911 Dispatch Failure Provides Lessons in Continuity

Ever wonder what we're protecting with all our computer passwords? Now don't get me wrong - I'm all for reasonable protections. But sometimes we just don't think things through.

Case in point - this morning's San Francisco Chronicle contained a short article about a failure of the Department of Emergency Service's computer system during a fire on New Year's Eve. The failure came to light almost by accident during a routine hearing before the city's Disaster Council. Failure of the system was, of course, something for which the Department is expected to be prepared. However, the Department was unable to switch to its backup system because the password was not available and they could not locate the only person who knew it. The Department operated for two hours on a manual system before the primary system could be restored.

When queried about the problem, the Department spokesman gave the impression that this was no big deal, implying that system might not be all that necessary. NOT what your elected officials want to hear after a screw up.

There are a number of lessons to be gleaned from this faux pas:

• In planning for crisis, we need to assume key people will be absent and have a mechanism for delegating authorities and providing passwords and keys.
• Having more than one backup plan is a really good idea.
• If you've screwed up, you better take it seriously and fix the problem before it comes out in public. You've got to be able to say, "Yes, that happened. Here's what we've done about it."

Comments

[Lucien Canton]

UPDATE: According to another article in today's Chronicle, it was not the 911 dispatch computer system that failed. It was the computer system servicing the city's emergency operations center which was activated to support police operations on New Year's Eve. Don't know if this is better or worse - the EOC is supposedly designed to operate under disaster conditions. The city's fix is to have a technician on site whenever the EOC is activated.

[Coffeecolouredworld.wordpress.com]

Public relations wise it's probably better that the 911 system didn't go down. I'm not sure how much the "average" citizen understands about the emergency operations centers and what any of that involves . . . until of course the system fails during an emergency. And the public official prentending this wasn't a big issue, wonder if they realized just how big an issue this was?