Towns prepare for emergencies
It's 9:45 a.m. A commuter steps off the train at Medford's Wellington Station carrying a concealed package. A deafening blast echoes down the tracks, followed by a powerful shock wave.
One car in a six-car train is badly damaged, and two others are tipped over. Shards of glass and steel rain down onto crowds racing to escape. Screams fill the air. Bodies litter the ground. Sirens sound, and first responders begin to arrive.
Fill in the blanks.
That was the job of about 200 police officers, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, transport workers, and others from 95 federal, state, and local agencies during a simulated explosion of a terrorist's dirty bomb.
This table-top exercise, which was first conducted in October 2006 and may be repeated in the spring and the year after, is among a host of activities across the state being undertaken by fledgling regional emergency management committees - in this case, the Mystic Regional Emergency Planning Committee.
The groups are being mobilized to supplement the response of local communities during emergencies, particularly if the disaster were to cross municipal borders.
The regional groups are intended to help shuttle victims to shelter, provide medical treatment, secure order, put out fires, shore up floods, restore services, assess environmental damage, and clean up in the aftermath of a disaster.
"The regional approach allows for coordinated training between communities," said John Nash, fire chief in Winchester, one of 15 communities represented at the dirty-bomb exercise.
"Most importantly, it provides a planning tool that encourages communities to participate with one another, because no community can handle a large-scale emergency on its own."
Officials emphasized that the regional approach will not replace preparations by cities and towns.
"It's got to start locally," said Concord Fire Chief Kenneth Willette.
Still, many communities, required by law to have an emergency management plan, have neither the resources nor the personnel to put it into practice.
In Concord, one of the better-prepared communities, officials are honing local resources, even as they participate in exercises that have regional implications, said Willette, who also serves as local emergency management director.
The town has designated a school, the Senior Center, and a municipal fitness center as emergency shelters. Concord-Carlisle High School is the principal shelter, because it has parking, a lobby area to register people, adequate bathrooms, and a gymnasium that can hold 150 to 250.
About 50 residents have volunteered to serve as shelter staff and have received training from the American Red Cross.
A telephone system similar to reverse 911 can dial residents and inform them about a disaster, and the local newspaper and cable TV station can supply updates. The town also has secured the services of amateur ham radio operators to help with communications.
In October, Concord and Emerson Hospital personnel staged an emergency response to a hypothetical situation involving contaminated water supply. The exercise included the hospital's decontamination unit, a trailer designed to isolate victims and flush contaminants from them.
In an even more widespread emergency - say, a chemical spill on Route 2 - Willette said the town would turn for help to the Battle Road Regional Emergency Planning Committee, which also comprises Arlington, Bedford, Belmont, and Lexington.
Many communities have backup plans for shelters out of town that do not necessarily fall under the official regional rubric.
Arlington, for example, has designated as shelters several schools and the Regent Theatre, with supplies stockpiled in a trailer outside Police Headquarters, said Allan McEwen, the town's fire chief and emergency management director. But if victims needed long-term shelter, he said, officials might turn to hotels or a Boston University athletic facility.
Likewise, the campus recreation center at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, with its three gymnasiums, is ready to shelter victims from surrounding communities, said Jean Robinson, athletic facilities manager.
The principle of cross-boundary aid was tested in 2006, when a shelter in Methuen was set up to house 3,000 evacuees of a raging flood in Lawrence, said Lawrence Fire Chief Peter Takvorian.
But officials learned a primary lesson of emergency management, as only about 100 victims showed up to use it.
"A lot of people found places to stay with friends or relatives," said Takvorian, who also serves as the city's emergency management director.
Even well-prepared communities and regional groups cannot anticipate every glitch, nor supply every need.
In Groton, for example, officials have identified the high school as a likely emergency shelter, but lack a written contract as yet to guarantee its use, relying instead on a verbal agreement.
"If we have an emergency, we're going to move in," said William Shute, the town's emergency management director.
Even the seemingly simple stockpiling of bedding brings challenges. "Cots can get rodent infestation, dry rot, and worn out," explained William Middlemiss, Lexington's fire chief and emergency management director.
Storing food can also present a problem, with the possibility of spoilage. Some communities have solved it by establishing agreements with restaurants and grocery stores.
Tewksbury, for example, has a contract with the local Market Basket. Michael Sitar, fire captain and emergency management director, said that if the store were closed, "we have the key."
Many communities have yet to configure their municipal websites to broadcast during an emergency and to set up a reverse 911 system. And such aids would prove useless during a crisis with combined power failure and telephone disruption.
How would residents be contacted?
"I don't know, other than word of mouth," said Edward Pitta, Lowell's fire chief and emergency management director.
Local and regional officials also said they need to work on establishing systems to serve special-needs populations.
With all the flaws and lapses, local and regional emergency management teams are continuing to try to prepare for natural and man-made disasters.
At their dirty-bomb exercise last year, the Mystic Regional Emergency Planning Committee discovered what kinds of decisions they would have to make and who would make them.
"Everything was thought of beforehand," said Rick Tustin, Winchester fire captain and chairman of the Mystic Regional Committee.
"It's just that, as with any type of exercise, you realize, 'I probably could have handled it a little differently.' "
Next spring, the group, which includes representatives from Medford, North Reading, Reading, Stoneham, Wakefield, Winchester, and Woburn, is likely to mount a reenactment - still indoors, but this time actually making the decisions and seeing where they lead.
The group will try to improve communications, and test out a new state Web-based emergency operations center, Tustin said.
He said participants also will be practicing "monitoring the environment - which direction was wind going; to what extent would there be contamination; how far would you have to go out; how many hospitals would you have to close down temporarily; would there be cross contamination?"
The spring training could prepare for staging a full-scale drill, in real time and on the ground. But that's still up in the air. "Those exercises are very costly, very time-consuming to produce," Tustin said.
Connie Paige can be reached at cpaige@globe.com. 