From Festivals to Hurricanes: How Lincoln County Stays Prepared

About Lincoln County Emergency Services

Lincoln County in North Carolina, with a population of around 100,000 residents, is roughly 45 miles long and 20 miles wide, spreading the terrain long and narrow. This presents a unique set of considerations due to its stretched-out geography. Managing emergency preparedness across a larger area can add layers to coordination and communication.

The common incidents faced by the county are thunderstorms and other severe weather events such as tornadoes. During the summer small tornadoes (EF0/EF1) can occur, and during the wintertime threat of icing and the subsequent power loss and outages are also significant concerns for the region in North Carolina.

Another hazard managed by the team at Lincoln County is that they are an EPZ (Emergency Planning Zone) county for a nuclear station located just across the river in an adjacent county. This plays a role in their preparedness efforts. Having approximately one-third of the county within that evacuation zone requires a substantial amount of planning and coordination, even though the facility itself isn't within its borders. The variability with both natural disasters and the presence of a nuclear plant provides the team with a multifaceted approach to preparedness.

D4H and Lincoln County

The sudden discontinuation of their previous platform, Mission Manager, presented an urgent need for incident management software for the team at Lincoln County. This unexpected challenge, spurred a proactive search for a solution that could not only fill the immediate void but also enhance their overall preparedness capabilities.

Through research and thorough demos, Lincoln County found D4H to be the platform best suited to their needs. What stood out was D4H's ability for real-time operational management and the ability to maintain a detailed historical record allowing for analysis and learning from past events. Additionally D4H allows seamless sharing of information, including demographic data vital for search operations. These capabilities streamline immediate response efforts and contributes to long-term improvements in productivity and effectiveness.

"The platform that D4H provides suits our needs from start to finish, D4H allows us to pass off information very easily and keep it documented which is key for us"

— Joshua Holland, Emergency Management Planner

Another advantage Lincoln County has experienced with D4H is its scalability. D4H software enables the efficient dissemination of information across multiple jurisdictions, fostering stronger collaboration and bolstering the regional emergency preparedness network. This ability to connect and share seamlessly underscores the critical role of unified platforms in modern emergency management.

Storm Preparedness: Responding to Hurricane Helene

For Lincoln County, preparedness for severe weather events like storms is a big focus for the emergency team. The county manages a diverse range of environmental challenges, the team prioritize multi-agency coordination and ensure that essential personnel have the access they need within the D4H platform to effectively manage and respond to incidents. This proactive approach allows for seamless information flow and collaborative action, even before a storm makes landfall.

Hurricane Helene served as an early, yet significant, test of Lincoln County's newly implemented D4H system. Having just completed onboarding and full implementation in July, the arrival of the hurricane presented a "trial by fire" scenario. However, D4H proved to be an invaluable asset. The county utilized the platform's logging features to meticulously track events and the mapping functionality to visualize the deployment of resources, including volunteer fire departments and sheriff's officers. Notably, the mapping feature showcased the interoperability of the system, as personnel operating in a neighboring county, Mitchell County, could also log their activities within the same platform. This was crucial given Lincoln County's unique structure, where a vast majority of the 45-mile-long county relies on volunteer fire departments and the sheriff's office for emergency services.

During Hurricane Helene, the real-time data capabilities of D4H proved particularly beneficial. Fire departments actively input road closures due to fallen trees or power lines directly into the system, providing the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) with a dynamic and up-to-the-minute operational picture.

"D4H mapping software is great, our fire departments were logged in during Helene and able to input road closures in real time due to down trees, or power lines. So it gave us that real-time data aspect that we needed here in the EOC in order to manage the incident."

— Joshua Holland, Emergency Management Planner

Furthermore, Lincoln County activated its swift water rescue team, managing their assignments within D4H. Beyond internal deployments, the platform facilitated the coordination of 21 missions in support of neighboring jurisdictions affected by the hurricane. This involved tracking the deployment of equipment, supplies, and personnel, highlighting D4H's capacity to manage mutual aid efforts effectively. Lincoln County's innovative approach of transforming the traditional ICS 204 Assignment Form into an actionable, real-time dashboard within D4H significantly enhanced their ability to track resources and respond swiftly throughout the emergency, demonstrating the platform's adaptability and user-friendly interface at all levels of operation.

"The D4H dashboard allowed us to build out data so much quicker and push it out to the field really quickly"

— Joshua Holland, Emergency Management Planner

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Lincoln County's Annual Apple Festival

While the county uses D4H for natural disasters, the team also uses the software for planned community events, such as Lincoln County's annual Apple Festival. For this tradition, the county adopts a similar structured approach to preparedness for emergency response, emphasizing meticulous planning and the engagement of all key stakeholders.

The process kicks off with a planning meeting, bringing together officials and representatives from various participating agencies. D4H is used to streamline collaboration. Instead of relying on a single point of data entry, D4H empowers each involved entity to directly input their specific assignments. Law enforcement can detail their deployment strategies, EMS can outline their medical support plans, and fire departments can delineate their roles and responsibilities. Even traffic control personnel gain direct access to mapping features, clearly displaying traffic control points and potential road closures. This decentralized yet integrated approach ensures that everyone is working within the same operational picture.

During the planning phase and leading up to the festival, D4H serves as a central hub for all critical information. Road closures, traffic management plans, special assignments, and resource needs are all documented and readily accessible within the platform. The resource ordering feature has proven particularly valuable, allowing different agencies to request necessary equipment and support, with notifications efficiently routed to relevant personnel. This centralized system not only enhances clarity and coordination during the planning stages but also provides a common operational briefing point, ensuring that all teams are aligned and well-informed as the Apple Festival unfolds. By leveraging D4H, Lincoln County transforms the complex logistics of a large-scale community event into a well-orchestrated and effectively managed operation.

During last years Apply Festival the team experienced a missing child case and needed to use D4H and quickly be able to track a missing persons.

"Within two to three minutes I had a very rough template up that we were able to automatically start inputting data into and even had a dashboard view built out, color coded to show the status of the missing individual. So if you know the D4H system, play around with it you can pick it up extemely quickly."

— Joshua Holland, Emergency Management Planner

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