64 Washington State DHS&EM, Camp Murry, Washington, November 1015 Hrs (1715Z)

Washington State DHS&EM, Camp Murry, Washington, November 1015 Hrs (1715Z)

Michelle was standing at the podium in the executive conference room right off of the operations room. She was scheduled to give a briefing on the current status of the agency in regards to the current issue at hand. She looked over her notes with what she knew. And there was quite a bit. Her briefing wasn't scheduled until 10:30, and she wanted some more tea. She had stayed the night in her office in the EOC and she never slept well when she did that, partly because of the lights in the hallway and partly because of the hustle and bustle of the whole building when they were activated. There were windows high on the wall of her office that she couldn't cover and they let the light from the hallway in. She left her notes where they were and walked toward the cafeteria to make her tea. While she was there Zoe walked in. "I'm starting to get worried that we can't stop this..." Zoe said. "We've practiced grid down scenarios, but this one feels different..." She looked at Michelle as she pulled a mug and a tea bag down. "I'm less scared of the Cascadia subduction zone giving way. At least that will be quick." That was a true statement. The entire region was not prepared for the zone to break loose and drown them all. Almost all of Seattle and the suburbs would be flattened by the quake that would happen. Thousands would die just from the quake, but more would die when the Pacific ocean came crashing ashore in the landslide driven tsunami. Everyone was acutely aware of what damage a wall of water from a landslide driven tsunami could do; it had happened in Fukishima Japan. "We're going to do everything in our power to stop this," Michelle said. "There are millions of Washingtonians out there that are counting on us." She placed her tea bag in the cup of hot water. "I'm scared shitless by a grid down scenario, but I'm not giving up on my country, my state, and certainly not the millions people who have no clue what the fuck is going on and is just going to be sitting in the dark if these terrorists succeed. Either stand up and lead this agency or get the fuck out of the way and let someone else do it." Zoe looked shocked, and started to slouch. She stopped, looked at Michelle who looked like she was ready to take on these insurgents one by one and by hand if she had to. She would go through hell for the people of this state. Zoe stood and squared her shoulders. She looked at Michelle. "You know," Zoe said, looking Michelle in the eyes. "You've got a reputation for being a hard ass when you need to be. Thank you for that." Michelle smiled. "You're welcome," Michelle said. "Let's go give a briefing and give these people hope." The tea bags went in the trash and the two of them walked side by side, step in step back to the operations center. The pair walked in to the executive conference room, The Governor would be joining via a phone call, and the Spokane office would also be joining via phone call. All in all, Michelle would be briefing around 75 people. "Everyone that should be on the call is on the call, Michelle." One of the members of the IT department said, Michelle thought he was new, because she'd not seen him before. She watched as Samantha and Rebecca slipped into the room. "Good Morning," She started. "I'm Michelle Oldham, I am the Operations section Chief at the Washington State Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management This briefing is to bring all the section, and branch chiefs as well as the other stake holders in the State up to date on the state preparation for a possible attack on critical infrastructure in the state. So far, DHS has possibly identified possible targets on the east side of the state, namely in the area of the Grand Coulee dam. At this time we don't know of any targets in the larger metro areas, but if an attack takes place in Grand Coulee, it will take Spokane out. We've been in touch with the folks at the Department of Homeland Security as well as representatives of the Idaho and Oregon offices of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. We suspect that an attack is imminent and could take place at any time. With the very vague ideas we have for targets, anything in the state could actually be the target. I'm going to go around to each of the ESF's that have representatives at the meeting. ESF 1, Transportation?" "ESF 1 has nothing to report at this time." "Okay, Moving on to ESF 2, Communications?" "All state wide communications systems are green, All backup system are go, we've been testing as many as we can." The person from ESF 2, said. "Thank you." Michelle said. "How are we on backup communication?" "All of our backups seem to be operational," He spun in his char to look at Rebecca. "One of the members of our AuxComm group is here, I'll let her tell you their status... Rebecca?" "Thank you, Michael," Rebecca said. "We last tested the AuxComm system last Tuesday, Everything was operational and we were able to contact people in all 39 counties. That's all I have to report." "Thank you, Rebecca." Michael looked at Michelle. "That's all ESF 2 has to report." "Thank you both, ESF 3, Public Works?" "In light of the details that we know about the possible attack, we've stepped up security at all the public works facilities that we can. We have identified replacement equipment that is staged in various places throughout the state. That's all I have to report." "Thank you, ESF 4, Firefighting?" "ESF 4 has nothing to report, Ma'am." "Thank you. ESF 5, Information and Planning?" "Ma'am, we continue to work with the Department of Homeland Security in DC to work to identify targets. That's all we have for now." "Thank you, ESF 6, Mass Care, Emergency Assistance, Human Services?" "ESF 6 has nothing to report." "okay, ESF 7 Logistics?" Michelle took a drink of her tea "We are working with various suppliers to determine supplies that could be rapidly accessed. We are just beginning to do this so we have nothing to really report." "Thank you Logistics," She said. "ESF 