Weather or Not: ASLRRA Offers Disaster Preparedness Resources

Written by Andrew Corselli
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The American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association (ASLRRA) has developed and provided resources designed to proactively assist its members in addressing the challenges of both weather- and non-weather-caused emergency events affecting employees, shippers, infrastructure and operations.

Materials provided so far cover Disaster Planning, HazMat Response and instructions on accessing an Emergency Docket. ASLRRA noted that the site will continue to be updated.

ASLRRA also offers recorded webinars available for members in the On-Demand Resource Library that may be used to prepare and train for emergency situations.

Disaster preparedness is a key component of the educational programming being provided at ASLRRA’s fall 2019 Regional Meetings, and it will be a topic for multiple breakout sessions at the 2020 Annual Meeting.  For meeting registration information, click here.

“Extreme weather events such as hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, intense heat waves, record cold snaps, floods, fires and all variety of natural disasters can cause widespread damage to the national rail network, disrupting normal business operations for customers that depend on freight rail service,” said Chuck Baker, President, ASLRRA. “The potential human, community and economic impact of such events underscores the critical need for short line railroads to have a well-though-out emergency plan in place that can be activated at a moment’s notice. Short lines need to be thinking through disaster preparation, response, mitigation and resiliency on the calm days so that they’re ready to respond in a crisis. As we looked to help our members in this effort, we put out the call for resources and our staff and supplier members answered that call, providing resources that can be adapted to fit a railroad operation’s unique needs in advance of an emergency occurrence.”

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