'That's what happened, I think, struggling to stay afloat as the ocean pummels me from all sides. I must have blacked out -- exhausted, dehydrated, even a little delirious -- and hit the water. And no one saw it happen.' 'When I heard Brett had fallen overboard, after twelve hours I said, "There's no way anyone can survive longer than that in the ocean - I certainly couldn't do it." This is an incredible, incredible story.' Oscar Chalupsky, Twelve times Molokai Paddleboard World Champion In April 2013, fifty-year-old Brett Archibald was on board a surf-charter boat, making a night-time crossing of the Mentawai Strait off Sumatra, Indonesia. In the middle of a storm, ill with severe food poisoning, Brett was being sick overboard when, for a moment, he blacked out. When he came to, he found himself alone in the raging sea, being spun as if in a washing machine. Sixty miles from shore, Brett saw the lights of his boat disappearing into the darkness. It was very quickly clear that no one had seen him fall, and that no one would hear his shouts for help. He was alone in the ocean. It would be eight hours before his friends realised he was missing. At that point a frantic search began, for a single man hopefully still alive somewhere in thousands of square miles of heaving waves. The Mentawai Strait is remote and the rough weather meant that no planes or helicopters could assist in the search. This is the remarkable story of Brett's ordeal, and his miraculous rescue after twenty-eight hours alone in the ocean; also of his family and friends back home and around the world and the Australian skipper whose sheer doggedness and instinct played such a key role in saving Brett.

This series of books focuses on highly specialized Emergency Management arrangements for healthcare facilities and organizations. It is designed to assist any healthcare executive with a body of knowledge which permits a transition into the application of emergency management planning and procedures for healthcare facilities and organizations.This series is intended for both experienced practitioners of both healthcare management and emergency management, and also for students of these two disciplines.

Disasters and the American State offers a thesis about the trajectory of federal government involvement in preparing for disaster shaped by contingent events. Politicians and bureaucrats claim credit for the government's successes in preparing for and responding to disaster, and they are also blamed for failures outside of government's control. New interventions have created precedents and established organizations and administrative cultures that accumulated over time and produced a general trend in which citizens, politicians and bureaucrats expect the government to provide more security from more kinds of disasters. The trend reached its peak when the Federal Emergency Management Agency adopted the idea of preparing for 'all hazards' as its mantra. Despite the rhetoric, however, the federal government's increasingly bold claims and heightened public expectations are disproportionate to the ability of the federal government to prevent or reduce the damage caused by disaster.

Emergency managers and officials have seen a tremendous increase in the planning responsibilities placed on their shoulders over the last decade. Crisis Management and Emergency Planning: Preparing for Today's Challenges supplies time-tested insights to help communities and organizations become better prepared to cope with natural and manmade disasters and their impacts on the areas they serve. Author and editor Michael J. Fagel, PhD, CEM has more than three decades of experience in emergency management and emergency operations. He has been an on-site responder to such disaster events as the Oklahoma City Bombing and the site of the World Trade Center in the aftermath of 9/11. He is an experienced professor, trainer, professional, and consultant and has pretty much seen it all. The book delves into this experience to present advanced emergency management and response concepts to disasters not often covered in other publications. It includes coverage of planning and preparedness, public health considerations, vulnerability and impact assessments, hospital management and planning, sporting venue emergency planning, and community preparedness including volunteer management. Contributions from leading professionals in the field focus on broad responses across the spectrum of public health, emergency management, and mass casualty situations. The book provides detailed, must-read planning and response instruction on a variety of events, identifying long-term solutions for situations where a community or organization must operate outside its normal daily operational windows. This book has been selected as the 2014 ASIS Book of the Year.

