Cape Cod stages mock hurricane evacuation
No part of Massachusetts is more susceptible to a hurricane than Cape Cod, a 65-mile elbow of sand where any mass evacuation to the mainland must be squeezed over two narrow bridges. On a peak summer weekend, the shores swell with more than a million vacationers, a scenario that could create a traffic catastrophe if even a weak hurricane took aim.
With hurricane season two weeks away, some 300 federal, state, and local public safety personnel practiced a revamped plan to move people off Cape yesterday.
The annual drill at Otis Air National Guard Base simulated a Category 3 hurricane barreling toward Massachusetts. The mock command center tracked the storm from the Outer Banks of North Carolina, and Massachusetts Maritime Academy cadets posed as desperate evacuees seeking shelter and medical attention.
The key to disaster planning is preparation and heeding the danger of a potential storm when it is still several days away, said State Police Sergeant Barry Domingos.
"When it is hitting Bermuda, we are already in the planning stages," Domingos said yesterday in a telephone interview. "We are not waiting until it is off the coast of New Jersey."
The revamped emergency plan includes adjustments for a population increase, new developments, and changes to key roadways, such as the elimination of the Sagamore Rotary on Route 6 in Bourne. Even on a peak summer weekend, an evacuation could involve a maximum of 350,000 people, with the rest taking refuge in well-built homes and shelters on the Cape, Domingos said.
Authorities would focus on people living in low-lying areas and those in less sturdy mobile homes and summer cottages that might not withstand a strong storm.
To facilitate a mass exodus, authorities would close certain ramps onto Route 6, such as Exit 1 near the Christmas Tree Shops, giving motorists a straight shot across the Sagamore Bridge without having to fight merging traffic, Domingos said.
The last major cyclone to batter Cape Cod was in August 1991, when Hurricane Bob hit Block Island as a Category 2 storm and surged up the coast, killing 18 and causing $1.5 billion in damage, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 