Harvard StormReady
In 1998, the National Weather Service established StormReady. StormReady is a program by which counties, communities, commercial sites, and private industry can form a partnership with the NWS. On July 20, 2007, Harvard University was officially recognized as being StormReady. To achieve this recognition, the University Operations Center submitted an application on behalf of the University and submitted to an inspection by experts in the field.
To gain recognition as a StormReady University, Harvard needed to meet the same criteria as a large city. These criteria are based on six guidelines: 1) Communication and Coordination, 2) NWS Warning Reception, 3) Hydrometeorological Monitoring, 4) Warning Dissemination, 5) Community Preparedness, and 6) Administrative Oversight. Harvard University has developed systems to address all of these assessment categories within its StormReady program.
At Harvard, the program is administered by the University Operations Center. The Operations Center, a 24/7 emergency call center, serves as the communication and coordination point for the University. It is responsible for receiving warning products from the National Weather Service and promulgating the warning information within the Harvard community. To do this, the Operations Center employs a myriad of communications technologies.
For information reception:
- NOAA weather radios
- cable television
- AM/FM radio
- subscription to a commercial desktop monitoring service
- subscriptions to the Emergency Email Network (TM)
- notifications through WebEOC® when it is activated
For information dissemination:
- two-way radio infrastructure with repeaters for broadcast messaging
- high-speed emergency communications system capable of delivering messages to multiple types of devices
- text-pager database
- email based opt-in notification database
- updates to the UOS website and an emergency message phone number
- notifications through WebEOC® when it is activated
The University also maintains a number of local meteorological monitoring systems. These include two local weather stations, one of which posts its data to an internet-based website. This weather station includes an anemometer, barometer, thermometer, and rain gauge. It also provides graphing products which show the monitoring data over time. Additionally, the Operations Center has installed a ThorGuard Lightning Prediction System which is able to measure atmospheric electrostatic energy, and through a series of mathematical algorithms, estimate the probability of a lightning strike locally. The University also utilizes programs such as Hurrevac(TM) for emergency planning and hazard monitoring.
Contacts
| Gary Kassabian | Director of Emergency Services | 617-496-1436 | gary_kassabian at harvard dot edu |
| Colt Hagmaier | Emergency Planning Coordinator | 617-496-9525 | colt_hagmaier at harvard dot edu |