From the "perfect storm" to the South Pole, a stirring true-life adventure story by a celebrated helicopter rescue pilot During the course of a 30-year career in helicopter rescue, Colonel Edward Fleming led scores of high-risk, high-profile missions, including rescue operations during the Halloween storm of 1991 described in Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm and the successful rescue of Dr. Jerri Nielsen from Antarctica after she developed breast cancer. Now, Colonel Fleming takes readers along for a bracing ride as he recounts the most thrilling episodes of his long career. With all the nail-biting excitement of a bestselling thriller, Heart of the Storm brings to life dramatic jungle rescues in the Philippines, the longest helicopter rescue mission in history to save crew members of a Ukrainian freighter 840 miles off of the coast of Nova Scotia, a nearly disastrous rescue off a listing two-masted schooner during an Atlantic winter storm, and many more - including the ill-fated "perfect storm" operation of 1991 and the exceptionally difficult Dr. Nielsen rescue. Fleming describes the many near-misses and narrow escapes he and his crews experienced, as well as many tragic loss

Incident Command: Tales From the Hot Seat presents a unique examination of the skills of the on-scene or incident commander who is in charge of an emergency or major incident. Experienced commanders from the police and fire services, the armed forces, civil aviation and the prison service give personal accounts of their command experiences, discuss their dilemmas and the pressures they faced, and reveal the demands of leading under extreme conditions. They share intimate details of cases where their command skills were tested, ranging from industrial fires, riots, hostage taking, warfare, peacekeeping, to in-flight emergencies. Each case ends with lessons learnt and tips for the developing commander. Additional chapters present expert accounts of the art of incident command, incident command systems, competencies for command, as well as reviews of the latest psychological research into decision making and team work under pressure. The book is an essential compelling text that captures the essence of incident command by analyzing command experiences across a range of professions.

Japan has been one of the most important international sponsors of human security, yet the concept has hitherto not been considered relevant to the Japanese domestic context. This book applies the human security approach to the specific case of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident that struck Japan on 11 March 2011, which has come to be known as Japan's 'triple disaster'. This left more than 15,000 people dead and was the most expensive natural disaster in recorded history. The book identifies the many different forms of human insecurity that were produced or exacerbated within Japan by the triple disaster. Each chapter adds to the contemporary literature by identifying the vulnerability of Japanese social groups and communities, and examining how they collectively seek to prevent, respond to and recover from disaster. Emphasis is given to analysis of the more encouraging signs of human empowerment that have occurred. Contributors draw on a wide range of perspectives, from disciplines such as: disaster studies, environmental studies, gender studies, international relations, Japanese studies, philosophy and sociology. In considering this Japanese case study in detail, the book demonstrates to researchers, postgraduate students, policy makers and practitioners how the concept of human security can be practically applied at a policy level to the domestic affairs of developed countries, countering the tendency to regard human security as exclusively for developing states.

In the wake of the recent unsuccessful drive for health care reform, many people have been asking themselves what brought about the failure of this as well as past attempts to make health care accessible to all Americans. The author of this original exploration of U.S. health policy supplies an answer that is bound to raise some eyebrows. After a careful analysis of the history and issues of health care, David Rothman concludes that it is the average employed, insured "middle class"--the vaguely defined majority of American citizens--who deny health care to the poor.
The author advances his argument through the examination of two distinctive characteristics of American health care and the intricate links between them: the ubiquitous presence of technology in medicine, and the fact that the U.S. lacks a national health insurance program. Technology bears the heaviest responsibility for the costliness of American medicine. Rothman traces the histories of the "iron lung" and kidney dialysis machines in order to provide vivid evidence for his claim that the American middle class is fascinated by technology and is willing to pay the price to see the most recent advances in physics, biology, and biomedical engineering incorporated immediately in medical care. On the other hand, the lack of a universal health insurance program in the U.S. is rooted in the fact that, starting in the 1930s, government health policy has been a reflection of the needs and concerns of the middle class. Playing up to middle class sensibilities, the American presidents, Senate and Congress based their policy upon the private rather than the public sector, whenever possible. They encouraged the purchase ofinsurance based on the laws of the marketplace, not provided by the government. Private health insurance and high-tech medicine came with a hefty price, with the end result that about 40 million Americans could not afford medical care and were left to fend for themselves. The author investigates the moral values underpinning these decisions, and goes to the bottom of the problem of why the United States remain the only developed country which continually proves unable to provide adequate health care to all its citizens.

This book provides an introduction to the field of human factors for individuals who are involved in the delivery and/or improvement of prehospital emergency care and describes opportunities to advance the practical application of human factors research in this critical domain. Relevant theories of human performance, including systems engineering principles, teamwork, training, and decision making are reviewed in light of the needs of current day prehospital emergency care. The primary focus is to expand awareness human factors and outlay the potential for novel and more effective solutions to the issues facing prehospital care and its practitioners.

