31 Washington State DHS&EM, Camp Murray Washington, November 18, 0702 Hrs (1402Z)

Washington State DHS&EM, Camp Murray Washington, November 18, 0702 Hrs (1402Z)

Michelle had been running flat out in the car since she had pulled out of the driveway. Between the blue beacons in the grille, and the state issued tags on the car, people got out of her way. Vehicles with state tags were permitted to pass through security with no inspection at all, and because they had taken the EOC from Steady State to Enhanced, there was now a lane open just for vehicles with tags issued to the vehicles that belonged to the state. This was to facilitate these people getting into the Camp Murray Complex quickly. She rolled up to the gate and had her badge out. "Good Morning, Ms Oldham." The guard said, swiping her ID badge. "Good Morning, Sargent." She said. She knew his name was Jeremy, but she never addressed him that way, only addressing him by his rank. "You're good to go, Ma'am." He said snapping to attention and giving her a salute. She was a Civilian, so she shouldn't be raising salutes, but the guard staff saluted the leadership of the Emergency Management Agency. She went through the gate and drove through the grounds to her normal parking spot. As Michelle was getting out of her car, Ashely pulled in to her normal parking spot right next to Michelle. Since she was the defacto head of ESF15, she would have gotten the call (as would all of her people.) "Any idea what's going on, Michelle?" Ashely asked, closing the door to her car and opening the back door to get her laptop and stuff out. "No idea, I was making my tea when the call came in." Michelle said, grabbing her bag from the back seat of the car. The pair walked up to the front doors of the EMA building. The Operation Center was in the basement. Washington State Police officers stood sentry and were checking everyones badging. What ever was going on, it was serious. Michelle, being part of ESF5 went down to the lower level in the building and walked into the operations room. It still had it's normal amount of lighting turned on, just enough to see, but not be overly bright. None of the projectors were lit and none of the work stations were in use. Only the Watch Office and the JIC were lit. Ashley had followed her into the operations room. They both walked into the chaos that was the watch office. "I'll let them know you're here, Ashley, head on over to the JIC." "Thank you." Ashley said, leaving the room. Michelle walked up to a bank of four desks arranged so that they could all see each other as well as the screen all around the room. The same stuff was shown on different screens so that everyone had a sight line to one of them. There was a little bit of controlled chaos in the room, but it was largely calm. The people in this room were professionals, and they trained for this type of an event. Zoe walked into the room from the door that went to a small office that was reserved for the Director. She watched as Zoe walked up to Jackson Richards who was the manager of the State Emergency Operations Center. She couldn't tell what was being said, but Jackson walked over to one of the microphones that were attached to the speaker system in on the Ops Room Floor. His voice would come out of every office as well. "Attention all section and branch chiefs, there will be a meeting in 110A at 0800." He paused for a second "Again, Attention all section and branch chiefs, there will be a meeting in 110A at 0800." Zoe walked over to Michelle. "Just a heads up, I'm going to need to you to bring copies of the memo you wrote and the memo from the STACC to the meeting." Zoe said quietly. "I got word that they found photos and video of some of the Bureau of Reclamations facilities in the western part of the state in that scrape from the site they found." Zoe paused. "A Grid down event is the worst scenario that we've ever drilled on. It might be happening for real...." Michelle looked at Zoe. "This thought scares the hell out of me." Michelle said, feeling a cold shiver run through her body. "There's more of us than there are of them... We're going to win. We have to. I'll be upstairs in my office if you need me." "I'll call your cell..." Zoe said. Michelle went out the back door of the Watch Office and headed to the back stair well and up to her office on the third floor. As she was walking she fished her phone out of her pocket and fired off a quick text to Samantha, who had a home day for school. It was short and to the point. 'Pull van out, stage for move, maintain shore power until van is needed. Fill main and reserve white tanks, check fluids." The van was cleared as if it were a state vehicle and both Samantha and Rebecca were badged to get into the EOC. They worked as part of ESF 2, Communications Or Communication and Alerting. As she walked into her office, She typed out a second message to both Samantha and Rebecca 'be advised, as of 0700 this am, SEOC moved to Enhanced Monitoring from Steady State. ESF 5,15,12,13 are required for staffing. If I get word about ESF2 I will advise. Pack go bags. Could get a bit bumpy.'