Just wanted to give you a heads up - you may want to include Stargazer’s BE REALLY READY campaign - simple safety kits for families, groups, and businesses to save critical information and make it available when its needed most! Answers to the question of what would you do if you could not get home tonight?.

-john

I’d like to encourage every medical librarian to develop a MOU. The one I created started for the hospitals I serve in New Jersey. It was developed with the invaluable assistance and feedback and input from Barbara Reich, medical librarian at Hackensack University Medical Center, Hackensack, NJ.

I spent a good deal of time researching agreements between medical organizations and best practices, before I wrote this one. It also comes from my operational and library experiences responding to 9/11 information needs of hospitals and community groups for my organization. Good luck to everyone, don’t delay do a MOU today.

Thanks for an informative and productive day! I look forward to working more with our State Coordinators to implement our regional plan.

The University of Virginia (UVa) held a tornado drill, which included our library, on March 18 at 9:45 AM (see http://www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/newsRelease.php?id=4544 for more information). The drill had been announced two days before it was scheduled to occur. Overall, our library’s plan functioned well, but the drill definitely served its purpose, as it tested the systems and the knowledge of staff, and effectively showed the areas that need to be improved. Our Library Director held a drill de-briefing meeting this morning, so that we could share information/observations about the exercise and what we need to do to improve our planning and training. Lessons learned from the drill:
–in our library, staff followed procedures for sheltering-in-place. Patrons were given the option to participate in the drill or not, and only one person took shelter with our staff.
–we realized that our shelter-in-place plans need to be clarified so that everyone realizes the differences between sheltering-in-place for tornadoes and sheltering from a biochemical/hazmat situation or an active shooter
–a goal of the drill was that it be completed in 3 minutes. We found that this is adequate time if the overhead PA system is working. However, if power is off when a tornado is sighted, staff will have to warn patrons in person. We have a bullhorn with a siren, and have moved it to Circulation for use in making announcements if necessary.
–we had already contacted the Office of Emergency Preparedness at UVa to request help in verifying the best shelter locations in our library, so we look forward to having their guidance
–we are investigating the purchase of signs to designate shelter-in-place spaces in the library, once our sites are verified by UVa’s Office Emergency Preparedness