(upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to The Journal, I'm Steve Kendall.

Like many organizations, the Wood County Emergency Management Agency is preparing for the April 8th eclipse.

We're joined in the studio today by Wood County EMA Director, Jeff Klein, and Deputy Director, Erin Konecki.

I wanna welcome you both to the program.

Obviously, the eclipse is a big situation, but let's talk at first just about what Wood County EMA is, so people get an idea of you're not just about the eclipse.

You're involved in anything that requires emergency management in the county, and then coordinating with all of the other EMAs at the federal and state level as well.

- Yeah, we really do a lot of different things.

And EMA, emergency management, is kind of a new field.

People don't really realize, that if you think about police departments, fire departments, things like that, they've been around for over 200 years.

Emergency management really started to be in 1979, under President Carter.

They realized that they had all sorts of military resources and disaster resources, things like that, spread throughout the country, but they didn't have an effective way to implement them when the disasters occurred.

So, that's when FEMA was created.

And when FEMA was created, then they kind of had all the trickle downs from the state to the locals.

We used to be called Civil Defense.

- [Steve] Okay, right.

- Some of the older folks remember a lot of that.

- [Steve] The triangular yellow and black signs.

- The triangle, yep you got it.

- You still see those around.

- [Erin] You still see those, yep, yep.

- [Jeff] Can't replace everything all at one, you gotta give people time.

- [Steve] Phasing those out eventually, right?

- [Jeff] Yes.

- [Steve] Okay.

- [Jeff] So we've kind of morphed into emergency management from that.

And really kind of, we do a couple different things.

The first thing is, is you mentioned with the eclipse, we do a lot of planning.

You know, we hold plans for the county and we make sure that they're up to date, things like that.

We do some exercises on that.

One of the other big things is if there's ever a disaster, one of the problems that they saw before creating FEMA, whoever dialed the phone fastest got what they wanted.

And, if somebody else needed something, they didn't get it, because- - [Steve] It was already- - it was already allocated- - [Steve] spoken for, yep.

- somewhere else.

So the way the system works today is there's an incident in Bowling Green.

And Bowling Green Police, Fire, they do everything they can.

They reach out to their mutual aid.

When their mutual aid is exhausted, then they reach out to us.

- [Steve] Okay.

- And then, we work out with neighboring counties and so forth to get them the resources.

We run out, we go through the state.

When the state runs out, they go to the federal government for that.

And all the requests for supplies, equipment, manpower, things like that have to come through us.

And that's basically just so you can be able to track it.

You know, one of the things a lot of people don't think about is there's a cost that goes with it.

- [Steve] Sure.

- So when we're sitting here and we're saying yeah we need 30 front end loaders, we're understanding there's a cost, and we kind of have an idea of what that's gonna be be.

So we're kind of a clearing house for that.

And make sure really nationally on a large scale event, people are getting the resources that they need.

- Yeah, and plus if you're the providing agency, you're going to FEMA or whoever, you don't want 10 different people calling going, - [Jeff] No.

- asking for the same event, thinking I'm the only one calling.

Now you've got more resources coming that maybe you don't need or now.

- [Jeff] And it does, and it adds to the confusion.

- [Steve] Sure, yeah.

- It really does.

It's one of those things.

I think a lot of times people, you know I got a friend that works over here and we can do that.

And they've learned over time that, at some point in time, your friend may be able to get the ball rolling.

But when it hits the state, what they call a watch desk, you're done.

Because it's gonna have to come back through us and and be approved.

- [Steve] Yeah and it makes sense because you have a chain of command and a chain of communication that makes sure every, as you said, the resources get where they need to go, in the right amount and the right kind of resources.

Versus it sort of being a piecemeal thing where people are just throwing things at the event.

- [Jeff] Yep, where they're going how are we gonna communicate and that sort of good stuff.

- [Steve] Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah now Erin, Deputy Director, so your role obviously is extremely important too.

So, what are some of the things that you handle, that Jeff doesn't take care of?

- [Erin] Well, a lot of what I do is, I mean, mirrors what he does.

And then there's a lot of supporting things as well.

A lot of planning for the exercises, looking at a lot of the plans.

That's another thing, because there's so much that our office needs to shoulder to make sure that everything is in line.