8, Public Health," Michelle watched as Abby slipped into the room. She had access to all of this data anyway, it just wasn't laid out as concisely as it was in this meeting. "We have nothing to report at this time..." "Thank you," She looked around the room, She didn't see anyone from ESF 9, Search and Rescue in the room, but she tried anyway. "ESF 9, Search and Rescue?" There was no response. "okay, No ESF 9, Moving on to ESF 10, Oil and HAZMAT?" "We've got a NEST on Stand by, other than that we have nothing to report." Several heads turned to the voice. Having a Nuclear Emergency Search Team on stand by was a little unsettling. "You've got a NEST on standby?" "Yes, Ma'am..." The person from ESF 10 said. We figure that it's better to have them on standby since we do have potential targets in the state that are nuclear in nature." "okay, ESF 11, Agriculture and Natural Resources." Michelle took another drink of her tea. "Ma'am, we've closed the various state parks near the hydro dams, as well as any recreation area that may be near the same. Everything else for us is green..." "Thank you. ESF 12, Energy." She knew this was going to be a long winded update because most of threat dealt with the energy sector. "Good Morning, ma'am," The representative from ESF 12 said. "Since this seems to be the major focus of this potential threat, we have had all of the energy suppliers in the state increase security, we've requested that WSP and local law enforcement pay attention to to any thing that is energy related. Security has been stepped up at substations and generating facilities. There is one issue though... any destabilization in the grid can have effects far away. It's a delecate balancing act, the supply has to meet demand or very very bad things can happen to the grid..." Michelle was watching the girl that was giving the briefing for ESF 12 speak,. She sounded scared and for good reason. She knew what just destabilizing the grid could do if the various safeguards didn't work as designed. Out of the corner of her eye, Michelle saw Abby take her phone out and send a message to someone. The Executive Conference room was considered a Secure Compartmentalized Information Facility. No one was supposed to have a cell phone in this room. The data being relayed in this room would make it's way to WebEOC, but only after the fact as this was an ongoing situation. Michelle beconed one of the WSP troopers that was in the room over. "Yes, Ma'am?" he whispered. Abigail looked around the room. "See the brunette over by the door, white top, pink skirt?" Michelle asked. "Yes, ma'am." The trooper said. "I would like her phone confiscated and her detained, please." Given the nature of what was going on, there would be no questioing of the order. "Yes, Ma'am." The trooper said, and slowly went around hte room to where Abby was standing. "Ma'am, please hand me your phone and come with me." He said, placing an hand on her upper arm. The Trooper was six foot three inches tall and probbably had one hundred pounds on Abigail. Rather tha put up a fight, she knew she'd been caught and went with the Trooper wilingly. The whole thing was missed by most of the occupants of the room as the representative from ESF 12 was still giving her briefing. "We've been working with the energy suppliers to try to judge what they've got in terms of spare equipment. We've started compiling a list of who has what and are working to be able to move stuff around as necessary. That's all I have at this time." Michelle had missed the middle of the breifing but had gotten the jist of it. "Thank you. ESF 13, Public Safety." "Ma'am as the ESF 12 representative said, WSP is working with local law enforcement to protect the infrastructure as best we can. We are using every asset availaibe to us to help with this effort. That's all I've got for now." "Thank you, Corporal." Michelle replied. She looked around the room for anyone that representied ESF 14 and didn't see any one. "Moving to ESF 14, Cross-sector business and infrastructure." Tehre was nothing heard in the room or on the phone. "okay, ESF 15, External Affairs." "Good morning," The person from External Affairs said. "At this time, we've had no inquires for media or anything. Presumably, the media doesn't have this yet, but when they get it... And that's all we have for now." "Thank you ESF 15," She consulted her list of invited attendees; she had worked through the fifteen emergency support functions. Now it was time to get into the other more specialized folks that were represented around the large table. "Washington Natiaonl Guard." She said. "Ma'am," A Staff Sargent said, rising to Attention. "The Guard currently has no assets deployed and stands ready to assist the people of Washington in any way necessary. That's all we have at the moment, Ma'am" He sat back down. "Thank you, Staff Sargent," Michelle consulted the list again. "WP3." She said. WP3 was the Washingon Private Public Partnership, a partnership between the public sector and private businesses ot help those private businesses return to normal following a disaster. "WP3 has nothing to report at this time." "Thank you WP3." The last group on her paper before she pivoted to the Spokane office was VOAD. "VOAD?" "Ma'am, VOAD has nothing to report at this time." Someone in the room said. "Okay. Spokane office..." "Good morning. This is the duty office at the Spokane office. We've been working with the Bonneville Power Administration who runs the dam in Grand Coulee. Hopefully we can get them on for the next call, but they have increased security in and around the dam as well as around the Power Switching yard where the power is sent in every which way. We have a list of spare equipment that they have. They are working with the UTC to see if they can pull the entire plant off line to protect it. As the representative from ESF 12 said, Depending on what actually happens, the process of kicking a plant out of service could be as simple as a circuit breaker tripping; or it could be as catastrophic as a generator tearing itself to bits... Now the BPA has a lot of spare parts, but a genset isn't one of them...."