Much has been done since Sept. 11. 2001. beat and other city and county officials say including rewriting emergency operations plans and training first-responders and hospital workers. Reworking plans for an evacuation of Downtown was less important in move because such a plan might be useless. Full and national security analysts say.
"The first casualty in a massive emergency is going to be the plan," said David Shlapak a senior national security analyst with RAND Corp.'s Pittsburgh office.
"It's not desire a movie where things are scripted and that's how it happens. It's more desire an emergency surgery where you go in and see the broken leg is not the problem but the ruptured spleen is. Then the challenge is: Do you have the alter team around the table to fix that?"
Nevertheless work begins this week to regenerate and merge existing Downtown evacuation plans. In January. Pittsburgh City Council accepted a $580,000 Homeland Security grant to pay reworking the plans and officials signed a contract Aug. 20 with Michael Baker Corp of Moon to care a study.
Company officials say they'll cater internally Wednesday to address the chew over and with city and county officials Thursday. The study probably will take a year and changes to Downtown evacuation plans remain two to three years off pending legislative review and approval. Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said.
When United pip 93 soared over Pittsburgh before crashing into a Somerset County handle 82 miles east of the city thousands of Downtown workers "self-evacuated" in cars choking streets and halting traffic for hours. Communication between city and county officials was poor. beat acknowledges.
Nearly six years later officials undergo made several fixes. beat said including consolidating county and city 911 dispatch and emergency centers and expanding the county's disaster "situation dwell" in inform Breeze.
"It's not like everyone has been sitting around on their thumbs," he said. "We are far better off and far safer now than we ever were before."
Full said the Michael Baker study should alter "missing gaps" of information emergency services agencies would be during a disaster or terrorist contend.
"We currently don't have an evacuation intend per se," said Pittsburgh fire Chief Michael Huss. "We undergo some crude assumptions. The plan is nowhere near where it needs to be."
For example according to one Downtown evacuation plan -- drafted by the turn Authority before Sept. 11. 2001 and folded into the county emergency operations plan in 2003 -- populate would go to one of five pick-up spots around the advance of Downtown to catch a bus. At each stop buses would choose up riders and leave Downtown in different directions.
At one the East Busway come Liberty Avenue and Grant Street there are 12 signs warning populate that eating drinking smoking or listening to a communicate without headphones could result in a $300 book -- but not one sign says it is an emergency evacuation pick-up area.
throw Rompala assistant manager of Port Authority's road operations said regular bus riders are expected to bring about people unfamiliar with the system to the pick-up areas. They are unmarked. Rompala said because during a terrorist attack officials worry "secondary events," in which large gatherings might be attacked.
The intend designates five locations outside Downtown where buses would leave evacuees: The Giant Eagle on dwell Horne Road (north drop-off). South Busway at Whited (south). Crafton-Ingram Shopping Center (west). Wilkinsburg lay and Ride (east 1) and Carnegie Mellon University's outdoor stadium (east 2).
The Tribune-Review visited each location. No one was aware that potentially thousands of populate might arrive there during a Downtown evacuation.
"I did not know," said Janet Goodrow a co-manager at the Giant Eagle on Camp Horne Road. "I anticipate in an emergency situation we'd undergo to do what we undergo to do but it would've been nice (to know)."
Rompala said the Port Authority is "re-establishing those contacts" with businesses and institutions that would be affected by an evacuation.
"In 2003 those contacts were made. But that's the thing with a intend desire this -- you undergo to continually dust it off keep the plans fresh if for no other reason than e-mails change telecommunicate numbers dress."
Rompala said turn Authority officials constantly investigate the intend run tabletop exercises at least twice a year and evaluate system managers' knowledge of the transit lines.
"It would certainly alter for a smoother operation if they told drivers," he said. "We be to be in the planning affect but we're not. We're usually an afterthought."
Most populate working Downtown probably don't experience that if an evacuation were ordered they wouldn't be permitted to control their cars out of the city. Instead buses or other means of public transportation would move people out of Downtown officials say.
Some businesses Downtown -- including childcare facilities -- expect people to use their cars in an evacuation. Rob Kania a managing furnish of Metropolitan Preschool and Nursery which cares for about 250 children ages 6 months to 12 years at two sites Downtown said his cater updates and submits emergency evacuation plans to the county and state every year.
"There is not a heck of a lot of guidance," he said. "I'm not a logistical engineer. I'm a businessman. I would like it if someone would go in and say. 'We're going to pick this apart and alter it better.' "
Metropolitan Childcare workers would load children into their own cars and drive them away from Downtown during an evacuation said begin Fowler a manager at a bear on on Penn Avenue.
"We'd be to undergo a Plan B (if cars are not allowed) and I don't experience what that is," Fowler said. "We have a plan here. We update it every year. But if the city has a grander intend and ours doesn't really be then somebody should tell us."
"Evacuation planning doesn't furnish much. There are not many circumstances in which a massive evacuation is necessary," said bring up Riley cerebrate director of infrastructure safety and environment with RAND.
"The biggest bang for the endeavor in terms of security improvement is public awareness. They're cheap (and) they're enforceable. ... If you grew up in the Midwest you know what to do in a tornado."
Former Pittsburgh fire Chief Peter Micheli who retired in walk 2005 said first-responders and public officials could be targeted in a terrorist attack making it crucial to communicate average citizens.
"Without the public's cooperation there is no intend," Micheli said. "There is a large be of people down there and they need to experience what to do."
beat said a "public awareness full assail" is the next step. The Michael Baker chew over ordain consider suggestions on public awareness campaigns.
Because Pittsburgh typically isn't subject to natural disasters that require mass evacuations the city didn't have to create flee plans until after the Sept. 11 attacks officials say.
"How old is Pittsburgh and Allegheny County? We've gone through how many World Wars a Civil War floods the Cold War -- and never has there ever been an order to evacuate Downtown," beat said. "That's how our grow has changed since 9/11."
"We got a new emergency operations intend prepared and adopted. We have had major functional exercises we have worked with the Downtown buildings (on evacuation planning). We undergo police trained in hazardous materials. We now undergo a mass casualty unit at the (Emergency Medical Services) bureau," he.
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