And we have an office of three, so it, a lot of the time, especially with big events like the eclipse coming up, it's so important for us to be able to cross train and be able to do each other's jobs.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- You know, depending, but also kind of divide and conquer.

- [Steve] Yeah, go ahead.

- [Jeff] I think we're really blessed in our office is, with the three of us, it's interesting, we all three have different skills.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- [Jeff] We all have different skill sets.

Suzette that's in the office, she's like our money person, she understands the budgeting and she's got the history.

I know all the people.

I've been around long enough.

Clearly when you look at the face, you can tell that.

Erin brings a new life to it.

She sees things a little bit different than we do.

And on top of that, she's fantastic with the social media stuff that we do.

- Oh, okay.

- So anything that you see social media, Erin is really the one that creates that.

And one of the biggest donors we have is we see Erin's artwork under other county's names.

- [Steve] Oh!

- So, I think that speaks volumes.

- [Steve] Yes.

- [Jeff] You know, that people think that that's such quality work, so we're just, I think we've just got a great group that we work with.

- [Steve] Well, and you know the funny thing is, and we talk about that, and communication obviously, the traditional means of communication for some of us meant radio, phones, whatever.

But obviously social media, that's where a lot of people will go if they think what's going on.

The first thing they'll do is look at a social media page and say, is anybody talking about this?

What is this?

And you'll see a stream of questions and comments.

So, it is extremely important to be on top of that because that's where people are gonna go it seems, to begin with now.

- [Erin] Yeah, it's important for us to be a member of a lot of those groups, just to be able to see what people are talking about.

- [Steve] Sure.

- [Erin] So that we get a flavor of oh, how bad is this?

I mean, at one time, we would've probably been the first to know, but you know, now whoever is there is taking pictures and videos.

And you can get a different look through a different lens and be able to get things in real time, and it's really interesting.

- And you probably hear things like oh, we didn't know they'd be talking, they'd be concerned about that.

Or you get the impression, well we figured everybody knew that already.

- [Erin] Yes.

- And yet you find out, oh, maybe everybody doesn't know a thing that we kind of take for granted, maybe because of our different perspectives, depending on our demographic kind of a thing.

- [Erin] Yeah.

- So yeah, you probably say oh wow, we need to address that.

We thought that was covered.

People understood that.

Oh, maybe they don't understand it as much as we thought.

- So it is helpful, that way we can put out some sort of messaging if we need to, to try to rumor control and things like that.

- [Steve] Which is a huge thing, right?

That's the downside, the dark side of social media is bad information gets out there.

So it's just as important to be able to combat that and know what people are being misinformed about and be able to correct that too.

When you work with, obviously you talked about some of the training episodes, or training things that you did.

Obviously we've got railroads that run there, we've got an an interstate highway, we've got a turnpike in Wood County.

You obviously have to train for all sorts of potential issues there, a lot of it hazmat related I'm assuming.

But, when you looked at what happened say in East Palestine, what kind of bells did that set off here?

Like oh hmm, are we ready for something like that?

Or, we think we are but are we?

It probably gave you guys a chance to step back and say what does our plan look like and what if that happened, at Wooster and you know, right here, 200 yards from where we're sitting on that railroad track?

- [Jeff] I always think it's interesting, when you have these real life things, you know, the writing the plans and doing things like that, you know, there's formats that you use.

And they're all really, when you look, somewhat similar.

There's different things, full-time fire departments, volunteer fire departments, - [Steve] Right.

- and all that sort of stuff.

But it never really is real world.

And what are people really gonna do?

- [Steve] Until- - And that's the, and I think that's the thing that's so interesting, you know, and unfortunate when you have those situations.

You know, some of the information that we've heard out of there, from that situation, it really was interesting and kind of eyeopening.

Because you always hear when something like this happens, it's gonna be much bigger than the day-to-day stuff.

- [Steve] Right.

- But when you start hearing things like there are 70 representatives from the United States government that are there, different agencies doing different things, and we have an EOC that has 20 chairs in it, it kind of gets us thinking.

You know, not only do we need to get one that's a little bigger, but we really need to start looking at buildings and different things like that.

And you know, it's interesting, I'm glad that it didn't necessarily happen here, but it's when these real life things happen, we go to conferences and that and we talk, - [Steve] Sure.

