CCB staff worked quickly to ensure that the little ones were secure and protected from falling debris during the earthquake.

CCB staff worked quickly to ensure that the little ones were secure and protected from falling debris during the earthquake.

Deputy Director of CDEMA, Elizabeth Riley, and Chief Evaluator, Earl Arthurs, as they conversed on the fire drill.

Deputy Director of CDEMA, Elizabeth Riley, and Chief Evaluator, Earl Arthurs, as they conversed on the fire drill.

Drills tested at Nursery

ALARMS rang loudly at the Black Rock Nightengale Nursery and Violet House on Thursday afternoon, sending staff and children running for safety.

All part of earthquake and fire drills, the response and evacuation of the buildings were monitored by representatives of the Department of Emergency Management (DEM), and the Fire Service, spearheaded by the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) as part of the planning process being tweaked for the revised disaster plan.

Speaking after the drills were analysed and evaluated by the various emergency officials, Deputy Director of CDEMA Elizabeth Riley, highlighted the importance of ensuring that there was an adequate response to vulnerable persons, especially the very young, the elderly and disabled population, in times of emergency.

“As you know, persons who are differently abled, as well as very young persons or very elderly persons, are persons of specific concern when we look at disaster management, and there are very specific considerations that we have to make for them, and from our agency’s perspective, this is something we highlighted in our comprehensive disaster management strategy, and it is an important message we would like to send from this exercise,” she pointed out.

Impressed with the reaction of Child Care Board (CCB) staff of both facilities to the procedure, Riley said that the drills were part two of a three-prong process aimed at ensuring that in the times of any disaster, personnel were well-trained and aware of their roles and of the necessary response.

“The final phase would be the lesson that we would have learnt from this particular exercise. We are going to be incorporating it into the revision of the plans here for the Nightengale complex, and would be very pleased in partnering with the DEM in formally handing those plans over to the Child Care Board,” Riley added.

Saying that the staff had done the best it could with the resources it possessed, Administration Manager with the CCB, Sheila Francis, encouraged the DEM and CDEMA to continue to work with the agency in such exercises. (JMB)

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