In Case Of Emergency, Read Blog

The blog “Web Strategy by Jeremiah” does an interesting, multi-media analysis of the role of the social messaging service Twitter (as well as other civilian media coverage) in reporting a propane gas explosion in Toronto early Sunday morning. In the post, titled “Crises Tracking on Twitter: The Benefits -and Dangers- of New Media,” Jeremiah (Jeremiah Owyang, […]

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One of the simplest but most ingenious uses of the internet for disaster preparedness is the New Orleans Times Picayune’s list of reader hurricane preparedness lessons learned mostly as a result of Hurricane Katrina.
The Times-Picayune, which did such heroic coverage during and after Katrina, solicited these ideas from readers in 2006 and printed them weekly […]

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Welcome to listeners of the public radio show “Homeland Security Inside & Out” who are arriving here at this blog for the first time. I hope you’ll stick around.
I did an interview for the show about the blog that appears on this week’s show. 
As I have written before, I am a big fan of “Homeland […]

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Thanks to “The Takeaway”, WNYC Radio’s new morning show, I discovered a fascinating website/project, Hero Reports (Heroreports.org). Brainchild of Massachusetts Institute of Technology doctoral candidate Alyssa Wright, Hero Reports takes its inspiration from the “See Something, Say Something” transit security campaign but adds a very constructive twist by soliciting examples of what the site calls “civic […]

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In a post earlier this week, I discussed the Florida Legislature’s attempt to address an obstacle faced by citizens as they try to prepare for emergencies — storing prescription medicine. In last weekend’s New York Times Magazine, there was an article, “Are You Ready For The Next Disaster,” by Eric Klinenberg that describes the range of other impediments that […]

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I recently had the opportunity to participate in a “Blogger Roundtable” on emergency preparedness with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Michael Chertoff and Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) chief R. David Paulison held at DHS Headquarters in Washington, D.C. I joined Jonah Czerwinski of the Homeland Security Watch and Rich Cooper of Security Debrief as one of three questioners. The full transcript can be found here. 
It was a wide-ranging, […]

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On the train back from Washington last week, I was riveted to my iPod watching one of the best hours of television I’ve seen in a long time – the first segment of “Carrier,” PBS’ 10-part documentary, which follows a six-month deployment of the USS Nimitz to the Persian Gulf.
The episode is wonderful – informative, funny, inspiring, frank, and beautifully shot. There […]

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With summer approaching and the memory of the Iowa tornado disaster still resonating, the Linda Wagar of Fox-4 TV in Kansas City had a good story reminding parents to make sure the camp their kids has an emergency plan:
“The Boy Scout camp tragedy in Iowa is raising awareness of just how vulnerable kids can be when they’re away at […]

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The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes — And Why by Amanda Ripley goes on sale today.
I have had a chance to read the book, and I can recommend it wholeheartedly not only to any readers of this blog — who tend think about disasters more than most folks — but also to anyone who ever thinks about what they would do if […]

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I recommend anyone interested in the role of the public in homeland security should read “Civic Security”  an article in the Winter 2008 edition of a terrific new policy magazine, Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. Dallek, a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars, cleverly offers a new take on homeland security by citing an old model –World War II’s Office of Civil Defense. He writes:
“In May 1941, President Franklin D. […]

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