Incident Command System
Encyclopedia : I : IN : INC : Incident Command System
The Incident Command System (ICS) is a management system used within the United States, parts of Canada, the United Kingdom and other countries to organize emergency response and was designed to offer a scalable response to incidents of any magnitude. Incident Management Teams (IMT), are combined crews of multi-agency staff that use the concepts outlined withing the Incident Command System to react to an emergency situation.
As part of FEMA's National Response Plan (NRP), the system was expanded and has become the National Incident Management System (NIMS). The system is designed to grow and shrink along with the incident, allowing more resources to be smoothly added into the system when required, and also the smooth release of resources when no longer needed.
History
In the 1970s, as California was battling significant wildfires, emergency managers learned that the existing management structures - frequently unique to each agency - did not scale to dealing with massive mutual aid responses involving dozens of distinct agencies. As a result, the Incident Command System (ICS) was collaboratively developed to provide a consistent, integrated framework for the management of large, multi-agency emergencies. It has now found its way into everything from law enforcement to every-day businesses, as the basic goals of clear communication, accountability, and the efficient use of resources is common to all. In some cases, such as a Hazardous Materials incident in California, it is state law that the Incident Command System be used to handle the situation. The United States Department of Homeland Security has mandated the use of ICS for emergency services throughout the United States. ICS is widely used in the United Kingdom. The United Nations recommended the use of ICS as an international standard. New Zealand has implemented a similar system, known as the Coordinated Incident Management System, while Australia has the Australian Inter-service Incident Management System or AIIMS.Organization
Every section of ICS can be divided into sub-sections as needed, and ICS has the ability to grow and shrink along with the incident. The basic guiding idea in ICS is that a person at the top of the command structure is the responsible party until the task is delegated. This allows for small incidents to be handled by a single or few people who fill multiple roles, or large incidents to have many people working towards a common goal, but all on different tasks.The major management activities that always apply and are always filled, no matter the size of the incident, are made up of the following 5 sections: Command, Operations, Planning, Logistics, and Finance/Administration. These positions can be performed by the same person, or multiple people.
Command - The Incident Commander (IC) is the single person in charge at the incident, and initially fills all 5 command staff positions. As the incident grows the tasks covered by other sections can be delegated, and those new positions take the title of Section Chief. The IC is responsible for all activity on the incident as well as creating the overall incident objectives.
Operations - The Operations Section Chief is tasked with directing all actions to meet the incident objectives.
Planning - The Planning Section Chief is tasked with the collection and display of incident information, primarily consisting of the status of all resources and overall status of the incident.
Logistics - The Logistics Section Chief is tasked with providing all resources, services, and support required by the incident.
Finance/Administration - The Finance Section Chief is tasked with tracking incident related costs, personnel records, requisitions, and administrating procurement contracts required by Logistics.
Chain of Command
The Chain of Command is an essential part of being able to control incidents of any size. Every person on the incident has a designated supervisor. There is a clear line of authority within the organization, and all lower levels connect to higher levels, eventually leading solely back to the IC.
The Chain of Command follows an established organizational structure which adds layers of command as needed. The basic outline of command layers follows:
- Command
- Sections
- Branches
- Divisions/Groups
- Units
- Resources
Flexibility
The ICS is an extremely flexible organizational system that ideally reflects only what is required to fill the planned incident objectives. The efficient use of all resources on an incident is a high priority, reducing incident clutter and costs. A single person may be in charge of more than one unit if the span of control for that single person has not yet been exceeded, but in all cases an element of the incident must have a person in charge of that element. Elements of the system that have been expanded but are no longer needed are contracted and the resources released from the incident.ICS Key Management Concepts
Many agencies and organizations modify ICS to fit their needs, yet it is absolutely critical to realize that without the application of the ICS management concepts, ICS becomes ineffective. While the picture of the response organizational tree may look like the ICS, without applying the management concept and principles, the organizational charts and models will resemble the original ICS model in title alone. Furthermore, problems and conflicts during some incidents will indicate that fundamental ICS management concepts either are missing or not functioning as designed. Therefore, to avoid such difficulties, agencies/organizations using an ICS design should incorporate the following basic management concepts:
Span-of-control is the most fundamentally important management principle of ICS. It applies to the management of individual responsibilities and response resources. The objective is to limit the number of responsibilities being handled by, and the number of resources reporting directly to, an individual. Based on experience, the number is thought to range from three to seven, with five being considered an optimum number. In other words, one manager should have no more than seven people working under them at any given time. When span-of-control problems arise around an individual's ability to address responsibilities, they can be addressed by expanding the organization in a modular fashion. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways. An Incident Commander can delegate responsibilities to a deputy and/or activate members of the Command Staff. Members of the Command Staff can delegate responsibilities to Assistants, etc.
Consolidated Incident Action Plans means that for the specific event, the response is coordinated and managed through one plan of action. The consolidated Incident Action Plan (IAP) should be written rather than oral, and is prepared by the Planning Section. The consolidated IAP means that everyone is working in concert towards the same goals set for that operational time period. The consolidated IAP is a very important component of the ICS that reduces freelancing and ensures a coordinated response.
