From a Small Disaster to Worst-Case Scenario:
Not Planning for Disaster Makes the Emergency Worse

Is there any true way to test how prepared you are in the face of real, life-threatening and life-altering disaster?

What catastrophes like Hurricane Katrina and the BP oil spill have taught us is that it’s hard to plan for the worst-case scenario and the ensuing aftermath.

It’s not that these events were “unexpected.” Everyone knew a hurricane of Katrina’s magnitude could conceivably hit Gulf Coast shores. Everyone knows that oil spills can happen if you’re drilling for oil.

What people failed to recognize in both cases was how to prepare adequately for the absolute worst-case scenario. What happens when nothing you’ve planned for works?

Maybe they just didn’t want to face the reality of how bad a catastrophe could turn out to be. But not planning adequately for huge disasters only makes the disaster bigger – and then you really will have a worst-case scenario on your hands.

Find out what it really takes to be prepared for disaster from many different angles in this accredited emergency planning training session. Whether you are looking at an industrial, an office or a government setting, this training could mean the difference between managing a disaster and letting the disaster get away from you.

How do you reach out to your planning team? How do you look realistically at every outcome, so that you know what kind of aftermath you could be facing?

And how do you PRACTICE for the disaster? After all, an emergency plan isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on if it only stays on the paper. You have to know how events and emergency responses will play out during the real deal. How do you run a realistic emergency drill, and how do you get an accurate picture of your vulnerabilities from it?

Improve your organization’s response, see how you fit into the community response plan, and learn how to evaluate your survival options realistically and unflinchingly. Sign up today for this revealing, and potentially life-saving, accredited emergency planning training session to keep your potential disaster from being listed in the same paragraph with “Katrina” and “BP.”

Learning Objectives:

• What is your organization’s definition of a disaster – and how do you evaluate different levels of disaster?
• What are the critical parts of planning that most people miss – and how can you plan honestly and unflinchingly without looking away from the most devastating details?
• The 3 stages of disaster – preparation, response, recovery. Where do you stand at each stage?
• Who needs to be on your planning team? How do you choose?
• What is the key to executing a successful disaster simulation exercise – and how do you measure your successes and your vulnerabilities?

Presented by:

Michael J. Fagel, Ph.D., CEM

Michael Jay Fagel, Ph.D., CEM, has over three decades of experience in public service across many different sectors, including fire service, emergency medical service, public health, law enforcement, and emergency management. He has also worked in corporate safety, security and threat risk management.

Mr. Fagel has worked with numerous prestigious agencies, including the National Domestic Preparedness Office SLAG team (NDPO) at the FBI, FEMA in their Occupational Safety & Health Cadre, and the Fire Department of New York. He has been a responder to incidents and disasters such as the Oklahoma City bombing. He has also been an exercise developer and lead for several regional operations as well as for specific federal partners.

His international experience includes spending several months in the Middle East, helping to create a national response plan and create a new FEMA-type organization. He was a delegate to the European Conference on Emergency Management held in Budapest in 2007. Mr. Fagel currently acts as a Homeland Security Analyst at the Argonne National Laboratories, engaged in the protection of Critical Infrastructure.

Locally, he is an active member of the Northern Illinois Critical Incident Stress Debriefing Team and the International Association of Fire Chiefs, serving on both their Committee on Safety and Health and their Terrorism Committee. He serves on the Illinois Terrorism Task Force, where he served as the Region V president for the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM), and was a Certified Emergency Manager Commissioner (CEM) for IAEM as well.

Mr. Fagel teaches undergraduate and graduate classes at the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, Benedictine University, and Eastern Kentucky University in topics that range from bio defense to public health to emergency management.

Mr. Fagel has delivered over 350 lectures across the nation and written over 100 articles on safety and disaster planning. He has published two textbooks on food safety and emergency management topics and has served as an editor for numerous trade textbook chapters. He has appeared on Fox, NBC and NPR.

Who would benefit from this program:

• Safety Managers
• Safety Directors
• Safety Executives
• Safety Professionals

Continuing Education:

• This program has been applied for CIH and CSP Continuing Education Credits. Earn .25 CM Points for CIHs and .156 Points for CSP.
• This is a CEU presentation. Earn 0.15 CEU credits for attending. For a list of organizations accepting this CEU, please visit http://www.iacet.org/content/accepting-ceus.html.
• This program meets the requirements for 1.5 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs).

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Length: 2 hours