Emergency Managers: Are You Prepared for Water Loss?

We stand in autumn’s vivid landscape of fiery reds, golden yellows, deep oranges—but the preparations for the winter emergency management season are already underway.

We are only a few weeks from our crisp nights becoming biting days. And soon we’ll be bundled in boots and coats beneath drifting snow, bracing for winter’s challenges. Sad as it is to say, the time for your facility’s emergency preparedness leaders to get ready for winter challenges is here.

I don’t mean to be overly morose, but I am striving to be overly prepared. That’s why a case from last year caught my attention.

A health system loses its water supply

We think of winter as the snow season, featuring transportation challenges, an influx of cold and flu patients, and overtaxed emergency rooms, but you should also be thinking about what the cold weather can do to your water supply.

In January, Richmond, Virginia experienced a massive water outage that lasted for days and impacted over 225,000 individuals. The outage occurred when the region was hit with a significant winter storm that contributed to a malfunction at the city’s water treatment plant. At the treatment plant, a power transfer failure set off a “cascade’ of events” leaving homes, businesses, and the health care infrastructure significantly disrupted.

As emergency managers we are always thinking about the hypothetical cascade of events.

Lessons in readiness

Ahead of the storm, the area health system prepared for snow-related issues like removal, impassable roadways, and potential staffing issues. And, per facilities management, “the last thing” they thought of was the city’s water supply. Staff noted that’s not the case anymore.

The health system’s first sign of an issue was a slight loss of pressure. A few hours later, the medical center had a strong suspicion that the issue at the city’s plant was much worse than originally thought. As temperatures dropped, concerns rose. Water from the city’s system was critically needed to create steam and produce heat. Evacuation was a brief thought but was disregarded as it was not a viable option.

Taking action

The incident command center was activated. As a team, the center began navigating the event, and the hospital turned to an individual who recently supported efforts at a facility impacted by last year’s Hurricane Helene event. Taking this knowledge and experience, the facility team set out to overcome the challenge they faced. 

After hours of analyzing “every aspect of the medical center’s water and steam delivery systems,” a plan was created to have tanker trucks haul in the 30,000 gallons of water an hour that was needed to maintain operations.

Before that could be done, the fabrication of new pipes needed to be completed to allow for the correct water volume and pressures. To complicate things even more, the hospital “only “sourced trucks with potable water” to avoid sanitation issues which was a lesson learned from Hurricane Helene.

It was a colossal effort on many individuals, but the facility succeeded. 

Lessons learned

Seasons shift, bringing both beauty and challenge. Winter will soon arrive, along with its familiar hardships. Though we can't predict every obstacle, we can learn and prepare—individually and as teams—by imagining scenarios that may seem only remotely possible.

Quitting wasn’t an option then, and it shouldn’t be now. If we lack answers, someone else may have insights that can help us. And when we face big challenges, we get the privilege of imagining big solutions. That’s not morose at all!

For more information, contact Matthew Linse, manager, emergency management.