Management by Objective: The Incident Commander and Planning Section are responsible for the development of Strategic Objectives that clearly define what the ICS response team is working to achieve during emergency response operations. Based upon the information presented at the initial incident planning meeting and the analysis of incident potential and impacts, the Incident Commander, and Section Chiefs should have a clear understanding of the major problems that need to be addressed.
The Planning Section Chief is responsible for ensuring the objectives define how the ICS plans to address the problems. Strategic objectives should be written and posted on a status board or communicated through the organization. Objectives must be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-based (S.M.A.R.T). Having S.M.A.R.T objectives helps the ICS response organization keep specific goals in sight during the operational period. Keeping tangible goals in sight is beneficial not only from perspective of keeping response teams focused, but also from a post-mortem standpoint to benchmark the effectiveness of the response against the objective set.
Unity of Command means that each individual participating in the operation reports to only one supervisor. This eliminates the potential for individuals to receive conflicting orders from a variety of supervisors, thus increasing accountability, preventing freelancing, improving the flow of information, helping with the coordination of operational efforts, and enhancing operational safety. Unity of Command also means that that all personnel are managed and accounted for.
Modular Organization means that the size and focus of the ICS organization depends on the magnitude of the incident, and the system can be expanded or contracted as necessary. Only positions that are required for an adequate response need to be filled, and ICS sections should be kept as small as possible to accomplish incident objectives and monitor progress. The level of response necessary for a specific incident dictates how and when the organization develops, and in many instances not all sections need to be activated. Only in the largest and most complex operations would the full ICS organization be staffed.
Comprehensive Resource Management is a key management principle that implies that all assets and personnel during an event need to be tracked and accounted for. Comprehensive Resource Management ensures that visibility is maintained over all resources so they can be moved quickly to support the preparation and response to an incident, and ensuring a graceful demobilization. Comprehensive resource management also applies to the classification of resources by kind and type, and the categorization of resources by their status.
- In Transit resources are those that are dispatched to, but not yet checked-in at an incident scene.
- Assigned resources are those that are working on a field assignment under the direction of a supervisor.
- Available resources are those that are ready for deployment, but have not been assigned to a field assignment (note: all resources in a staging area should be on an "available" status).
- Out-of-service resources are those that are not in either the " available" or "assigned" categories. Resources can be "out-of-service" for a variety of reasons, including: a shortfall in staffing (i.e., not enough people to operate equipment); personnel taking a rest; maintenance or repair; weather; demobilization, or others.
The "kind" of resource describes what the resource is, for instance, generator or a truck. The "type" of resource describes a performance capability for a kind of resource for instance, a 50 kW generator or a F-350 truck, etc.
Pre-Designated Incident Facilities: Response operations can form a complex structure that must be held together by response personnel working at different and often widely separate incident facilities. These facilities can include:
- Incident Command Post (ICP): The ICP is the location where the Incident Commander operates during response operations.
- Staging Area: Can be a location at or near an incident scene where available tactical response resources are stored while they await assignment. Resources in staging area are under the control of the Logistics Section. Several staging areas may be created during emergency response operations.
- Camps: Locations, often temporary, that are equipped and staffed to provide sleeping, food, water, sanitation, and other services to response personnel that are too far away to use base facilities.
Each facility has unique location, space, equipment, materials, and supplies requirements that are often difficult to address, particularly at the outset of response operations. For this reason, responders should identify, pre-designate and pre-plan the layout of these facilities, whenever possible.
Common terminology: An emergency response organization is made up of individuals who normally may not work together as a team except during emergency response operations. When they come together, the use of common terminology is viewed as an essential element in team building and communications, both internally and with other organizations responding to the incident. The Incident Command System promotes the use of common terminology, and has an associated glossary of terms that help bring consistency to position titles, the description of resources and how they can be organized, the type and names of incident facilities, and a host of other subjects.
When effectively applied in concert with each other, these concepts provide the basis for an effective and coordinated response to an emergency.
Safety
For Emergency services, any incident will have a designated Safety Officer. For smaller incidents this can be a role taken on by the Incident Commander, but for most incidents the Safety Officer is an entirely separate person, one that must be very well qualified in all the technical aspects in use on the incident. The Safety Officer is the only person allowed to move in and out of the chain of command and issue orders to resources not directly his subordinate. While, in essence, all people on an incident are “Safety Officers” and can stop an operation at any time if they have a safety concern, it is the Safety Officer’s job to evaluate that concern and make a final judgment. Most Safety Officers are also known to do routine, random checks on resources throughout the incident and ensure everyone knows at all times their supervisor, their exact job on the incident, and the safety measures in place for them on the incident. This roving, well-trained, powerful role is a crucial key to keeping an incident safe while still moving at the speed required to meet the operational goals of the incident.See also
External links
- [Federal Emergency Management National Incident Management System]
- [UN Wildfire Working Group report recommending use of ICS]
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.