During the twentieth century, the issue of health care burst out of the private confines of the physician's office to become a monumental contentious social issue. Giant multinational corporations scooped up proprietary hospitals and nursing homes and assembled them into vast chains crisscrossing America. The incomes of entrepreneurial fee-for-service physicians grew several times faster than the rate of inflation year after year, while the cost of health care swelled to consume 14 percent of the gross domestic product and continues to climb higher. The government gingerly applied cost containment strategies while hospitals expanded capacity and filled multiple "profit centers" with expensive high-tech equipment. Health care administration emerged as the fastest growing segment of all health-related occupations.Meanwhile, infant mortality in the United States is increasingly excessive compared with other industrialized countries, and the gulf of health status disparities between white Americans and minorities soars. Tens of thousands of Americans each year die from complications due to unnecessary but profitable surgeries, while millions suffer from medical neglect because they cannot pay for health care. The cost of malpractice insurance skyrockets while the fraternity of physicians pretend to discipline one another.Health care is a nation-wide problem, and the social devastation in its wake is a tragedy of national scope. Existing assumptions, power structures, political and economic interests, and social organizations have contributed to the crisis. In "Private Medicine and Public Health, " Lawrence Weiss dispassionately questions and analyzes the many issues of the health care crisis in search of much-needed solutions.

Although quality initiatives and management skills are not new issues in hospitals, their financial evaluation may be a source of pressure to those managing clinical directorates. This A-Z reference provides an immediate source of ideas and includes practical examples. It covers 100 quality issues, from pets and pillows to staff management and training. The work takes account of the varied backgrounds from which the clinical directors may come. The up-to-date information contained in this text should be of use to health care managers in hospitals.

In recent years the problem of homelessness has escalated into a critical social issue stimulating a wave of concern from the voluntary sector, pressure groups and policy makers. As shopfronts, underpasses and doorways are transformed into hotels for the needy, the shock of homelessness becomes ever more public. These homeless people are the most vulnerable sector of the population to illness and disease and, as they are not part of the system, they are the most isolated from the welfare services.

Provides an understanding, in the light of both political and economic developments, of what has been happening to NHS managers and professionals in the last decade. The book also explains the basis for various recommendations and related developments.

NCTE-CCCC Best Book in Technical or Scientific Communication 2020 Rhetorical Work in Emergency Medical Services: Communicating in the Unpredictable Workplace details how communicators harness the power of rhetoric to make decisions and communicate in unpredictable contexts. Grounded in a 16-month study in the emergency medical services (EMS) workplace, this text contributes to our theoretical, methodological, and practical understandings of the situation-specific processes that communicators and researchers engage in to respond to the urgencies and constraints of high-stakes workplaces. This book presents these intricate processes and skills-learned and innate-that workplace communicators use to accomplish goal-directed activity, collaborate with other communicators, and complete and teach workplace writing.

Urban Emergency Management: Planning and Response for the 21st Century takes the concepts and practices of emergency management and places them in the context of the complex challenges faced by the contemporary city. Cities provide unique challenges to emergency managers. The concentrated population and often dense layering of infrastructure can be particularly susceptible to disasters-both natural and human-caused. The book provides guidance across all phases of emergency management, including prevention and all-hazards approaches.

The baby boom generation were born between 1946 and 1964 and are the largest population cohort in US history. They should number about 90 million by mid-century, more than doubling their current size. The massive increase in seniors and relative decline of those of working age in the US is mirrored in almost all the world's most populous countries. This book connects the dots between the US baby boom generation and the marked increase in natural and human-caused disasters. It evaluates options available to seniors, their aids, for and not-for and for-profit organizations and government to reduce vulnerability to hazard events. These include coordinated planning, risk assessment, regulations and guidelines, education, and other risk management efforts. Using interviews with experts, cases studies, especially of Superstorm Sandy, and literature, it culls best practice and identify major gaps. It is original in successfulness in making the connection between the growing group of vulnerable US seniors, environmental events, and risk management practices in order to isolate the most effective lessons learned.

