March 22, 2021 — This week, staff from the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration’s Disaster Preparedness Program partnered with the NOAA National Weather Service to conduct a joint hotwash for National Ocean Service and NWS staff and facilities that were impacted by the recent winter weather outbreak across Texas.

The hotwash focused on impacts to personnel, mission, infrastructure, and how each office was able to coordinate internally within NOAA and with partners. The meeting was well attended with over 20 representatives from both offices.

Through discussions during the hotwash, many NOAA staff who are Texas residents noted they lost both power and water for at least 12 hours, if not longer. Those challenges resulted in NOAA staff needing to relocate to ensure safe drinking water, power, heat, and other life-preserving necessities. However, it was clear that NOAA staff are creative, ingenious, and resilient in the times of a disaster—to the point they were also able to find ways to accomplish their jobs and missions.

The results of the hotwash meeting will be incorporated with the feedback received from the hotwash survey sent to those staff who were not able to attend. Then, the improvements, gaps, and lessons learned will be combined into one after-action report that will be available in early June 2021.

For additional information, please contact Katherine.Krushinski@noaa.gov.

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