Believe it or not, on Thursday, January 16, more than week before Georgia and Alabama citizens were stranded by a snow and ice storm, Georgia Governor Nathan Deal held a “Severe Weather Awareness Week” proclamation ceremony at the Georgia State Capitol. At that meeting, it was announced that Feb. 7 – 11, 2014 would be Severe Weather Awareness Week. During that week, the state has a plan to highlight different natural threats, including weather, thunderstorms, lightning, and floods.

Charlie English, the director of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency/Homeland Security (GEMA), said this at the proclamation ceremony:

Take time now to prepare for the extreme weather the rest of the year can bring. Tornadoes, storms and floods can devastate our communities, but devastation can be minimized if we’re prepared.

Mr. English said this 11 days before Georgia was hit with a severe winter storm that resulted in chaos in the Atlanta area with thousands of vehicles, people (including school age students throughout the metro-area) being stranded on the highways and roads, at schools, and businesses.  Some people endured from 15 – 20 hours being in their vehicles, and thousands simply abandoned their vehicles and walked to the nearest shelter, e.g. a local store or business).

It appears as if GEMA and the office of the Governor of Georgia did not heed its own preparedness program.  They did not act on the data they had from the National Weather Service, instead they were more concerned with their own personal issues, and not the 3 million people in the metro-Atlanta area, not to mention a million people south of the city.  The Governor was off attending a “come travel to Georgia meeting,” the major of Atlanta was receiving an award as citizen of the year, and the Director of GEMA moaned that Delta had canceled on Monday his flight to Washington which was set to leave Atlanta on Wednesday morning.

Outrageously, GEMA received a series of slides from the National Weather Service which laid out the details of the impending storm, and predicted that not only would the Atlanta area receive snow, and roads would become ice, but that temperatures would stay below freezing for at least 36 – 48 hours.

Emails from the Georgia Emergency Management Agency surfaced this week that were sent to and from the director of GEMA, to other GEMA officials, office of the Governor, and some private firms.

Here is an email that Jamie Kimbrough of the Georgia Insurance Information Service sent to Mr. Charlie English after the proclamation ceremony.  GEMA, under English’s direction, clearly did not help people prepare for this severe weather event.  You think he’d learn.  The same thing happened two years ago when a similar storm hit Georgia and paralyzed the city.

Figure 1. Email received by Charlie English, Director of GEMA/Homeland Security

Heck of Job Brownie

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) released the emails to the public, and today an interesting article summarizing the GEMA director’s emails paint a picture of a person in an important place being nonchalant, rather than of a leader of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency/Homeland Security.

Charlie English heads GEMA/Homeland Security, and I have to wonder what he was thinking on Monday when the weather service had already predicted a storm for Georgia including the highly populated city of Atlanta.  From the emails that were released, Charlie wrote on Monday at 7:37 PM:

Delta called advising that they have cancelled my flight to DC scheduled for Wednesday morning.  Thought it was interesting that they are already canceling flights.

As the director of the emergency network for the state of Georgia, you would have thought that this might have been clue to get serious about the storm.  Why didn’t he act at that moment by calling the Governor.  If he had done so, and recommend a state of emergency, every school system in Georgia would have cancelled school for Tuesday.  Instead, Charlie ignored the signal from Delta, and the National Weather Service.  But he is president of the National Emergency Management Association, and Chair of the Governor’s Commission on 9-1-1 Modernization and state Point of Contact for the FirstNet Public Safety Broadband Network.

I’ve read the emails that were released and published by the AJC, and it ought to make the citizens of Georgia furious over the inaction of the leaders of the state, especially the GEMA/Homeland Security.  You would never guess that the GEMA is led by such incompetence if you looked at their website, and reviewed the information at the site.

Unscientific Agency?

I think we have a scientific literacy problem at the level of the GEMA/Homeland Security.  I do not mean simply information or factual knowledge about science, but the ability to apply scientific understandings and theories to solve environmental problems, many of them being weather related–snow storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, and drought.  In these cases, the people at GEMA/Homeland Security are responsible for warning the state of impending natural disasters, and how the state will coordinate preventiveness and recovery operations.

