The winds of Ike are blowing hard southwest of us, but just a strong breeze (read: small craft warnings) here in Baton Rouge. The Red Cross is strong on preparedness, so my trip to New Orleans got cancelled today, and headquarters shut down at 2:00 so we could stay out if the worst of the traffic. Then, when we got to the hotel where we're staying, the power was out for 3 hours, then on and off three or four times before it stayed on around 7:30.
The TV is now displaying all the tornado watches and warnings near here, all in the LA parishes SW of here, towards Texas. By and large, the Cajuns have been pretty laid back in the face of all that's going on here, but I think we're all getting a bit weather weary.
The TV is now displaying all the tornado watches and warnings near here, all in the LA parishes SW of here, towards Texas. By and large, the Cajuns have been pretty laid back in the face of all that's going on here, but I think we're all getting a bit weather weary.
Not sure what will happen next, but I'm thinking we'll got back to Maine when our term is up on September 22nd. Consuelo has a cold, along with lots of other people at HQ. Most of them are sleeping in shelters, where colds spread like wildfire. So far, I've stayed immune, but I'm sure that won't last.
My work has been handicapped by no power, no network, no server, slooooow communications. It makes me wonder whether all this technology that the Red Cross depends on is really the right lone solution. But we keep pushing on, and when we're not, we're sitting on our hands.
For the geeks that might read this, a major Red Cross Disaster Response (DR) runs on lots of laptops, backed up by a major server with full backup. The function is to procure, track and manage resources needed to support the operation, such as finances, supplies (food, toilet paper), and our staff. Reports are produced daily, indicating measures of activity, like how many shelters are open, how many staff are on the ground, and how many rental cars we have. The disaster itself is measured by our disaster assessment team, who travel through the affected area to inspect the actual damage. After that is done, client caseworkers provide dollars for victims with immediate needs.
The laptops tie into an ethernet network, which connects with our national sites by T1 if available, or via a high speed satellite link. For our personnel database, we run an application that talks to a remote database across the network. If the network is down, we wait. If the application hiccups, we wait. Over the last 3 days, we have had less than one full day of useful work time. I got more work done in 2 hours in my staff lodging than I did in two days at HQ, because of program/network problems.
And of course, we have the GIGO function. I estimate that there are about 40 people feeding data into the database for this operation alone. My job is to make the data as accurate as possible. I am quickly reminded of the EDS commercial showing the cowboy herding cats. In my opinion the job is not to provide 100% accuracy, but rather to allow management to quickly spot trends and maneuver resources to be most effective. The response to Gustav has tested this need exhaustively, as we've arrived, prepared mega-shelters, pulled them down, then put them back in place for Ike. Some of the staff feels like they're on a merry-go-round, and others have been twiddling their thumbs in both directions, but the news about Gustav died down rapidly after the storm, and to me that's a good sign that we got our job done.
Our the mission is a valuable one, we address a need that is not met in quite the same way as any other organization. Some folks think that we compete with the Salvation Army, but I don't think so. Our focus is on providing immediate need after a disaster, and I think the Salvation Army is around all the time. SA doesn't do disaster assessment, and to the degree possible, we're trying to cooperate with FEMA on this. But our standards are different than FEMA, we have more granularity. And we intend to disappear, or at least dissolve back into the local chapters, that are always responding to local disasters like apartment fires.
Tomorrow, if time permits, I'll take more classes to further acquaint myself with other portions of a disaster operation. Then I can be more of a know-it-all.
For the geeks that might read this, a major Red Cross Disaster Response (DR) runs on lots of laptops, backed up by a major server with full backup. The function is to procure, track and manage resources needed to support the operation, such as finances, supplies (food, toilet paper), and our staff. Reports are produced daily, indicating measures of activity, like how many shelters are open, how many staff are on the ground, and how many rental cars we have. The disaster itself is measured by our disaster assessment team, who travel through the affected area to inspect the actual damage. After that is done, client caseworkers provide dollars for victims with immediate needs.
The laptops tie into an ethernet network, which connects with our national sites by T1 if available, or via a high speed satellite link. For our personnel database, we run an application that talks to a remote database across the network. If the network is down, we wait. If the application hiccups, we wait. Over the last 3 days, we have had less than one full day of useful work time. I got more work done in 2 hours in my staff lodging than I did in two days at HQ, because of program/network problems.
And of course, we have the GIGO function. I estimate that there are about 40 people feeding data into the database for this operation alone. My job is to make the data as accurate as possible. I am quickly reminded of the EDS commercial showing the cowboy herding cats. In my opinion the job is not to provide 100% accuracy, but rather to allow management to quickly spot trends and maneuver resources to be most effective. The response to Gustav has tested this need exhaustively, as we've arrived, prepared mega-shelters, pulled them down, then put them back in place for Ike. Some of the staff feels like they're on a merry-go-round, and others have been twiddling their thumbs in both directions, but the news about Gustav died down rapidly after the storm, and to me that's a good sign that we got our job done.
Our the mission is a valuable one, we address a need that is not met in quite the same way as any other organization. Some folks think that we compete with the Salvation Army, but I don't think so. Our focus is on providing immediate need after a disaster, and I think the Salvation Army is around all the time. SA doesn't do disaster assessment, and to the degree possible, we're trying to cooperate with FEMA on this. But our standards are different than FEMA, we have more granularity. And we intend to disappear, or at least dissolve back into the local chapters, that are always responding to local disasters like apartment fires.
Tomorrow, if time permits, I'll take more classes to further acquaint myself with other portions of a disaster operation. Then I can be more of a know-it-all.
No comments:
Post a Comment