Response to a Terrorist Threat

When responding to a fuel tanker explosion at a loading dock in a large warehouse district, local firefighters and the police would be in the first line of defense to deal with the incident. They would then turn to the state governments after exhausting their resources. From there, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the lead federal agency, would play the role of deploying the Federal crisis management response. As the lead federal agency, the FBI would be responsible for designating a Federal commander on the scene to facilitate ideal coordination of all the local, state, and federal authorities until the transfer of the overall lead federal agency role to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). With the needed approval, the FBI would establish and coordinate the institution of a Domestic Emergency Support Team (DEST) together with other agencies when ideal in line with seeking ideal federal support depending on the situation’s nature. FEMA would serve as the consequence management’s lead agency by managing and coordinating consequence management response to back the local and state governments with statutory authorities. The Department of Energy (DOE) would offer support to technical operations to the FBI and support FEMA. It would avail the scientific equipment and personnel to assist the lead federal agency in all aspects of the explosion incident. Furthermore, the Environmental protection Agency (EPA) would avail the supporting equipment and technical personnel experienced in all aspects of the incident. The assistance that the EPA would provide would revolve around assessing threat, deploying emergency response team, offer operational support, and technical advice for biological, chemical, and radiological releases. For the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), it would aid the FBI with agents’ identification, collection, and analysis of sample, and participate in on-site safety as well as protection efforts together with planning medical management (FAS, 2019) . It can also support FEMA through management of mass fatality, patient tracking, pharmaceutical, patient evacuation, and medical care needed.

Reference

FAS. (2019). Counter terrorism cordination. Retrieved from https://fas.org/irp/threat/inman/part08.htm