What if a dangerous chemical spills during a flood? What if a chemical plant is too close to a large forest fire? How to protect communities and environment from hazardous materials in the most effective way? How to work together if the accident is close to the national border? Scenario-based exercises are the best way for finding answers to these questions. It is the closest the responders can get to testing their skills in the real accident.
On 24 November 2021, NET-CBRN-REACT project gathered 20 experts from five countries and the European Commission for the first workshop to agree on guidelines for preparation of realistic and challenging disaster scenarios. The workshop was planned to be held in Lviv, Ukraine, but due to the worsening epidemiological situation was converted to a fully digital event and split into two parts.
In the first part, the participants, who came from international organisations, research and training institutions and civil protection agencies discussed the draft guidelines, presented by the ICCSS Program Director, Dr Lech Starostin. The guidelines emphasised plausibility and adequate level of complexity as important factors for a successful scenario-based exercise. It can be achieved by preparing credible prior history narration, event incident description and detailed list of scenario’s inputs.
After agreeing on the guidelines as a main framework for developing disaster scenario templates the participants will move on to the next part of the workshop, which will be aimed at developing detailed scenarios for table-top and field exercise templates for major forest fires and floods. These disasters were chosen by the consortium as the most relevant for the countries participating in the project.
Development and approval of scenarios and the establishment of on-line experts support network will be in focus during the second part of the workshop, which will be held online on 20th December 2021.
NET-CBRN-REACT is set to improve response capacity of participating countries to use the Union Civil Protection Mechanism (UCPM) and to contribute to the development of its newly established Knowledge Network by engaging partners outside EU.