RESOURCE ARTICLE

Mitigating foreseeable risksassociated with internationalemergency response

Marne SA&M U(Tel.: 1 8e-mail: m

1871-5532

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The intent of this article is to highlight the complexities of emergency response planning for organizationsthat operate across National borders. Emphasis will be focused on foreign responder training andexperience, cultural differences, foreign government policies and regulations, physical security of buildingsand foreign response capability in terms of foreseeable risk. Knowing and understanding the emergencyresponse environment prior to organizational set-up will be stressed in terms of how to leverage foreignresponse capabilities to your company’s advantage while simultaneously developing initiatives to fill inresponse gaps, if needed.

By Marne Smith

Working for a branch campus of anAmerican university operating abroad,

I do quite a bit of thinking about Dutyof Care and what this tort requirementmeans in terms of our responsibility forcovered individuals. Individuals at myorganization that are covered underDuty of Care include employees, theirdependents, students and visitors toour foreign campus. Under the mostbasic conditions, Duty of Care pertainsto the area of responsibility that fallsbetween deliberately causing injury toothers and accidental injury that isunforeseeable.1 The area betweendeliberate and accidental injury dealswith negligence in the form of foresee-able risk and is not considered delib-erate. However, negligent injury inregards to Duty of Care is not consid-ered an accident either, as foreseeablerisk can be identified and mitigated tosome degree.

In an international setting, Duty ofCare extends to covered individuals inthree critical areas: Providing informa-tion about the risks in the area inwhich people will be working, living,and traveling; monitoring the interna-tional environment for potentialhazards/risks and updating people as

mith affiliated with Texasniversity-Qatar,United States062280747;arne.smith@qatar.tamu.edu).

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needed; and providing support andassistance in the event of crisis oremergency.2 Focusing on potentialhazards and risks, most professionalsresponsible for assessing risk wouldzero in on the more obvious predict-able threats that covered individualsmay face such as theft, violence, actsof terror (depending on the area ofinternational operation), legal pro-blems, illness and injury. However,one area that is often overlooked isthe risk associated with emergencymanagement and response. Blan-chard3 defines emergency manage-ment as the ‘‘preparation for and thecoordination of all emergency func-tions’’ (p. 345). These functionsinclude firefighting, police, medicaland health services, emergency rescueand emergency transportation. All ofthese functions can be associated withforeseeable risk and should be exam-ined in comparison to probability andseverity of consequences resultingfrom deficiencies in these operationalfunctions.

The ability to manage in an emer-gency includes a reliance on the pro-fessional responders that show up atthe scene of the incident, whether it is amedical emergency, fire, or a policeemergency. My experience has shownthat reliance on professional respon-ders in foreign settings carries its ownforeseeable risk. Local responders anddispatchers may have difficulty under-standing a person in need of assistancebecause of language barriers. The

� Division of Chemical Health

inability to explain the emergencyand provide the location of wherethe emergency has occurred can bedetrimental when quick response isneeded.

In addition, it is important to gaugethe capability of the fire service, ambu-lance service and hazmat service inyour area of operation to determineif they are capable of handling inci-dents that involve your facilities andcovered people. In my time abroad Ihave witnessed local responders arriv-ing to a fire without proper turn-outgear and I have felt anxiety and frus-tration over not being understoodwhen calling for an ambulance. Theseinstances represent real vulnerabilitiesthat can be identified and mitigated. Iam not talking about providing equip-ment and training for local responders,rather, mitigation involves communi-cating the capabilities of local respon-ders (or lack of) to covered individualsand setting up a system that allows forsupport to and assistance for coveredindividuals in an effort to address defi-ciencies. The support and assistancecan include providing annual basicresponse training in the areas of fireextinguisher use and basic first aid,encouraging the development and test-ing of evacuation routes from busi-nesses and homes, teaching basicforeign language skills to allow forcommunication during emergenciesand providing directional routes tokey locations for utilization duringan emergency.4

and Safety of the American Chemical Society 9Published by Elsevier Inc.

