It became apparent after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, that our nation wasn't adequately prepared for mass casualty catastrophes

Question

Having numerous agencies working together brought on some unexpected problems and issues, such as communicating with each other and figuring out who was ultimately responsible for decisions. What if anything has our nation done or should do better to prepare for multi-agency disasters?

Answer 1

The National Incident Management System (NIMS) provides a systematic, proactive approach to guide departments and agencies at all levels of government, nongovernmental organizations, and the private sector to work seamlessly to prevent, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate the effects of incidents, regardless of cause, size, location, or complexity, in order to reduce the loss of life and property and harm to the environment.

The concept of Incident Management System (IMS) was developed more than thirty years ago, in the aftermath of a devastating wildfire in California. During 13 days in 1970, 16 lives were lost, 700 structures were destroyed and over one-half million acres burned. The overall cost and loss associated with these fires totaled $18 million per day. Although all of the responding agencies cooperated to the best of their ability, numerous problems with communication and coordination hampered their effectiveness. As a result, the Congress mandated that the U.S. Forest Service design a system that would "make a quantum jump in the capabilities of Southern California wildland fire protection agencies to effectively coordinate interagency action and to allocate suppression resources in dynamic, multiple-fire situations."

After 911, President Bush called on the Secretary of Homeland Security to develop a national incident management system to provide a consistent nationwide approach for federal, state, tribal and local governments to work together to prepare for, prevent, respond to and recover from domestic incidents, regardless of cause, size, or complexity.

On March 1, 2004, after close collaboration with state and local government officials and
representatives from a wide range of public safety organizations, Homeland Security issued the
NIMS. It incorporates many existing best practices into a comprehensive national approach to
domestic incident management, applicable at all jurisdictional levels and across all functional
disciplines.

The NIMS represents a core set of doctrine, principles, terminology, and organizational
processes to enable effective, efficient, and collaborative incident management at all levels. To
provide the framework for interoperability and compatibility, the NIMS is based on a balance
between flexibility and standardization. The recommendations of the National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (the "9/11 Commission") further highlight the
importance of IMS. The Commission's recent report recommends national adoption of the IMS
to enhance command, control, and communications capabilities.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) offers several on-line NIMS trainings free of charge at http://training.fema.gov/IS/NIMS.aspx. After passing the exam, you will receive a certificate. There are several categories of NIMS training and certificates available, such as law enforcement, schools, hospitals, firefighting, etc.