Large-Scale Evacuation introduces the reader to the steps involved in evacuation modelling for towns and cities, from understanding the hazards that can require large-scale evacuations, through understanding how local officials decide to issue evacuation advisories and households decide whether to comply, to transportation simulation and traffic management strategies. The author team has been recognized internationally for their research and consulting experience in the field of evacuations. Collectively, they have 125 years of experience in evacuation, including more than 140 projects for federal and state agencies. The text explains how to model evacuations that use the road transportation network by combining perspectives from social scientists and transportation engineers, fields that have commonly approached evacuation modelling from distinctly different perspectives. In doing so, it offers a step-by-step guide through the key questions needed to model an evacuation and its impacts to the evacuation route system as well as evacuation management strategies for influencing demand and expanding capacity. The authors also demonstrate how to simulate the resulting traffic and evacuation management strategies that can be used to facilitate evacuee movement and reduce unnecessary demand. Case studies, which identify key points to analyze in an evacuation plan, discuss evacuation termination and re-entry, and highlight challenges that someone developing an evacuation plan or model should expect, are also included. This textbook will be of interest to researchers, practitioners, and advanced students.

This book is based on a public-health approach to the provision of water and sanitation in emergencies: an approach that is information-based and people-based. It emphasizes the need for a coordinated and phased response, which adapts to meet constantly changing needs. Two kinds of reader will find it useful: non-technical managers of disaster-relief programmes, who need to understand how water supply and sanitation works; and technicians and engineers, who need to see their work in a broader context and make decisions based on principles of equity and participation. Topics include site-selection, disposal of excreta and solid waste, drainage, and hygiene promotion. The text draws on Oxfam's years of practical experience in this field, and on the recommendations of the Sphere Project on Minimum Standards in Humanitarian Response.

The main goal of this text is to introduce the systems approach to disasters management community as an alternative approach that can provide support for interdisciplinary activities involved in the management of disasters. The systems approach draws on the fields of operations research and economics to create skills in solving complex management problems.

The text is organized into four parts. Part I provides an introductory discussion of disaster management including an overview of the main terms used. Part II is devoted to the introduction of systems theory, mathematical formalization and classification of methods. The material presented in this section should be of practical relevance during the process of selecting an appropriate tool for the solution of a problem. Part III is technical in nature, providing a simulation approach and a detailed description of system dynamics simulation. This section details two areas of application: flood evacuation simulation, and disaster risk assessment. Part IV ends with a chapter covering steps to improve disaster management. Finally parts of the book can be used as a tool for specialized short courses for practitioners. For example a course on 'System analysis for emergency management optimization' could be based on Chapters 3, 4 and parts of Chapter 6.

Included in the book is a CD with three computer programs Vensim PLE, LINPRO, and COMPRO. Vensim PLE (Personal Learning Edition) is state-of-the-art simulation software used for the implementation of system dynamics simulation. The other two programs are: LINPRO, a linear programming optimization tool; and COMPRO, for the implementation of the multi-objective analysis tool of compromise programming.

As a relatively young field, emergency management has already undergone considerable evolution and change. And now that Web 2.0 technologies and social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter have become inherently ingrained in all facets of our lives, emergency managers must once again re-evaluate best practices and standardized approaches. Providing a roadmap for twenty-first century emergency management best practices, Leadership in the Open: A New Paradigm in Emergency Management examines public expectations relative to the use of communication and Web 2.0 technologies for emergency management activities. It covers current technologies along with the public's demand for transparency and ever-increasing need for instant information and updates. The book is divided into three sections that focus on the fundamentals of social media, the potential effects of its strategic use in disaster management, and the attitude of engagement that is effective for community commitment. Coverage includes efficiency, magnification, humility, creativity, ethics, the tension of changing public expectations, and long-standing best practices within the emergency management community. This book builds on the author's bestseller, Disasters 2.0: The Application of Social Media Systems for Modern Emergency Management, by looking at an emergency manager's role not simply by job function, but on what the public demands. Filled with extensive real-world examples, this is an ideal guide for leaders in emergency management, first-response, and business continuity-as well as advanced level students preparing to enter the field.

