SportsTurf provides current, practical and technical content on issues relevant to sports turf managers, including facilities managers. Most readers are athletic field managers from the professional level through parks and recreation, universities.
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/183915
Facility&Operations | By Kevin Mercer, CSFM "There's a storm brewing!" Are you ready? M ark Twain said, "Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get." This statement stills holds true today. Weather affects sports turf mangers livelihood weekly, daily and sometimes hourly. How many times have you thought over and over about the weather? Is global warming alive and well? Could it be true? Who knows? Let the meteorologists and environmentalists argue that point and case. This is what we do know, with the recent tornado events from May and June 2013 in Oklahoma, about 40 people have lost their lives; that's worrisome enough. However, looking back at 2012, I was taken back on how much the weather has impacted our livelihood in such big ways. From California and the Dakotas and east to Indiana and Illinois, at least 123 deaths were associated with excess heat and $35 billion primarily in crop losses were a result from record drought. 32 SportsTurf | October 2013 The western wildfires that burned over 9 million acres across the United States resulted in eight deaths and cost over $908 million in damages. Super Storm Sandy and Hurricane Isaac contributed to 182 deaths and cost more than $64 billion. The term Derecho refers to fast moving storms that are long-lived and wide-spread wind storms that can exceed hurricane force winds typical of most hurricanes. Last year when this type of weather system went through the Midwest to the Mid-Atlantic, it was responsible for more than 20 deaths and millions of dollars in property damage. Last but not least, there were 939 tornadoes last year which cause 70 deaths and over 1.6 billion dollars in property and crop loss. These facts are stunning and a little bit scary, but how can we prepare ourselves from such mayhem. Being prepared is only half the battle; predicting the unpredictable is the second half. To start you need to develop a plan, a checklist, for every department of your facility. You also need to conduct round-table discussions with appropriate representation from critical areas such as: the general manager, security, the sports turf manger, the housekeeping manger, public relations, human resources, IT, local fire and police departments etc. Planning: (Before the StormChecklist) • Resource management: Make sure you have enough staffing and contractors to maintain all shifts with places for them to rest in case long hours are needed. • Fleet Management: Make sure your vehicle fleet is gassed up with extra gas and properly stored in case of power failure that could put your gas tanks out of service. • Back up Power: Make sure all generators are filled with fuel and are working properly. • Flying Debris: Make sure all tables and chairs or any other loose items are put away or tied down. HTTP://WWW.READY.GOV/BUSINESS Your headquarters for a storm event or also known as an Incident Command System (ICS) is used by public agencies all the time. www.sportsturfonline.com