerous activity, it does promote a safer environment for the public and those involved with repairs, demolition, and reconstruction.

Responders after the earthquake had a dangerous job ahead of them. To keep damage assessment teams and others safe, firefighters cordoned off the most dangerous areas with yellow tape, and only those with the proper safety equipment – and accompanied by a firefighter – were allowed to approach the damaged buildings.

Lesson Four: There is an incredible convergence of personnel at the scene of a disaster for the purpose of evaluating the disaster’s impacts.

Damage assessment after the earthquake was conducted by the local Emergency Management Agency, the Fire Department, the American Red Cross, the Building Department, Public Works, volunteer architects and engineers, and officials from the county, State, and Federal levels of government. The Chamber of Commerce and Main Street Association helped local businesses determine lost income and other liabilities, and insurance companies assessed damages to settle claims with their clients.

Lesson Five: There are different types of damage assessments and diverse methods to conduct them.

An initial damage assessment (also known as a windshield survey or a drive-through assessment) was conducted immediately after the event.

Later, aerial damage assessments covered the large geographic area affected by the quake. Site assessments were conducted to gain an up-close visual evaluation of damaged buildings.

As time progressed, additional detailed information was collected, and eventually all of this information was included as part of the Preliminary Damage Assessment to contribute to the Presidential Disaster Declaration application.

Lesson Six: Damage assessment is not a one-time occurrence, but a repetitive process.

By conducting multiple damage assessments, officials in Paso Robles were able to evaluate damage they couldn’t detect in early assessments, as well as that done by aftershocks, and reevaluate buildings for entry once stabilized.

Lesson Seven: Accuracy of initial and even later damage assessments may be questionable.

Structural integrity may often be seen only upon careful inspection from within, which was difficult or impossible with many of the buildings damaged in the earthquake. Some information was delayed as well because many property owners were out of town for the holiday season.

Lesson Eight: Damage assessment is a politically salient activity after a disaster occurs.

When the earth stopped shaking, the disturbing images of destruction encouraged quick action not only by local officials, but by the Governor and congressional leaders.

Lesson Nine: There are several challenges confronting damage assessment personnel.

Damage assessment teams had to deal with people who wanted to obtain their personal belongings from damaged buildings, and business owners who were frustrated because they could not reopen due to safety concerns.

Communicating with other responders presented a challenge because of the sheer number of people involved. In addition, there was some variance in counting techniques and documentation methods used by different organizations.

Lesson Ten: Many steps can be taken before and after a disaster to ensure an efficient and effective assessment of damages.

All things considered, the damage assessment after the Paso Robles earthquake was fairly successful. County level interviewees believed that their prior planning, training and experience in damage assessment made the function easier to perform. Other major strengths that were noted were widespread knowledge of standard operating procedures and a concerted effort to reach out to the community to gather damage reports.

What can you learn from the Paso Robles earthquake that will help your community respond when disaster strikes?