Bhubaneswar: To strengthen the disaster management capabilities of different stakeholders and also to test the preparedness at different levels, the Odisha State Disaster Management Authority (OSDMA) and Office of Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) jointly on Wednesday conducted mock exercises on flood and cyclone management across the State.
As part of the exercises, a dummy warning message was sent by Regional Office of the India Meteorological Department at Bhubaneswar to the State Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) functioning in the office of the SRC.
The dummy message was in turn forwarded by the State EOC to all the district offices and others. On receipt of the dummy message, the District EOCs immediately disseminated the same among other offices at the district level, subordinate offices and to the multipurpose cyclone/ flood shelter management and maintenance committees.
Then mock exercises on the line of action to be taken in case of a real disaster were conducted at different levels.
Mock drill has also been conducted in 879 shelters (568 multipurpose cyclone shelters and 311 multipurpose flood shelters, including IRCS shelters) constructed in 25 districts – Balasore, Bhadrak, Mayurbhanj, Kendrapada, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Puri, Khordha, Nayagarh, Ganjam, Rayagada, Nabarangpur, Subarnapur, Gajapati, Koraput, Nuapada, Malkangiri, Kalahandi, Boudha, Sambalpur, Bargarh, Jharsuguda and Keonjhar.
The members of the Multi-purpose Cyclone/ Flood Shelter Management and Maintenance Committees and the community members have participated in the drill.
The districts in which Multi-purpose Cyclone/ Flood Shelters are available.
Awareness rally was also taken up at many places.
Under the guidance of the Special Relief Commissioner, the Mock drill was coordinated at the state level by the officers of the Odisha State Disaster Management Authority and the office of the Special Relief Commissioner. Similarly, the emergency wing of the Collectorates organized the drill in the district. The Collectors, Additional District Magistrates, Sub-Collector, District Emergency Officer and other Senior Officers attended and observed the mock drill at different levels. This drill will certainly help efficient management of disasters at different levels.
