Submitted by Marla Dalton
Each time a natural disaster, such as Hurricane Katrina, or a man-made event, such as the terrorist attacks of 9/11, occurs, ASCE members generously volunteer their time and talents to assist in response and recovery initiatives, and look to ASCE to provide an avenue to do so. The ASCE Committee on Critical Infrastructure (CCI), in response to our members’ desire to lend support to such efforts, is developing a directory of members who express their interest and availability to assist. CCI is currently seeking volunteers to participate in disaster management activities (planning, preparedness, response, and recovery) on an as-needed basis. The information provided will be included in a directory for the ASCE Disaster Assistance Volunteer Program to use in the event of natural and man-made disasters requiring engineers for planning, damage assessment, and rebuilding efforts.
The ultimate goal of the directory is to be prepared to respond to future disasters by employing the expertise of qualified members. Data provided may be made available upon request to qualified parties including local, state, and federal agencies as well as private consulting firms seeking professional engineering expertise. Beginning June 1, 2006, members will be able to update their ASCE member profiles by providing additional disaster assistance related information for inclusion in the directory. To ensure the accuracy of the directory, members may be asked to confirm the information provided on an ongoing basis.
For additional information about the ASCE Disaster Assistance Volunteer Program, visit http://ciasce.asce.org/.
Construction Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers