EPA Expands Tabletops on Labs and Contamination Incidents

EPA is expanding its series of free tabletop exercise webcasts that examine the coordination of laboratory services in response to a drinking water contamination incident. The scenario-based exercise provides state and local governments, utilities, emergency responders, and laboratory personnel with the opportunity to answer questions based on their real-life experiences and knowledge of emergency response practices and procedures contained in the Water Laboratory Alliance Response Plan (WLA-RP). Exercise participants will receive first-hand experience with Water Sector emergency response “best practices” and Water Security tools and resources.  Because of the popularity of these exercises, seven additional events have been added:

2014 Exercises                                                    2015 Exercises

September 17  10:00AM-Noon (ET)              January 14     1:00-3:00PM (ET)

October 8       1:00-3:00PM (ET)                      February 18   10:00AM-Noon (ET)

November 5    10:00AM-Noon (ET)               March 11       1:00-3:00PM (ET)

April 15         10:00AM-Noon (ET)

Registration:  To register for an exercise and select the date of your choice, please visit: http://water.epa.gov/infrastructure/watersecurity/wla/training.cfm.

Over 200 people participated in the first six webcasts of this series conducted between March and July of 2014. The following is some of the feedback that has been received.

  • State Drinking Water Agency Participant: “We like the way that the exercise was conducted.  …it was interactive, we could see the responses, and it was the perfect length of time.”
  • Water Utility Participant: “We learned a great deal during the course of this scenario. The step-by-step question and answer process was very helpful.”
  • Laboratory Participant: “Very good exercise. A fun way to spend a couple hours!”

For more information about the exercise, please see the attached flyer.

ATTACHMENT – Perfect Storm TTX flyer_2014_2015_07312014