Jacksonville Disaster Drill May 5th

CERT Members Owen Jurling, Bill & Linda Graham with Fire Chief Devin Hull

The City of Jacksonville will participate in a Disaster Drill the morning of Saturday May 5th.  This event will be a multiple element drill which will instruct and test the Cities ability to deal with a local incident.  The event will test the ability of the Jacksonville Emergency Operations Center (EOC). City Employees and Officials who would staff the EOC in the event of a Disaster.  In addition, the Cities CERT Team will canvas the Westmont Area of the City encouraging voluntary evacuation to two of the Cities Churches which will also be tested on their ability to create evacuation centers, and a Mass Casualty Unit of Jackson County Volunteers will exercise their expertise with a mock incident in the Westmont Area.

The Westmont Community, the Jacksonville EOC, Jacksonville First Presbyterian Church, and the Calvary Church will be the primary areas of this drill.  Citizens in these areas are going to be encouraged to participate in this evolution to simulate a Brush Fire in one of the many Wildland Interface areas of Jacksonville.

The Westmont area was selected for the drill, in that it is one of the areas of the City of Jacksonville which is of concern in the event of a Wild Fire in the Wildland/Rural Interface.