Camp crisis management: Responding to new challenges

Camping Magazine, March, 2002 by Will Evans

Over the past few years, the scope of crisis response plans for many camp programs has expanded as camps share specific crisis experiences and network with other industries, such as schools and law enforcement agencies, to find solutions. In the past, crisis response plans at camps focused on child abuse; drownings or other activity-related deaths; vehicle wrecks; and environmental disasters such as earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, or fires. Today, crisis response plans cover additional concerns such as suicide threats, shootings, hostage taking, pollution and hazardous waste exposures, communicable disease outbreaks, food poisoning epidemics, and the possible sudden implementations of governmental restrictions (such as airport closings). A new level of crisis response planning is emerging in many industries as professionals reevaluate what can be reasonably anticipated and identify resources to help manage these risks.

Creating a Crisis Response Plan for Your Camp

How well could your camp adapt to meet the challenges of widespread grief or hysteria, panic-stricken children whose parents can't pick them up at the end of the camp session, interrupted communications and probable delays in vendor deliveries, and a significant reduction in EMS personnel or other professional resources who could respond to your site? With the proper resources and planning, you can minimize many of the emotional and physical traumas that may occur during a crisis. Consider the following steps when creating a crisis-response plan for your camp.

Get the right people

The people you involve in your planning process will dramatically influence the scope of the crises and the planned options available to your staff. Key camp staff to include are the director, camp medical director, maintenance supervisor, and offsite trip leaders. Suggested outside resources include personnel from your state's emergency management agency, the local rescue squad and sheriff's department, child protective services, camp doctor, child psychologist, local insurance agent or company, high school principal, and a public relations advisor. Your staff know your camp, but may not be familiar with procedures and resources available to others outside your camp. By utilizing these people in the planning stages, all participating will have an opportunity to address many issues that could result in conflict or confusion during a real crisis.

For instance, when EMS is called in for mass casualty responses or hazardous waste spills, EMS procedures and protocols could conflict with your camp's plans. It's not that EMS crews don't care about your camp's reputation or your procedures for controlling the press. The priorities emphasized to them in their training are "protect yourselves" and "save lives" The camp director needs to understand that the camp's priorities and concerns in a crisis may not be the priorities and concerns of the people directly involved in the crisis. That does not mean that the camp director's concerns are not important and should not be addressed! By working cooperatively with the various agencies, perhaps camp staff could be assigned to various roles. Don't be surprised if others outside your camp program question the qualifications of those people that you want them to work with during a crisis.

Identify potential threats

Make a list of possible major threats to your camp, staff, or guests. Then start listing the people, resources, and activities that need to occur within specific time periods (such as the first twenty minutes, the first hour, etc). The crisis list should include:

* Environmental threats - earthquakes, hurricanes, forest fires, dam collapses, and tornadoes.

* Security threats - hostile parents or visitors, hostage situations, verbalized threats, and child abduction.

* Health threats - intentional or unintentional food poisoning or water contamination, child abuse, communicable disease outbreaks, staff death, and group-wide emotional stress resulting from a catastrophic world event.

* Off-site hazards - off-site trips, airports, nuclear power plants, and dangerous wildlife.

You may even want to consider evaluating a combination of crises such as a diabetic or anaphylactic medical emergency during a severe storm that has knocked down trees and power lines, making access to your camp hazardous or impossible.

Gather resources

Assemble reference resources, including building layouts and topographic maps of your site and the surrounding areas. You might also want to visit any off-site trip locations. Have the crisis response planners walk through the site and review the communications systems, medical equipment, maintenance equipment, and other resources such as camp vehicles that might be used.

Prepare for a Crisis

Can you really prepare for a crisis such as a tornado or earthquake? Absolutely. Knowing what equipment you have (chain saws, tractors, emergency generators) is simply the beginning. Here are a few ideas to consider:

* Store a supply of trauma equipment and topographic maps of the area in a secondary location away from the health center.