ACV Enviro understands emergencies, especially ones created by Mother Nature. With Hurricane season in full swing, ACV Enviro wants to make sure your business and employees are protected. By taking the following steps now, it could keep your employees safe and minimize damage to your business. Here is our hurricane checklist:
- Get Organized
- Make sure your employee contact list is up to date to include cell phones and the best method to contact them. By creating a communication tree, this gives you the opportunity to talk to employees before, during and after a storm.
- Create an evacuation plan for your employees and make sure the team understands and knows what to do in case of a storm.
- If you are an industry that uses computers and servers, make sure you are backing up your data to a secure location or a cloud location. Make sure you test your backups of the data in case something goes wrong during a storm, you want to make sure your data is ready to go when the storm clears. This also goes for important documents, make sure you have a copy in a secure location offsite.
- Is your insurance up to date and does your policy contain everything you need incase of a hurricane? Review your policy each year and make sure you are covered.
- Inventory your business. You don’t want to have something happen and you didn’t take an inventory of everything in your office. Make sure you have all the valuables documented with serial numbers, placement, estimated value, etc. A video or photographs of your business inventory would be helpful as well.
- Is your fire equipment working? Make sure you check it so it is in good working order.
- Make sure your fuel tanks on the emergency generator and fire pumps are full and don’t forget about vehicles too.
- The Storm Is On The Way
- Secure all doors and windows to protect against flying debris.
- Check all floor drains, catch basins and sump pumps.
- Unplug all computer equipment to include servers, desktops, printers, etc. Make sure your equipment is on desks and off the ground in case of flooding. Cover this equipment with plastic or garbage bags to keep as dry as possible.
- Shut off process piping carrying gas or flammable liquids in case a pipe breaks during the storm – this could cause even more damage.
- Safely shut down production processes and turn off electricity for non-critical equipment.
- Bring in items that will not bear high winds such as chairs, ashtrays, picnic tables, etc. they could become flying debris and cause even more damage during the storm.
- Evacuate your employees.
When the storm has passed and your business has been given an “all clear” assess the business and communicate with the employees on the next step and plan. We would recommend you pull together a recovery team to handle any needed challenges your business now faces including electrical, mechanical, plumbing, hazardous and nonhazardous waste as well as general maintenance. Create a priority list including:
- Safety hazards (gas leaks, downed lines, fire, etc.)
- Structural damage
- Production equipment or valuables needing repair to get your operation moving again
- Make sure you watch for fires until everything gets back to normal.
If you would like more suggestions for your business from our ER response team, give us a call or check out our emergency response services.
