Staff at Kāpiti Coast District Council are the first line of defence for managing civil defence emergencies in the Kāpiti district.

To ensure staff are match fit and ready to respond, they train for their emergency response role (which is usually quite different from their main occupation) and conduct exercises to practice how they’d respond.

A recent exercise focused on planning for a distance-source tsunami affecting New Zealand.

Acting chief executive Sean Mallon visited the exercise and was impressed with what he saw.

“It’s heartening to know our team is prepared to do their part in the event of a civil defence emergency hitting Kāpiti. Seeing how the teams work together to plan and deliver services and information during an emergency gives me confidence about how our community would fare if we did experience a major event.

“Representatives from several partner agencies and utility providers exercised with the Council and WREMO teams. Major tasks included planning how the team would identify and contact affected people, set up and supply welfare centres, inform the community about a mandatory evacuation, and put road closures in place,” said Mr Mallon.

Kāpiti Coast District Council is one of the few councils in the country with an ‘all in’ approach for civil defence preparedness. This involves encouraging all staff to undertake at least the basic level of civil defence training and supporting staff to further their training to advanced level in some cases.

“It’s part of everyone’s job here at Council to help during a civil defence emergency. In some cases, this involves keeping our core services going, but many staff train for roles such as intelligence gathering, public information or logistics (sourcing supplies).”

As well as staff preparing to manage an emergency, community members also need to be ready to respond. This includes having a family plan, knowing where your evacuation point is and having a grab bag with essential items packed and ready to go.

Tsunami are long, deep, fast travelling ocean waves caused by earthquakes, landslides or volcanic eruptions beneath or near the ocean. The first wave is not usually the biggest and the waves can be spread over 12 hours arriving up to an hour apart.

Find out more at Tsunami zones - Kāpiti Coast District Council

© Scoop Media