EMS Education, Inc. - Emergency Services

Exercise Planning:

- What is an Exercise?
- Seminars
- Workshops
- Tabletops
- Games
- Drills
- Functional Exercise
- Full Scale Exercise

What is an Exercise?

“It is a rehearsal of a simulated emergency in which members of various emergencies perform the tasks that would be expected of them in a real emergency”
Federal Emergency Management Agency

An exercise is a single practice activity. Exercise are designed to help promote emergency preparedness within a community or an organization. They test policies and plans already in existence, or ones that are newly developed. In addition, exercises test the personnel training and readiness.

What are the benefits of Exercising?

Exercises are conducted to evaluate an organization’s capability to execute one or more portions of its response or contingency plan. Many successful responses to emergencies over the years demonstrate that exercising pays huge dividends when an emergency occurs
Allows for public recognition and opportunity for official’s support
Readiness for response is increased in the event of an actual emergency
Conflicts are revealed
Roles and responsibilities are confirmed
Modifications and improvements to emergency plans, procedures, and action checklists are identified based upon the lessons learned from the exercise\
Effectiveness of training is evaluated and additional training needs are identified
Provide an opportunity to improve inter-agency coordination and communications
Procedural and policy gaps are identified
Provide an opportunity to practice skills and improve individual performance under varying degrees of stress
To test and evaluate plans, policies and procedures (including new ones)
Provide a means to assess the readiness of State and local emergency plans and response capabilities as well as different organizations that may be involved