With regards to medical capabilities,it is important to know and communi-cate to covered individuals the locationof the nearest hospital(s) and averagetransportation time by ambulance, thequality of the hospital staff, the extent ofmedical treatment available, require-ments for payment of service, languageskills of hospital staff, and location ofcapable medical care providers outsideof hospitals. As a part of my job respon-sibilities, I have been involved withemployees who were seriously ill andtreatment had been denied by localhospital staff. I have also been involvedwith employees with serious injuriesthat couldnotbe treated locally becausethe expertise or equipment was notavailable. Once an understanding ofmedical capabilities is determined, aug-menting services where needed byensuring outside medical consultationis available and a medical evacuationprocess is in place is important. For myorganization, we use an outside servicethat provides 24/7 medical consulta-tion provided by reputable Americandoctors who interact with the patientas well as with the local medical staff todetermine that adequate care is beingprovided in a timely fashion. This pro-fessional service also includes medicalevacuation and medical repatriationwhen necessary.

With regards to medical services, it isalso beneficial to build, where possible,partnerships with emergency respon-ders and medical facilities to further

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improve upon services provided.Establishing personal contacts atresponse agencies and hospitals cancreate opportunities for joint trainingand information exchange that canprove valuable in a crisis situation.

In addition, it is important to estab-lish a program that encourages the cov-ered individual to assign power ofattorney to a delegate who can author-ize medical treatment and medicallynecessary evacuation of the coveredindividual and family members shouldthe covered individual not be present orphysically unable to make these deci-sions. Instances where medical care ormedical evacuation cannot be providedbecause a legal document delegatingauthority for such decisions is not inplace, is a genuine risk that should beconsidered.

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Personally, I feel the area of buildingcode and fire code compliance/enfor-cement is another area of risk that canhave serious impact on emergencymanagement and response. Whenlooking at building safety as it pertainsto hotels, employee residences andbusiness locations, it is critical torecognize that safety code inspectionof construction projects as well asinspection of existing buildings maynot be as robust as what you are usedto or may not exist at all. An actualincident that highlighted this foresee-able risk was a fire in a high-rise apart-ment building where my organizationleased apartments for thirty families.My office was made aware of the firefrom another employee who was in thearea. I assumed evacuation of thebuilding was underway therefore Iactivated our warden calling systemto contact people in the building anddirect them to a rendezvous point forheadcount. My team and I soon rea-lized that the problem was larger thanestablishing a gathering point for resi-dents when it became obvious that theemployees we were calling were notaware of the fire in the building andthe need to evacuate. The resultinginvestigation highlighted significantdeficiencies with life safety code sys-tems in the building and it was aneye-opener for me and my organization.We no longer take for granted that phy-sical safety and security of buildings is agiven and we developed a residentialand business property inspection pro-gram to address this risk.5

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To fully appreciate this danger, it willbe important for company officials toinvestigate construction standards inthe area of operation, managementpractices of the property utilized bythe company and governmental enfor-cement of applicable building and firecode requirements. Becoming familiarwith the operational capability of lifesafety systems including back-up powersystems within rental buildings as wellas understanding the maintenance andinspection process in place for thesesystems is crucial. If governmentalenforcement of established standardsis minimal, a company should be pre-pared to make building renovations andadditions to improve life safety systemsas needed as well as be prepared tosupplementbuilding management prac-tices to ensure safety systems areinspected and maintained as required.In addition, it is important to audit allaffiliated business properties for com-pliance with internationally acceptedlife safety codes prior to lease or pur-chase and to routinely audit these prop-erties once they have been acquired andare in use. Finally, it is imperative todevelop, implement and practice eva-cuation and shelter-in-place programsat all properties utilized by covered per-sons. We audit all properties beforesigning lease agreements and includecontractual items in lease agreementsthat requires inspection and mainte-nance of fire safety systems that meetinternational requirements as well asinsist that fire safety plans are reviewedand approved by a third party consul-tant. In addition, we participate in firedrills and alarm testing on a routinebasis at properties utilized for businessand residential purposes.

