Exercise Triton 04 - lessons identified.
Working together for a better flood response
The combination of high spring tides, storm surge, winds and wave action caused many flood defences to be overtopped and/or breached. The result was devastating. Many people were killed or injured and thousands of homes and several coastal towns and city centres were flooded. There was widespread disruption and damage to transport, power, water, and communications networks, along with major damage to industry and commerce and drowned livestock.
Exercise Triton 04 was the first national exercise of its kind and size and took place in June and July 2004. The scenario covered an extreme event (up to one in 1000 year occurrence) and with extensive flooding affecting nearly half of England and Wales.
The exercise tested the nation's ability to work together and deal with extensive flooding. The scenario deliberately tested systems that would not normally be planned for and identified valuable lessons for the Environment Agency and partners in improving:
- How we work together
- How we can improve our forecasting
- The plans and procedures that we use
- How we communicate
- The resources at our disposal
And in understanding:
- How the Civil Contingencies Act will change the way we work.
Who took part?
Over 60 organisations and agencies took part nationally, regionally and locally. Teams of people based at 35 locations were presented with the emergency scenario and asked to respond as they would if the events were real. Each team had to make decisions that included how to evacuate hundreds of thousands of people; inform and warn the public via the media; what resources they needed and what the priorities were; if they needed military aid; how to communicate up and down the chain of command and whether they needed emergency powers.
Day one focused on handling the emergency. Day two was about developing recovery plans. These plans looked at what was needed to get local communities, regions and the nation back to normal within a year.
For many of the people who took part one of the most successful parts of the exercise was how willing and enthusiastic everyone was to work together in responding to the crisis.
- Exercise Triton - overview of lessons identified. (Web link)
This document is in both Welsh and English. The first 48 pages are in Welsh and the remaining pages are a duplicate in English.
