The National Disaster Management Agency (NaDMA) has started planning for the hosting of CARIBEWAVE 2018, carded for Thursday, 15 March 2018.
The scenario this year will take the form of an earthquake just off the coast of Barbados which will trigger a regional tsunami. Due to the location of the earthquake, it will be expected to affect the eastern side of the island, St Andrew and St David.
The exercise this year will therefore be held in St Andrew, the focus area will span from Telescope to Hope.
On Tuesday, 30 January, a team from NaDMA together with the district and community groups will engage residents in the focus areas, to sensitise them on the exercise and the importance of their involvement. 2017 was a successful year for Grenada in the hosting of the exercise as we were able to double the number of residents reached within the exercise area.
CARIBEWAVE 2017 was held in St Patrick. CARIBEWAVE (Caribbean Tsunami Warning Exercise) is a tsunami exercise held annually in the Caribbean, including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, under the direction of UNESCO and the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre.
The purpose of the CARIBEWAVE exercise is to improve the effectiveness of the Tsunami Warning System along the Caribbean coast. The exercise provides an opportunity for emergency management organisations throughout the region to test their operational lines of communications, review their tsunami response procedures, and promote tsunami preparedness.
The objectives of the CARIBEWAVE exercise are to test and evaluate the operations of the Caribbean Tsunami Warning System (Caribe EWS), to validate preparedness response to a tsunami (which are test protocols and communications systems between tsunami warning centres and the tsunami warning focal points), and the use of the PTWC (Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre) enhanced tsunami products for the Caribbean, as well as assist in tsunami preparedness efforts of the emergency management agencies in those areas.
NaDMA