HT Correspondent
SILCHAR, Nov 17: A mock drill was held in Silchar on Thursday to test the ability to carry out rescue and relief operations in natural calamities like earthquakes.
The mock drill was initiated by the disaster management authority of the district administration, the speed of rescue and relief operations was verified by artificially creating an earthquake scenario in five buildings of Silchar.
The mock drill began with a siren which was played through the FLS system of the regional office of Information & Public Relations Barak valley zone, Silchar Assam at 9 am. The news came to the Disaster Management Authority’s Emergency Operations Center. The Incident Response System (IRS) was activated immediately to deal with the disaster.
An Incident Command Post has been set up in the settlement office here in Silchar.
In this system, rescue and relief operations started under the leadership of the responsible officer (i.e. DC). An incident commander (i.e. CEO, DDMA) took the responsibility to deal with the entire disaster. Section heads of operations section, logistics section, planning section, etc., sat in a meeting to prepare an incident action plan in the ICP. The plan was finalised with all section chiefs. Satellite phones and VHF wireless sets were used after the telephone lines were destroyed in the disaster. The incident commander directs all emergency departments including fire department, health department, traffic, APRO, APDCL, etc., to speed up their respective departmental disaster response operations. Operation led rescue and relief efforts at the affected areas began. Various forces like NDRF, SDRF, Assam Rifles, Police, Aapda Mitra Volunteers, NYK Volunteers, NGO Volunteers, etc., were involved in the rescue measures.
Prior to this, the staging area was set up on the police parade ground and all the resources used in the rescue and rescue phase were submitted. A total of 16 people were killed and 52 injured in this earthquake of 8.7 Richter scale. Injured persons were admitted in Red Cross Hospital, Jiban Jyoti Hospital and Silchar Medical College & Hospital Silchar.
Meanwhile, a relief camp was also set up under Deshbhakta Tarun Ram IRS where 20 families were given shelter.
After the operation, the incident commander briefed the press. He said that 2 people were killed and 8 injured in Soil Conservation Office, 2 people were killed and 8 injured in Zil Kadar Ali Higher Secondary School, 2 people were killed and 8 injured in Goldighi Mall, 8 people were killed and 20 injured in Boscotech Institute Ramnagar and 2 people were killed and 8 injured in Silchar Medical College & Hospital.
Deputy commissioner of Cachar, Rohan Kumar Jha, IAS worked as a response officer as per IRS Guidelines in Thursday’s mock drill on incident response system.
Besides, chief executive officer, DDMA, Cachar Yuvaraj Borthakur; deputy incident commander magistrate Kishan Chorei; safety officer DDC Rajeev Roy; liaison officer Shamim Ahmed; information and media officer, Sazzadul Haque Chowdhury and additional superintendent of police Subrata Sen worked as operation section chief. Operation section chief was also briefed in the press meet.
