ICE STORM: BWL Command and Communications Center

LANSING – Now that the Lansing Board of Water and Light has released its emergency operations plan and procedures manual (three days after the request during a press conference)(see below) new information related to the handling of the major crisis is becoming clear.

Despite the operation/action plan having a segment in place for the implementation of an emergency Command and Communications Center (CCC) at BWL headquarters, the CCC was never mobilized.

BWL Communications Director Steve Serkaian says that segment of the action plan is only in place in the event that top BWL leaders are unable to communicate in any other way. Because leaders had access to email and cellphones, the CCC was never “activated.”

Serkaian says that he was in Novi Saturday night and prepared for the ice storm by having his family pack overnight bags. His family made a decision to stay in Novi that night because of the storm impact; however, he says he was on his cellphone and email starting at about 4 a.m.

Sarkaian said he set up a response operation in the lobby of the hotel. At 7 a.m. with the extent of damage from the storm known, he says he left his family Novi and drove back to Lansing and began coordinating with city of Lansing and East Lansing officials which led to the Sunday 2 p.m. press conference – the first following the storm.

According to Sarkaian, BWL spent Sunday and Monday morning responding to downed power lines and making them safe. He called it “downed line triage.”

According to the BWL procedures manual, however, those responses should have begun immediately with staff on duty.

The document appears to have been last updated Feb. 22, 2001, but Serkaian was unable to confirm the procedures manual had not been updated since that date – the only date appearing in the document (located on page 8 of the pdf).

The action plan appears to have been disseminated to employees Oct. 28, 2013, but was not approved by Peter Lark, head of BWL, until Dec. 1, 2013. The plan is dated 2014.

BWL Emergency Action Plan

BWL Emergency Procedures Manual