When discussing foreseeable risk, itwould be remiss to ignore the impor-tance of selecting hotels that are safeand secure for use by official visitorsof an organization as well as foremployees who travel abroad to alter-nate locations as a part of business. Inthis area, it will be important to iden-tify risks and develop criteria thathotels must meet in order to ensurethe highest levels of safety and secur-ity standards are in place. For myorganization, hotel selection criteriahave been developed with advicefrom third party experts on the risks

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associated with hotels in the areasthat we operate.6

Physical security must also be con-sidered from the standpoint of antici-pated risk. This is an area that manyUnited States organizations with opera-tions abroad already evaluate, withsecurity officials undertaking securityvulnerability analyses involving inspec-tion of physical security capabilities atwork locations, employee residentiallocations and hotels used for visitors.Often physical locations host a localsecurity force but to anticipate possiblehazards, organizations must audit thesecurity practices in place and be pre-pared to enhance the number and qual-ity of security personnel, augmentsecurity infrastructure through alarmsystem upgrades and increasedclosed-circuit television (CCTV) pre-sence, and provide input for protocolsinvolving building and room access. Inaddition, it is important to build andmaintain relationships with buildingand hotel managers as well as securitychiefs who have authority over securitypersonnel and practices. Maintaining ahigh-level of security at all times in allforeign locations may not always benecessary but maintaining the abilityto escalate to tighter security protocolsas needed and in a timely fashion isimportant.

Finally, when considering securitymeasures, it is also important to men-tion emergency communication proto-cols and the ability of an organization to

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communicate to all stakeholders asneeded, when technology is available(text messaging, email, voice calling)and when technology is not availabledue to governmental shutdown of inter-net and cell towers, storm damage andother situations that impact communi-cation capabilities. Therefore, develop-ing and exercising comprehensiveemergency communication strategiesis critical and should be considered atop priority.

There is so much to consider whenevaluating foreseeable risk in foreignlocations it would be easy to say forgetit. It is too much work, too much risk,and too much liability. This may be thecase for some operations but certainly,not all. In many instances the pros defi-nitely outweigh the cons and as theworld continues to get smaller, moreand more organizations will decide thatthe pros of a foreign venture are worththe effort and work needed to build asuccessful and safe operational pro-gram. If you find yourself working ona team that is responsible for safety,security and ensuring you meet yourorganization’s Duty of Care responsi-bility toward employees and other sta-keholders – I offer these words ofadvice: (1) Do not worry about whatyou cannot control and concentrate onareas that you can impact. As we say inmy office – ‘‘it is what it is’’; (2) Assumenothing. Don’t fall into the trap ofassuming everything works the wayyou are used to in your home country.

When working abroad, assumptionsare dangerous. (3) Information is key,so ask questions often. ‘‘You don’tknow what you don’t know’’. (4) Enjoythe ride. If an opportunity like thiscomes your way I encourage you to takeit because it will be the most compli-cated, most difficult, yet most rewardingexperience of your life.

REFERENCES1. Debney, Partner, Cartwright and Lewis,

Solicitors. Duty of Care: Common LawNegligence. 1998. Retrieved from www.

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leedsuniversityunion.org.uk/pageassets/.../safety/dutycare.doc.

2. Claus, L. Duty of Care of Employers forProtecting International Assignees, theirDependents, and International BusinessTravelers. AEA International Pte. Ltd;White Paper, London, 2009.

3. Blanchard, B. W. Guide to EmergencyManagement and Related Terms, Defi-nitions, Concepts, Acronyms, Organiza-tions, Programs, Guidance, ExecutiveOrders and Legislation. 2008, Retrievedfrom http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/edu/docs/terms%20and%20definitions/Terms%20and%20Definitions.pdf.

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4. Doha News. Villagio Fire. 2012, Re-trieved from http://dohanews.co/post/23919755454/a-fire-broke-out-at-the-villaggio-mall-around-11am.

5. Law, B. Towering inferno fears for Gulf’shigh-rise blocks. BBC News. 2013,Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22346184.

6. Boylan, S. A look back at the Mumbaiattacks. Reuters. 2008, Retrieved fromhttp://blogs.reuters.com/photographers-blog/2008/12/19/a-look-back-at-the-mumbai-attacks/.

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