An emergency is a situation that poses an immediate risk to health, life, property, or environment. Most emergencies require urgent intervention to prevent a worsening of the situation, although in some situations, mitigation may not be possible and agencies may only be able to offer palliative care for the aftermath.
Search and rescue (SAR) is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger. The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, typically determined by the type of terrain the search is conducted over. These include mountain rescue; ground search and rescue, including the use of search and rescue dogs; urban search and rescue in cities; combat search and rescue on the battlefield and air-sea rescue over water.
The Incident Command System (ICS) is a standardized approach to the command, control, and coordination of emergency response providing a common hierarchy within which responders from multiple agencies can be effective.
Most emergency management in the United States is done at the local and state level. The Department of Homeland Security has attempted to standardize equipment, organizational structures, and terminology to create better response and preparedness to large and small-scale disasters across the country. The National Incident Management System is a collection of principles and methods that can be utilized by local, state, federal emergency managers as well as the private sector and NGOs. NIMS aims to better improve the nation's response to emergencies. Its goal is a better system that can more efficiently allocate resources in the event of a disaster and facilitate cooperation among diverse entities and agencies. Large-scale disasters in the past in the U.S. suffered from a lack of solid coordination and authority, as well as different entities utilizing different lingo when communication which led to confusion. NIMS attempts to solve these issues.
To that end, FEMA developed the National Incident Management System (NIMS).
National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) is an incident-based reporting system used by law enforcement agencies in the United States for collecting and reporting data on crimes. Local, state and federal agencies generate NIBRS data from their records management systems. Data is collected on every incident and arrest in the Group A offense category. These Group A offenses are 49 offenses grouped in 23 crime categories. Specific facts about these offenses are gathered and reported in the NIBRS system. In addition to the Group A offenses, 10 Group B offenses are reported with only the arrest information.
The New Zealand Co-ordinated Incident Management System (CIMS)
is New Zealand's system for managing the response to an incident involving multiple responding agencies. Its developers based the system on California's Incident Command System (ICS) - developed in the 1970s - and on other countries' adaptations of ICS, such as Australia's Australasian Inter-Service Incident Management System (AIIMS).
Motor coordination is the combination of body movements created with the kinematic and kinetic (force) parameters that result in intended actions. Motor coordination is achieved when subsequent parts of the same movement, or the movements of several limbs or body parts are combined in a manner that is well timed, smooth, and efficient with respect to the intended goal. This involves the integration of proprioceptive information detailing the position and movement of the musculoskeletal system with the neural processes in the brain and spinal cord which control, plan, and relay motor commands. The cerebellum plays a critical role in this neural control of movement and damage to this part of the brain or its connecting structures and pathways results in impairment of coordination, known as ataxia.
Multi-agency Coordination Systems (MACS) are a part of the United States standardized Incident Command System.
MACS provides the basic architecture for facilitating the allocation of resources, incident prioritization, coordination and integration of multiple agencies for large-scale incidents and emergencies.
The National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho is the physical facility which is the home to the National Interagency Coordination Center (NICC), and the National Multi-Agency Coordination group.
The National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) was formed in the United States as a result of the aftermath of a major wildfire season in 1970.
The National Multi-Agency Coordination Group (MAC) establishes National Preparedness Levels throughout the calendar year to help assure that wildland firefighting resources are ready to respond to new incidents. Preparedness Levels are dictated by burning conditions, fire activity, and especially resource availability.
Emergency Management BC (EMBC) used to be known as the Provincial Emergency Program and is a division of the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General of British Columbia, Canada. EMBC works with local governments and other provincial and federal agencies year round, providing coordination and support before, during and after emergencies. EMBC is administered under the Emergency Program Act.
National Counter-Terrorism Exercises are an exercise program involving the Australian Federal Government and all States and Territories designed to test Australia’s counter-terrorism response arrangements. Australia’s national counter-terrorism arrangements are well practised with major exercises held annually. The Department of Home Affairs manages the Counter-Terrorism Capability Branch in the Centre for Counter-Terrorism Coordination which supports the Australia-New Zealand Counter-Terrorism Committee (ANZCTC) who run the exercise program. The exercise was formerly named National Anti-Terrorism Exercise (NATEX).
The United States National Response Framework (NRF) is part of the National Strategy for Homeland Security that presents the guiding principles enabling all levels of domestic response partners to prepare for and provide a unified national response to disasters and emergencies. Building on the existing National Incident Management System (NIMS) as well as Incident Command System (ICS) standardization, the NRF's coordinating structures are always in effect for implementation at any level and at any time for local, state, and national emergency or disaster response.
The original acronym FIRESCOPE stood for "FIrefighting REsources of Southern California Organized for Potential Emergencies." The system was developed after a bout of massive southern California wildfires in 1970, which burned for days and involved multiple jurisdictions. The system was designed to create an efficient interagency resource coordination system for fire and other emergencies in the Southern California Region. The system was later expanded to provide service statewide.
One-alarm, two-alarm, three-alarm fires, etc., are categories of fires indicating the level of response by local authorities. The term multiple-alarm is a quick way of indicating that a fire is severe and is difficult to contain. This system of classification is common in the United States and in Canada among both fire departments and news agencies.
The Coordinated Regional Incident-Management Procedure or Gecoördineerde Regionale Incidentbestrijdings Procedure (GRIP) is a nationwide emergency management procedure in the Netherlands.
The procedure is used by all emergency services, different layers of government and government agencies.
The Integrated Planning System is a structured planning framework adapted from the US military's Joint Operational Planning and Execution System (JOPES) and was developed and released by the US Department of Homeland Security in January 2009.
The Security and Intelligence Agency is the Croatian security and intelligence service founded in 2006 upon the passing of the Security and Intelligence System of the Republic of Croatia Act and by combining the former Counterintelligence Agency (POA), and the Intelligence Agency (OA) which both ceased to operate.
The United Nations-Oceans is an inter-agency coordination mechanism of the United Nations, set up to enhance cooperation and coordination of activities concerned with the world oceans and coasts. The UN-Oceans was formed in September 2003 by the United Nations System Chief Executive Board (CEB), to replace the Sub-Committee on Oceans and Coastal Areas (SOCA) of the Administrative Committee on coordination (ACC) that was formed in 1993.
