Selecting Readily Available Equipment for Wide Area Response and Recovery. RRLT: an intelligent tool for radiological incidents
Citation:
Magnuson, M. AND M. Kaminski. Selecting Readily Available Equipment for Wide Area Response and Recovery. RRLT: an intelligent tool for radiological incidents. USEPA ORD Emergency Response Research Webinar Series, N/A, OH, May 12, 2021.
Impact/Purpose:
Cleanup resources will be extremely stretched after a large-scale radiological incident, such as the detonation of an improvised nuclear device, a release of a radiological dispersal device, or a nuclear power plant accident. Local, state, federal, and tribal agencies performing response and recovery efforts may need to find innovative approaches for their response and recovery efforts. This webinar will discuss how responders can use municipal and commercial equipment to compress the recovery timeline and support specific goals associated with radiological response and remediation, including reducing the radiation dose burden to response personnel. Argonne National Laboratory, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and the Environmental Protection Agency are developing a radiological recovery logistics tool (RRLT) to assist response agencies. This tool contains a database of common and specialty equipment available at local public works departments or commercial vendors that can be used to recover from an urban radiological release event.
Description:
Through an intelligent software wizard, the RRLT helps the user understand what types of equipment might be available to accomplish general and specific recovery mission activities based on environmental and operational constraints. The purpose of the RRLT is to increase the resilience of urban communities by expediting response and recovery operations. Potential uses of the RRLT include: tabletop exercises, pre-incident resource planning, and by a Planning Section of an Incident Command Structure post-incident. While geared towards radiological incidents, the RRLT could be adapted for biological and chemical incidents.