A joint US/UK exercise

Our work with the military and government

Escott Hunt were asked to plan and implement all the media-related aspects of the largest nuclear accident exercise to take place on UK soil. It involved more than 2000 participants in the UK, US and Germany.

The brief
Players from more than 20 agencies including the emergency services, local authorities and UK and US government departments and agencies (including the Pentagon and the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency) had to demonstrate their ability to provide timely, accurate information to the public and implement a co-ordinated multi-agency response for the media.

Agreeing the objectives
Escott Hunt invited emergency planners and communications staff (exercise participants) from all involved agencies to a media sub-group meeting. In this way corporate requirements as well as communications-specific issues were considered and media objectives agreed.

Scenario development
Only when the exercise objectives had been defined was the scenario developed. As always, it is essential that the scenario is used as a driver to achieve the objectives and not allowed to take on a life of its own. Timeline and technical injects were drawn up first, then Escott Hunt staff worked through this first draft to add injects that tied in with media-related objectives. All injects were linked to an objective. Technical issues and the timeline were adjusted if necessary to help achieve a particular media objective.

The media contingent
Once the scenario was confirmed Escott Hunt assessed the level and scope of media play and recruited journalists to act as the exercise media contingent. More than 100 were involved, based in London, Norfolk and Washington. The focus was on testing information management systems and not media handling.

Achieving beneficial outcomes during the exercise
Escott Hunt’s journalists don’t just ‘heckle’ at simulated press conferences. To be truly beneficial, informed feedback through TV and radio news bulletins and newspapers is crucial. Making coverage immediately accessible to players at different locations across two continents within a limited budget was a huge challenge. To meet it Escott Hunt developed a hidden, password-protected website.

Post-exercise
Feedback from players, facilitators, assessors and regulators was brought together in a post-exercise report.