Structural Engineering Emergency Response (SEER) Plan Organizing Committee

New

The committee has organized a seminar for structural engineering emergency response training as well as use of ATC Field Manuals - Evaluation of Buildings - the seminar which will be conducted by ATC (Applied Technology Council). See the Events section of our web site.

If you are interested in helping out on the committee, contact Jeffrey Struble.

History

Emergency preparedness is no longer just an issue for the West Coast where an earthquake could occur at any time. The constant potential for natural disasters and the increased threat of terrorism are a nation-wide phenomena. Western states have had procedures for emergency structural evaluations in place for quite some time. Following their example, emergency assessment teams were quickly assembled after the World Trade Center attacks in New York City and they remain organized to assemble again if needed.

From these experiences, it is known that structural engineers are needed to assist government agencies after an emergency, sometimes on a very large scale. In order to respond to this need, the National Council of Structural Engineers Association (NCSEA) formed the Structural Engineering Emergency Response (SEER) Committee to guide local SEA’s in the organization of their engineering communities into functioning SEER groups capable of providing rapid structural evaluations to local emergency management authorities (EMA’s).

At the end of 2003, BASE requested Jeffrey Struble to research the development of a new standing committee in BASE to create an Emergency Response Plan in our area.

Feb 25, 2004, BASE attended a regularly scheduled gathering of Massachusetts' various emergency response organizations associated with the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA). Volunteers who participate would fall under the direction of the Technical Services arm of MEMA and would mesh their organization with that department’s Incident Command System (ICS). Setting up the SEER Plan organization and maintaining it would be the function of the standing committee.

June 23, 2004, BASE attended a seminar presented by NCSEA's SEER Committee members, sponsored by the SEA of RI and the RI Emergency Management Agency. This seminar provided information on how SEER Committees are intended to work and to observe the preparedness of Rhode Island.

Based on the RI seminar, tasks to be completed as follows:

• Contact other state SEER Plan Committees to see how they are organized, plus how they became organized. This will include talking to the National SEER Plan Committee with questions and requests for contact information.
• Investigate the creation and maintenance of an up-to-date database that keeps track of volunteer structural engineers in Massachusetts. This will entail finding a suitable location for the resident data and establishing recurring procedures to contact volunteers about their status and recording it.
• Research the literature and various training programs available, such as ATC-20, FEMA-USR programs that SEER Plan volunteers would need to be effective during an emergency, including researching the funding needed to obtain the training.
• Confer with the legal/liability experts about our exposure as SEER Plan volunteers and see if any measures are needed to minimize it, including legislation (i.e., Good Samaritan laws).
• Coordinate the function of an eventual Mass. SEER Plan Committee with the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA), finding out how the committee could best present itself for service to that agency.

September 2005, BASE contacted BSCES to begin joint discussions of setting an SEERP in place for Massachusetts in order to include the possibility of structural engineers from many different backgrounds and abilities.

The committee believed that the SEER Plan Organizing Committee would be most suitable under the newly formed SEAMass. SEAMass is the Massachusetts member organization of NCSEA - NCSEA is providing the necessary tools help states form their own SEER plans.