The three councils covering the Western Waikato - Waitomo District Council, Ōtorohanga District Council and Waipā District Council – joined forces last week to undertake an exercise in how we would respond during a Civil Defence emergency. 

Similar to the national exercise programme ‘Ru Whenua’ being conducted by NEMA today, our teams recently set up an Emergency Operations Centre based at Ōtorohanga District Council to simulate our response to a severe earthquake.

The exercise provided the opportunity for the three councils, and sub-regional and local emergency organisations to work collectively on the response, with Waikato Region Civil Defence staff observing.

"An opportunity to test our response to a significant disaster is valuable, and we always take learnings from them in order to be better prepared, if and when the real one does happen in the future,” says Civil Defence Controller Dave Simes.

More information on the nationwide exercise can be found here