Odisha in collaboration with the National Disaster Management Authority organised State-level mock exercises on Chemical Disasters

Bhubaneswar:11/1/24: Odisha in collaboration with the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) today organised State-level mock exercises on Chemical Disasters in at least 28 identified industries of 10 districts viz. Angul, Balasore, Bhadrak, Cuttack, Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur (at Paradip Port), Khurda, Mayurbhanj, Rayagada and Sundargarh.

The basic objective of this Mock Exercise was to streamline emergency response and identify gap areas in detection, early warning, alert, evacuation, emergency response & containment at industries and local government levels.

The Mock Exercise was organised at industry locations based on scenarios related to the chemicals and hazardous materials being dealt with by the factories.

The Paradip Port conducted the mock exercise based on the Oil Spill scenario. During the exercise, the industries responded to the situation as per their response mechanism, available equipment, and standard operating procedures.

Additional resources like fire brigade and medical teams etc were also mobilised by the respective District Administration. Based on the threat situation, nearby villagers were also evacuated to the nearby identified safe shelters.

In addition to the top management and incident repose teams of the industries/ port, officials of district and block administration, district-level line departments, local police, fire & emergency service, medical teams, PRI members, and community volunteers were also involved in the exercise.

Five specialised teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), 3rd Bn, Mundli, and 10 ODRAF teams were deployed to various industries for the mock exercise.

Senior officers of District Administration were deployed to each industry as Incident Commanders to coordinate the response activities and mobilization of resources required. The State-level technical observers were deployed at the state level from organizations like the Directorate of Factories and Boilers, State Pollution Control Board, Indian Army, Indian Air Force, Indian Navy, and CISF.

During the mock exercise, Aditya Kumar, Commandant (Retd.), NDMA accompanied by Dr. Malay Pradhan, General Manager (ID & CBRN) also visited three locations viz. LPG Bottling Plant of HPCL & IOCL Bulk Petroleum Depot at Jatni, Kurdha and Sewerage Treatment Plant of CDA Sector-1, Cuttack.

After completion of the exercise a debriefing session was also organized through virtual mode at the State Emergency Operation Centre (SEOC), Bhubaneswar with the participation of the Administration of 10 districts, representatives of identified industries, Paradip Port Authority (PPA), nominated Incident Commanders and Technical Observers to discuss on various observations and feedback.

The debriefing session was chaired by Dr. Gyana Das, Managing Director of OSDMA