MIND-VERSA: A new Methodology for IdentifyiNg and Determining loopholes and the completeness Value of Emergency ResponSe plAns

•Organizations can reinforce their overall emergency response capacity.•Method to identify emergency response plans’ loopholes.•Evaluation number of how well “equipped” is an emergency response plan.•Validation of a case study research results’. There is a need for organizations and public services...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Safety science 2021-04, Vol.136, p.105154, Article 105154
Main Authors: Kafoutis, Georgios Charalampos E., Dokas, Ioannis M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Emergency medical care
Emergency plans
Emergency preparedness
Emergency response
Enhanced plan methodology
Evacuation
Evacuations & rescues
Fire prevention
Forest fires
Improvement of emergency response plans
Methodology
MIND-VERSA
Natural disaster
STECA
Technological disaster
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Summary:•Organizations can reinforce their overall emergency response capacity.•Method to identify emergency response plans’ loopholes.•Evaluation number of how well “equipped” is an emergency response plan.•Validation of a case study research results’. There is a need for organizations and public services to reinforce their overall emergency response capacity based not only in an ad hoc approach e.g. exercises, but also towards a more sophisticated and evidence-based approach to analyze emergency response plans, evaluate their overall capacity and maximize their efficacy based alternatively on modern systems’ theory methods. This paper focuses on the development of a new methodology, utilizing a systems’ theory method, that: a) identifies emergency plans’ loopholes and b) provides a numerical value that indicates the “distance” between what is planned and what should have been planned. For this purpose, a case study has been used and the proposed methodology was applied to the official evacuation plan due to forest fires, of Greece's Civil Protection Agency. Thirty-one missing specifications or loopholes were identified which made the emergency response plan dysfunctional and a value was calculated indicating that there was a considerable distance between the initial plan and the enhanced plan. These results were compared and validated against the prosecutors’ investigation findings of the 2018 forest fire in the small resort of “Mati” Greece, 18 miles east of Athens, where more than 100 people died because of the fire.
ISSN:0925-7535
1879-1042
DOI:10.1016/j.ssci.2020.105154