Hurricanes Wilma, Katrina And Rita Force Businesses To Rethink Computer

Besides Having a Plan, You Need to Implement It When Disaster Strikes

With hurricane Wilma bearing down and the effects of hurricane Katrina, now
being cited as the single most expensive natural disaster in the history of
the United States with a direct cost estimated at a $100 billion, still
fresh in our minds, businesses are being forced to rethink their computer
system and data recovery policies.

Of the catastrophic damage caused by hurricane Katrina, some estimate the
insured damage to be only about $12.5 billion. Over a million
non-agricultural jobs have been jeopardized by Katrina's devastation with
more than half of these in New Orleans itself. With the business
infrastructure of the New Orleans area so gravely damaged and recovering so
slowly, businesses are beginning to rethink their ability to survive a
natural disaster of Katrina's, Rita's and now Wilma's magnitude or the grim
possibility of a terrorist attack. Was the chaos that ensued after
hurricane Katrina due to the absence of a sound recovery disaster plan?

"The problem with the Katrina disaster was not necessarily the lack of a
plan. In fact, the US government, the State government and the local
government all had very good plans. The problem was that they were not
implemented," says David Russo, President of Independent Network Consultants
of Crofton, Maryland, (www.INCons.com), an IT services company that assists
businesses in creating their own disaster recovery plans.

"That is why, in formulating a disaster plan, we try to make sure that all
the senior management are involved and are on board to implement the plan if
the disaster actually strikes. This understanding has to trickle down to all
the appropriate levels of the business."

"A disaster plan, in part, is a laundry list of resources for use in a
disaster. For instance, a disaster plan for one of my clients calls for two
separate T1 lines. These telephone lines actually have two separate physical
routes so that, in the case of a disaster, one line will always be working
if the other is compromised."

"So let's say that certain lines of this phone system may be down while
others are still working. But, if a worker wasn't aware of that, after
picking up a phone or two, he might assume that the entire system was down-
unless he knew!"

"Even if the worker knew the phones were working, he must also know what the
priorities are and, if contacting someone is necessary, he must know whom to
call. When he calls, he must ask for what he needs and he must count on the
recipient to also know what can and must be delivered. Time is short in a
disaster."

"In the case of the hurricane Katrina disaster, some of the confusion caused
by lack of an informed team, can be seen in the situation revolving around
the failure to utilize local school buses in the New Orleans evacuation.
While there may be plenty of blame to be assigned…, there are some valuable
lessons to be drawn from the event. It is a clear example of a disaster plan
being there to draw from, but not being implemented," commented Russo.

According to the State disaster plan, Southeast Louisiana Hurricane
Evacuation and Sheltering Plan of January 2000, "The primary means of
hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles. School and municipal buses,
government-owned vehicles and vehicles provided by volunteer agencies may be
used to provide transportation for individuals who lack transportation and
require assistance in evacuating."

According to Mayor Nagin's famous interview on WWL, the New Orleans radio
station that stayed on the air during the disaster, "I need reinforcements.
I need troops, man. I need five hundred buses, man." When referring to the
suggestion by some to have public school drivers come to New Orleans to help
evacuate, Mayor Nagin exclaimed "…you gotta be kidding me! This is a
national disaster! Get every doggone Greyhound bus line in the country and
get…moving to New Orleans! …"

Regardless of who is to blame, many rightly raised questions: Why couldn't
the State provide assistance? Why weren't the National Guard sent in to
commandeer those buses? Why was the Mayor talking about Greyhound instead of
talking about the school buses he had planned to use for immediate
assistance?

Despite Senator Mary Landrieu's claims that the buses were flooded, when
questioned by newscaster, Chris Wallace, she could not adequately respond to
the claim that the flooding occurred after the school buses were supposed to
be used for evacuation. The main point, says Russo ( www.INCons.com ) is
"Even though everyone needs a disaster recovery plan today, what's the use
of a plan if you don't use it as a framework for action?"

These discrepancies, miscommunications and assignments of blame veil the
simple facts. The State plan called for something and, when local resources
failed - namely, the availability of local bus drivers, the State did not
move in to assist. The Louisiana Hurricane Evacuation and Sheltering Plan
clearly states, "State transportation resources will be made available to
assist local authorities in transporting special needs persons and persons
who do not have their own transportation."

Did the State help to man the buses? "It wasn't done." points out Russo. He
goes on to say, "In a business, all senior management needs to be involved
in the creation of the disaster recovery plan. All senior management needs
to know what their role is in a business disaster and to delegate the
appropriate role to those they supervise. Everyone needs to be on the same
page. It doesn't really matter who fails in a disaster, the consequences can
be devastating. The important thing is that everybody knows and executes
their role so that disaster recovery plans don't go astray."

"I don't know who or why the buses were not used in the New Orleans bus
situation but the failure of higher officials to fully know and execute
their own plan is very obvious. It could be analogous to a business having a
hot site in place, a secondary location for office equipment, furniture,
computers and communication equipment, etc., and key personnel not knowing
about this location or where it was; or, not having a backup system to make
hard copies of data and losing all your company's data; or, not having
effective data storage backup on the Internet."

Russo concluded, "No one can withstand a computer disaster these days. The
responsibility for failure becomes academic after everything is lost. Our
goal with our clients is always to minimize human failure and maximize
recovery and backup. The disaster recovery business is important these
days."

A business disaster recovery plan and a government disaster recovery plan
have many common components. They must include as much recovery planning as
possible, they must be understood by all concerned, they must consist of
real, available resources and there must be a system of delegation to people
who in turn know what their role is. Even with all of this in most cases,
one element is paramount, when disaster strikes, the workable parts of the
backup disaster plan must be actually executed. To this end, the plan must
be fully known and in the hands of capable people who will actually carry it
out. Only this way can business continuity be safeguarded and restored in an
emergency.

Bruce Prokopets
Executive Editor
Press Direct International
www.pressdirectinternational.org