City of London to host open house, test local alert system this emergency preparedness week

Globalnews.ca
May 7, 2018

Emergency preparedness week runs through to Saturday and the City of London has multiple events in place during which residents can learn how to be properly prepared for when an emergency strikes.

“Think back to even our last month and events that we’ve had locally within our own community: we’ve had flooding events, we’ve had an ice storm, we had a pretty significant wind storm just last Friday,” division manager of security and emergency management for the city, Dave O’Brien, told 980 CFPL during a kickoff event at the new Middlesex London EMS headquarters at 1035 Adelaide St. S.

“These events do take place. No one is immune from them. And it’s really important for us to be successful that everyone plays their part and the community needs to be prepared to help us do that.”

On Wednesday, at 10:55 a.m., the city will run a test of its Alert London Notification System, which was first introduced in 2017. Those who’ve signed up can expect a test message and those who wish to sign up can do so online.

Another key event is an open house on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Emergency Operations Centre at Byron Fire Station #12 at 275 Boler Rd.

“You’ll be able to interact with our partner agencies, learn about how we manage emergencies, learn how to prepare an emergency kit for your family and an emergency plan for your family so that everybody can be as prepared as possible.”

O’Brien says everyone in the community has a part to play when it comes to successfully managing emergency situations.