One of the four core phases of emergency management, hazard mitigation is essential for reducing disaster effects on human populations and making communities more resilient to the impacts of hazards. Presenting an up-to-date look at the changing nature of disasters, Natural Hazard Mitigation offers practical guidance on the implementation and selection of hazard mitigation programs and projects. Based on real-world applications, the book includes case studies that present a thorough explanation of the various issues involved. The contributors describe the value and potential of mitigation efforts and explain how to convince public officials and communities of that value. They also discuss how to better involve the community and uniquely tailor solutions to regional and local situations. The book begins with an overview of the history of hazard mitigation with a focus on the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000. It examines where hazard mitigation fits into emergency management and addresses some of the challenges that can arise in navigating the various intergovernmental relationships involved in hazard mitigation. The remaining chapters explore: Public-private partnerships for hazard mitigation at the local level The role currently played by the private sector and how communities can best make use of contractors How to maximize the use of the National Flood Insurance Program and the Community Ratings System Risk communications as a key component of encouraging hazard mitigation Legal issues relevant to hazard mitigation Ways to actively engage the community and how to advocate for hazard mitigation policy How state and local governments can promote and fund mitigation without utilizing federal dollars The challenges associated with volunteers and how to best make use of this resource The area analysis as an innovative means of addressing flood risk at the block or neighborhood level The book includes learning objectives, key terms, and end-of-chapter questions to enhance comprehension. It concludes with a discussion of tools that local practitioners can use and provides an appendix with additional links and resources. This volume is an essential reference for both students and professionals in the ongoing effort to better prepare communities against the effects of natural hazards.

This text examines actual attempts to "prepare" for catastrophes and finds that the policies adopted by corporations and government agencies are fundamentally rhetorical: the plans have no chance to succeed, yet they serve both the organizations and the public as symbols of control, order and stability. These "fantasy documents" attempt to inspire confidence in organizations, but Lee Clarke suggests that they are disturbing persuasions, soothing the perception that ultimately one cannot control technological advances. For example, Clarke studies corporations' plans for cleaning up oil spills in Prince William Sound prior to the "Exxon Valdez" debacle, and he finds that the accepted strategies were not just unrealistic but completely untenable. Although different organizations were required to have a cleanup plan for huge spills in the sound, a really massive spill was unprecedented, and the accepted policy was little more than a patchwork of guesses based on (mostly unsuccessful) cleanups after smaller accidents. Clarke points out that reassuring rhetoric (under the guise of expert prediction) may have no basis in fact or truth because no such basis is attainable. In uncovering the dangers of planning when implementation is a fantasy, Clark concludes that society would be safer, smarter, and fairer if organizations could admit their limitations.

Presents a unique view of social problems and conflicts over urban space from the cab of an ambulance. While we imagine ambulances as a site for critical care, the reality is far more complicated. Social problems, like homelessness, substance abuse, and the health consequences of poverty, are encountered every day by Emergency Medical Services (EMS) workers. Written from the lens of a sociologist who speaks with the fluency of a former Emergency Medical Technician (EMT), Medicine at the Margins delves deeply into the world of EMTs and paramedics in American cities, an understudied element of our health care system. Like the public hospital, the EMS system is a key but misunderstood part of our system of last resort. Medicine at the Margins presents a unique prism through which urban social problems, the health care system, and the struggling social safety net refract and intersect in largely unseen ways. Author Christopher Prener examines the forms of marginality that capture the reality of urban EMS work and showcases the unique view EMS providers have of American urban life. The rise of neighborhood stigma and the consequences it holds for patients who are assumed by providers to be malingering is critical for understanding not just the phenomenon of non- or sub-acute patient calls but also why they matter for all patients. This sense of marginality is a defining feature of the experience of EMS work and is a statement about the patient population whom urban EMS providers care for daily. Prener argues that the pre-hospital health care system needs to embrace its role in the social safety net and how EMSs' future is in community practice of paramedicine, a port of a broader mandate of pre-hospital health care. By leaning into this work, EMS providers are uniquely positioned to deliver on the promise of community medicine. At a time when we are considering how to rely less on policing, the EMS system is already tasked with treating many of the social problems we think would benefit from less involvement with law involvement. Medicine at the Margins underscores why the EMS system is so necessary and the ways in which it can be expanded.