Every individual and organisation needs to consider their own preparedness and resilience, Mārtiņš Baltmanis, head of Latvia’s State Fire and Rescue Service (VUGD), stressed in an interview with Latvian Television’s Rīta panorāma programme.
Asked what lessons the storm had provided in terms of preparedness and resources, Baltmanis said that two factors must be considered when dealing with threats – the scale of the emergency and the resources available, as well as how quickly normal operations can be restored.
The 72-hour preparedness concept should apply not only to individuals but also to every organisation, meaning they should be able to remain self-sufficient during that period, the VUGD chief said.
Baltmanis assessed that the warning about the approaching severe weather had been issued sufficiently early. He stressed that the warning explained what people should do and included a reference to the 112.lv website, which provides additional advice beyond basic emergency preparedness information.
He noted that
people had between 12 and 24 hours to read the information and consider what they had and what they were missing.
“In this case, it turned out that not everything was in place,” Baltmanis concluded.
Baltmanis said that within 48 hours, VUGD had almost returned to normal operations. In other words, even 72 hours had not yet passed, the service chief emphasised.
He urged everyone to consider their own level of preparedness and resilience.
As previously reported, Latvia was hit by its strongest summer storm in decades on Saturday, 22 August, and during the following night, with wind speeds exceeding 30 metres per second in some areas. The storm caused widespread damage to both electricity distribution and transmission networks, initially leaving around 277,000 customers across Latvia without power.
By Monday morning, approximately 87,000 customers throughout Latvia were still experiencing power outages.