Independent test needed of depot alarms, officials say

This story was published Wed, Jan 19, 2000

By Terry Hudson
Herald Oregon bureau

HERMISTON - The test last week of the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program's community alert system may have reinforced the need for a review by an independent investigator.

Motivated by the Dec. 30 false alarm, warning area residents of a chemical emergency at the Umatilla Chemical Depot, CSEPP and Oregon Emergency Management officials conducted a test of the console used to activate area highway reader boards and sirens.

On Tuesday, officials with the Federal Emergency Management Administration and Oregon Emergency Management met to discuss what happened and how to proceed with an independent study.

Friday's test included pushing a button marked C-34, which is supposed to activate a reader board near Boardman.

That was the scenario on Dec. 30 when sirens and reader boards warning of a chemical emergency were accidentally activated. At that time, a Morrow County CSEPP employee was attempting to activate a Boardman reader board from the Heppner Emergency Operations Center to warn about icy road conditions.

The console tested Friday is at the Umatilla Emergency Operations Center. The same type of consoles are at the depot, the Heppner EOC and the Hermiston Safety Center.

During Friday's test, the reader board was activated with the correct test message, but a possible glitch was discovered.

The chemical message light on button C-10 came on during the procedure, although it was cleared before a "send" button was pushed. The fact that it came on at all raises the possibility that the chemical event warning could have been activated if the send button had actually been pushed while that C-10 light was on.

"The console failed the test, because the C-10 light came on without the button being pushed," said Umatilla County Commissioner Dennis Doherty. "Why that happened, we don't know. And we don't know what the implications are."

Oregon Emergency Management and county officials were present during the test, which was conducted by Bill Flynn, a project manager from S.E.S. USA Inc. of Seattle, which is a manufacturing representative company for the console maker Whelen Engineering of Chester, Conn.

"It's an anomaly that it lit up," Flynn said. "I've never been able to get it to send anything other than what I've selected."

Flynn said he will go through the other three units to see if Friday's test result repeats itself. He plans on taking one of the units and sending it back to Whelen Engineering.

"A light did go on, but it didn't trigger anything. Essentially, the test was good," said Tom Worden, an Oregon Emergency Management spokesman. "They wanted to turn on the reader board in Boardman and they did."

But Doherty is terming the test a failure.

"They said the operational part of the test was a success, in that the technical representative for the manufacturer got the correct message on the correct reader board," Doherty said. "The fact that he could do that begs a couple of questions. If, on Dec. 30, our console was being used for the same purpose as Morrow County's, would our officials and 911 dispatchers have been able to do the same thing as the technician?"

Both Doherty and Flynn said even though the C-10 light came on, it didn't show up on a display panel that shows which buttons have been pushed.

"Nothing showed up on the reader panel when the light came on," Doherty said. "What does that mean? What would have happened if the send button had been pushed in the middle of all of this? We don't know. My concern was that the console failed the test. I don't want to mislead anybody about the console or the alert notification system."

Doherty says the latest test may support the claim by Morrow County CSEPP officials that they followed procedures correctly in attempting to activate the reader board on Dec. 30.

"At the very least, what we experienced Friday tends to support what the Morrow County Operations is saying," Doherty said.

Worden said most of the elements of the Alert and Notification System will be studied during any independent investigation.

"We didn't think we could isolate just one part of the system," he said. "Not only equipment. They'll probably be looking at training and planning issues too."

Worden said the officials who met Tuesday will detail what an outside contractor needs to do and see if any vendors want to take on the job, then put it out to bid.

"You'll be hard-pressed to find qualified people for an independent review," Flynn said. "This is a niche in the industry. My own opinion would be to send it back to the factory."

 

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