Figure 2. Georgia Emergency Management Agency/Homeland Security Website.

To solve problems and to make decisions requires systems thinking.  It means that people at the level of GEMA need to be able to step back and look at a weather event as part of a larger system for which we have models, maps, and data.  We are dealing with natural systems involving the atmosphere, the weather, the climate and in all cases, systems emerge out of the interactions between the components of the system.  Thinking in terms of systems involves analysis and synthesis, and not simply a matter of guessing.

For goodness sake, the Weather Channel is in Atlanta, and it has at its website a link to the National Weather Service Forecast Office in Peachtree City, Georgia which is just a few miles from the GEMA headquarters.  All the director had to do was click this link, and he would have seen that he needed to act.  Didn’t happen.

Thinking in this way requires knowledge and wisdom.  But based on the emails, the impending storm seemed to get in the way of the day-to-day operation and lives of these high officials.  As one official said, “Not to worry, it will be over by Thursday!

That said, I decided to look at the credentials of the nine administrators that lead the GEMA/Homeland Security.  Of the nine administrators heading the GEMA, only one has a degree in science.  That degree is in the earth sciences, which is very proper for the job.  The other administrators had degrees in urban affairs (1), criminal justice (4), engineering (2), business administration (1).  Degree information was not available for two administrators.

These are not the only employees of GEMA/Homeland Security.  But when the organizational chart of the agency is examined, there is no reference to any of the systems for which this agency deals with: atmospheric sciences, hydrology, meteorology, geosciences, data analysis, natural hazards, etc.  Wouldn’t you think that weather forecasting would be an important part of this agency?

The agency has received more than 250 million dollars in its Hazard Mitigation Division.  For example some of these funds were used to improve severe weather warning and alerts.  What application of this program did we see last week.  None.

Should there be a High-Stakes Test for GEMA Administrators?

After looking over the credentials of GEMA, perhaps there should be a test given to employees of GEMA that tests their knowledge of physics, earth science, and biology, economics, and statistical theory.  If students and teachers in Georgia are subjected to such a stupid notion of measuring performance by a paper and pencil test, why not extend it to state officials.  Here are a few questions that might be included in a test for GEMA employees:

1. The saying, “Red Sky at Night” means:

• a. Sailor’s warning
• b. Sailor’s delight
• c. Sailer’s compass heading
• d. None of the above

2.  Which of the following statements is true:

• a. Birds on a telephone wire predict the coming of rain.
• b. The moon and the weather may change together, but a change of the moon will not change the weather.
• c.  If the first snow falls on unfrozen ground expect a mild winter.
• d. None of the above

3.  Which of these persons had the facts about last week’s Atlanta snow storm:

• a. Al Roker
• b. Nathan Deal
• c. Charlie English
• d. Kasim Reed

Let’s Form a Committee

A friend once said to me there was an old joke about superintendents when they confront a debacle:

• (a)  form a committee
• (b)  do a study/report
• (c)  write your resignation letter

Well, the Governor of Georgia, Nathan Deal, announced yesterday the formation of a severe weather task force.  The committee is so large, nothing will happen other than a long list of recommendations, which most likely already exist over at GEMA/Homeland Security.  Follow this link to read the names and organizations of the task force.  Should Charlie English be on this committee.  The governor says yes.  What is the governor thinking?

Instead of looking carefully at GEMA, we not only condone GEMA by putting the director on the committee, but we create another level of bureaucracy preventing us from solving problems.

If you were asked to be on Governor Deal’s task force, what would you bring to the table?

 Post Script:

In 1998, I was in Moscow with about 120 middle and high school kids, and about 30 teachers from the US and Russia.  We were there for a culminating conference on the Global Thinking Project.  It was April.  For two days during this time, Moscow had a huge snow storm.  Traffic was snarled. People couldn’t drive anywhere.  It was difficult to get to the Metro.  So, the solution to the problem was the mayor of Moscow fired the chief weather forecaster!