{"id":24989,"date":"2021-11-24T08:41:07","date_gmt":"2021-11-24T13:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=24989"},"modified":"2021-11-24T08:41:09","modified_gmt":"2021-11-24T13:41:09","slug":"county-completes-safety-exercise-at-limerick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=24989","title":{"rendered":"County completes safety exercise at Limerick"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Chester County Department of Emergency Services (DES) has successfully completed its bi-annual federally evaluated, full-scale exercise at the Limerick Generating Station. The nuclear power plant in Montgomery County has been producing zero-emissions electricity since 1986 without incident, but these exercises are necessary to ensure full preparedness in the event of a radiation emergency.<\/p>\n

Chester County joined with Berks and Montgomery Counties, in coordination with the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA), engaging in simulated emergency response operations. The exercise demonstrated the ability to mobilize appropriate staff and activate each county\u2019s Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs), including sheltering and\/or evacuation.<\/p>\n

Fifteen Chester County municipalities that could be affected by an emergency at Limerick also participated in the drill and their performance was also evaluated by federal regulators. Chester County\u2019s EOC provided direction and coordination to the townships, which included: Charlestown, East Coventry, East Nantmeal, East Pikeland, West Pikeland, East Vincent, West Vincent, North Coventry, Schuylkill, South Coventry, Upper Uwchlan, Uwchlan, and Warwick, as well as Phoenixville and Spring City Boroughs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe municipal emergency management coordinators and their staffs did an excellent job preparing for and participating in this exercise,\u201d said Bill Turner, Chester County DES\u2019s Deputy Director for Emergency Management. \u201cThey demonstrated a high level of preparedness to respond to a potential radiological emergency. That\u2019s something none of us wants to ever see, but this exercise should reassure the public that we are prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n

Four school districts in the Emergency Planning Zone were also evaluated for their readiness: Owen J. Roberts Area, Phoenixville Area, Downingtown Area, and Great Valley.<\/p>\n

DES\u2019s Radiological Coordinator, Tony Przychodzien, explained that during the full-scale exercise, a simulated \u2018route alerting\u2019 was conducted by Liberty Fire Company of Spring City.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoute alerting is performed if one of the sirens in place to alert the public to an incident at Limerick fails to sound. The Fire Company goes through the neighborhoods affected and does the alert using a loudspeaker,\u201d Przychodzien said.<\/p>\n

Although not in the emergency zone, personnel from Bucks and Lehigh Counties participated in a support role for the exercise, just as they would in an actual emergency. Also supporting the Emergency Operations Centers coordination for this exercise: Chester County FIRST organization, which represents private industry; ARES\/RACES-amateur radio operators; American Red Cross; Chester County Sheriff\u2019s Office; and a liaison from PEMA.<\/p>\n

Chester County\u2019s DES Director Mike Murphy liked what he saw and believes the evaluators did as well. \u201cPreliminary reports from the federal evaluators are all positive and encouraging,\u201d Murphy said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Chester County Department of Emergency Services (DES) has successfully completed its bi-annual federally evaluated, full-scale exercise at the Limerick Generating Station. The nuclear power plant in Montgomery County has been producing zero-emissions electricity since 1986 without incident, but these exercises are necessary to ensure full preparedness in the event of a radiation emergency. Chester […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24988,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[549,10133,10134],"class_list":["post-24989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-chester-county-emergency-services","tag-limerick-generating-station","tag-tests"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24989"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24990,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24989\/revisions\/24990"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}