With this 12 months’s hurricane season quick approaching (June 1-Nov. 30), HURREX/CG, led by U.S. Fleet Forces Command and Commander, Navy Installations Command, prepares the Navy to reply to antagonistic climate situations in U.S. coastal areas and preserve the flexibility to deploy forces below probably the most extreme situations. It additionally assessments the response instances for accounting for Sailors, Division of Navy civilians and households in affected areas by way of the Navy Household Accountability and Evaluation System (NFAAS). This 12 months’s train comes on the heels of a very damaging hurricane season. Whereas 2022’s Atlantic hurricane season had solely 14 whole storms and eight hurricanes, it was one of many costliest on document as a consequence of Hurricane Ian, which alone value greater than $113 billion {dollars} in injury and was famous to be Florida’s deadliest hurricane since 1935. Workout routines equivalent to HURREX/CG purpose to coach set up workers within the particulars of storm readiness and response.
“The aim of the HURREX/CG train is to arrange our personnel for the impacts of a damaging climate occasion equivalent to a hurricane,” defined Capt. Derrick Kingsley, NAS Patuxent River commanding officer. “And similar to our safety workout routines, the first aim is to keep up the security of personnel within the occasion of an emergency. The second catastrophe strikes is rarely the time to determine easy methods to reply, so we prepare like struggle.”
Carried out over a two-week interval, the primary week of the train consists of monitoring the storm system’s evolution alongside the U.S. Atlantic coast, simulating upgrades to the set up’s Tropical Cyclone Situation of Readiness (TCCOR). Different deliberate simulations embody ship sorties, plane evacuations, base evacuations and catastrophe preparedness / response. The second week shifts focus to procedures for restoration, together with lifting evacuation orders, reopening installations, and conducting injury assessments.
Base management is working with management kind different instructions at Pax River to make sure minimal affect is felt as set up workers prepare throughout these workout routines.
Whereas HURREX/CG helps to find out if there are any areas the place the area or the set up can enhance their capability to arrange for and reply to pure disasters, personnel are inspired to take cost of their very own preparation and planning. Integral to that is conserving info updated within the Navy Household and Accountability System (NFAAS) and reviewing storm preparedness pointers from assets equivalent to www.prepared.navy.mil or www.prepared.gov.
“NFAAS is an important useful resource for finding Navy personnel and relations throughout disaster or pure disasters to make sure they’re secure,” mentioned Kingsley. “And the assets out there to our Navy households to assist them be put together for a catastrophe can actually save their lives in a catastrophe.”
To register with NFAAS, go to https://navyfamily.navy.mil.
