FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Aug. 26, 2011
Contact: Anika Mitchell Perkins
(662) 329-7124
aperkins@pa.muw.edu

Local, area and state agencies to participate in disaster training exercise at MUW

COLUMBUS, Miss. – Mississippi University for Women will serve as the site for a community-wide disaster training exercise on Wednesday, Aug. 31, which will commence at 8 a.m.
           
Senior students in MUW’s bachelor of science in nursing program and faculty as well as campus police, Columbus Air Force Base personnel and local and state emergency responders will participate in the mock scenario, which will involve an active shooter drill and chemical spray release.

“The training exercise is designed to establish a learning environment for community key stakeholders to exercise emergency response plans, policies and procedures,” said Dr. Deborah Miranda, associate professor of nursing. “Our students will gain better understanding of how community agencies cooperate in planning to mitigate the consequences of a man-made disaster.”

One of those agencies involved is the Columbus Lowndes County Emergency Management Agency.
           
Its director Cindy Lawrence said “Training exercises are necessary because it prepares the emergency response agencies for real-world events. From past experiences, we know that preparedness does save lives.”

Miranda said the MUW students involved in the exercise will walk away with many valuable lessons including the ability to describe a variety of characteristics of disasters, how community health nurses participate in disasters, the ability to discern what factors contribute to a community’s potential for experiencing a disaster, identifying agencies that must respond during a disaster and victim triage and tagging categories.

“Students who participated in last year’s training exercise were well prepared and ready to put what they had learned into practice when the tornadoes tore across North Mississippi and West Alabama this past spring.

Jeff Smith, exercise officer 1 with the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency, participated in last year’s exercise that was held on campus.

He said it was “one of the best full scale exercises that I have seen. Everybody was very professional.”
In the early 1990s, MUW students regularly participated in disaster exercises, according to Miranda. However, by the late 1990s it became too expensive to continue the practice because of reduced funding to both the campus and emergency response agencies.

“With increasing acts of violence perpetrated in our society, raising awareness of how community leaders and emergency response teams can mitigate the harmful consequences of man-made as well as natural disasters has become ever more important,” she said.
           
MUW Police Chief Kennedy Meaders added, "I feel that having these types of drills and training with other agencies give us an opportunity to see where our weaknesses and strengths are.

“The partnerships and participation with other agencies is vital to the success of the mission if and when a major incident occurs on campus. The time to fix the problems is during drills like these, not when the actual event occurs. The overall safety of the campus, faculty and staff is our priority and during this drill, safety is our top priority.”
           
There will be no access to campus at the front gate, and no parking and traffic in the area in front of Cochran and Welty Hall will be allowed between 8 a.m. and noon the day of the exercise. Gates at Third Avenue South, Fourth Avenue South and 11th Street South will be locked. Individuals entering campus should do so at Fifth Avenue South and 11th Street South or the back gates off of 15th Street South.  
           

September is designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency as National Preparedness Month.