MOUNT VERNON — The havoc wrought by the recent windstorm was a big test for the county’s local disaster response system. Not since the ice storm of 2004 had the entire county seen such hardship. It was a good chance to see the good and bad in a thankfully under-utilized response system.

In a disaster of the kind that hit the county recently, the Emergency Management Agency is at the center of the relief operations. It is charged with contacting all local governments and their agencies with information about what is going on. That process also works in reverse. The EMA depends on information from local government agencies to make strategic decisions on how to apportion resources.

“I think it went very well,” said Marie Blubaugh, director of the Knox County EMA. “We did some things this year that we haven’t done in the past. We contacted all of the village administrators to see if there was anything that they needed that we could help them with. We contacted the township trustees to find out what roads were closed. We tried to keep the news media informed as much as we could. So I think things went very well.”

Blubaugh said there were a few problems as can be expected in a situation like this. But she thought they would learn from the situation.

“There are some lessons we all could learn from,” she said. “One of the weaknesses was communications and the cell phones. One of the things we relied on too much was the cell phones. We found out there are certain people who don’t have land lines and just had their cell phones. And we couldn’t contact them (because service was out). I think that was our biggest weakness. We’re going to have to work something out on that.”

Blubaugh said there were things that worked out well.

“I think contacting the village administrations, the city and county engineer’s offices and townships to keep them all informed; I think that went very well,” she added. “We talked to the commissioners to let them know what was going on. I was in contact with the sheriff, Mike Merrilees at the (Mount Vernon) police department and that all went well.”

The EMA serves as the hub of relief efforts during a disaster and communication is at the heart of the efforts. But another consideration is acting on the information available and moving resources where they are needed. Much of that process falls to the Red Cross, the only non-government organization in the process. It is their job to provide shelter, water and food to victims as well as damage assessment information to EMA. Blubaugh said while she was pleased with the Red Cross response she thought there was some room for improvement.

“Once I made contact with the Red Cross to request a shelter in a certain area, I left the rest up to them,” she explained. “That’s part of their function. For instance, the Fredericktown fire department called me and said they wanted a shelter opened. I talked with them and asked where they wanted it and what can we do for them. On Sunday we did make contact with the Red Cross’ Keith Hughes and he was in our office Sunday night. So we talked with Dan Werner on Monday. So we had the Red Cross in the loop from the beginning. How they handled their shelters is their business. There are things we can improve on and those are the things we will work on in the future. There are issues we have to talk about and see if we can do better. I think it worked out pretty well for being our first time out.

“I think in the past we’ve had some issues with communicating with the villages and that to find out what they needed,” Blubaugh noted. “But I think this time we stepped up to the plate with them to find out what they might need and I think that worked out this year.”

Blubaugh got requests from the different fire departments and village administrations asking for certain things that were needed. Requests for equipment such as generators and the need for shelters were the main communications.

Maintaining contact with the utility companies, especially the electric companies was also a major concern for the EMA.

“I thought we had great contact with the electric companies just to find out how many people were without power,” Blubaugh said. “Of course they would never really say how long it was going to take but we were in contact with them.”

The EMA has two full-time employees and a network of volunteers. During the crisis, Blubaugh was assisted by Capt. Richard Brenneman of the Knox County Sheriff’s Office. Brenneman acts as the public information officer for the EMA. He handled the task of fielding questions from the media and getting information out to them.

Blubaugh said she is planning an after-action meeting with the different people involved with the recent disaster efforts to discuss the performance of all the entities. The date of the meeting has yet to be set.

Blubaugh had special thanks to the volunteers and all the people who helped out.

“I hope this doesn’t happen again soon, but I do want to put in a little plug for my dispatchers,” she said. “The communications technicians who were on duty that night and at the police department helped out a lot. And they did a wonderful job with all the calls that came in that night. And the media response went very well. I think you guys did an excellent job getting the information out when we got it to you. Both the newspaper and the radio stations, WMVO and WNZR. When something like this happens we like to have the information come through our office so that everybody is saying the same thing when the information goes out.”

Blubaugh had one last note of appreciation.

“I will say, for the most part, the residents of Knox County were very patient and we appreciated that,” said Blubaugh. “And I would like to say that we have what we call an emergency preparedness checklist. If anything like this should happen again or something worse at least they could have a kit prepared so that they could survive for three days without electric if they needed to. For the most part though most people were very patient. After a week without electric it can be hard, so I want to thank all those out there for the patience that they had.”