- and we learn what everybody else is doing.

- [Steve] Yeah.

When we come back and we can talk a little bit more about that too, as obviously the planning for the eclipse is a big thing.

The good news is we kind of know when that's going to happen, - [Jeff] Exactly.

- versus these other things.

So, back in just a moment with Jeff Klein and Erin Konecki from the Wood County Emergency Management Agency, here on The Journal, back in a moment.

Thank you for staying with us on The Journal.

Our guests are Jeff Klein and Erin Konecki, the two top people at the Wood County Emergency Management Agency.

And Erin, we were talking about events and a learning from other people's experience.

And then the training and the exercise and the planning that you guys do, based on what you've seen in other places.

So talk about some of the trainings you have in place and some of the things that you've done maybe in reaction to like East Palestine.

Because obviously that's one, I know you just got done doing a few, well it's been more than a few weeks ago now, but very recently.

- [Erin] Yes, and actually, oddly enough, we had that planned well in advance of East Palestine.

- [Steve] Okay.

- That was just an odd coincidence.

But it did fall in line with everyone's recent interests.

So, we're required every year to have an LEPC exercise, so that's our local emergency planning committee exercise.

It has to be a hazmat incident.

So either rail or simulated, you know, fixed facility, a tanker truck, something like that.

So we do that, and we have to do a different kinds of exercise each year.

So, a full scale exercise, which is what you may have seen - [Steve] Over here?

- outside here, with all the lights and sirens and everything.

That is all hands on deck, full response.

Everyone needs to act out every, not even act out, just do what you would do in the real response to an event like that.

It takes a lot of planning and a lot of buy-in from our partners, to be able to do something like that.

So, we had a great turnout.

The responders did wonderful, and it was great to know and take comfort in knowing that... - [Steve] They were ready for it, they yeah, yeah.

- [Erin] 100%.

And you know, we did it that way intentionally, so that the train was blocking off half of the city.

It was all the way across.

- [Steve] Which creates all of those issues then of response, - [Erin] Yes.

- [Steve] in a lot of cases.

- Which likely would not happen, because the train would probably continue out of the occupied area, as much as it could.

- [Steve] Right, but it could.

- Because this wasn't actually a derailment, our scenario, but it was very interesting and eye opening.

And I think it was wonderful, it worked out great.

- [Jeff] Yeah, it really did.

And I, it was one of those things that was just, it's interesting learning from other people and the different things that happened.

And one of the things that we fell into that Erin did was, this was modeled off another incident down, outside Cincinnati.

And she found somebody that was there, through a contact here at Bowling Green State University.

- [Steve] Oh.

- And they came to the exercise and talked about the real event.

And it was really interesting because I've never done that before.

We've never done anything like that before.

And it was really kind of cool what she was able to put together with that because it added a new dimension.

To yeah, we trained on it, yeah we did this, yeah we did that, and here's what really happened.

So, yeah- - [Erin] This is how my fire department reacted, and this is what we did right and what I think we did wrong.

- [Steve] And things we want to improve on the next time, that sort of thing.

Well one of the things you were mentioning, the fact, that obviously the train stopped over here and I keep pointing out that way.

People are going, what are they pointing at?

But one of the Bowling Green fire departments is literally by the railroad tracks.

So that, although seems like a good thing, that could be an issue if that train derails and takes the fire station offline in some way.

And I know that's, there's an issue, there is concern about moving that station.

But on one hand you think, oh great, it's right there where there might be the incident.

On the other hand, it's almost too close to the incident.

And I know that a little town nearby here, Tantagaknee, same thing, the fire department is along the railroad tracks.

And there was a derailment in the downtown.

It didn't hit that department, but it hit the building right across the street.

So, that could take out your response at the local level as part of the incident, before you even know it's happened.

You're already down that.

Now, when you talk about that training, obviously mutual aid, people filling in.

As people are drawn into the situation, people on the peripheral begin to fill in at the local jurisdictions, that have now responded to this incident.

So, that's also a big part of this too, is the whole coordination of, if Bowling Green responds, if Middleton Township has to come in to help Bowling Green, if Perrysburg has to come, then other agencies have to fill in so that there's still protection for regular first response in those jurisdictions.

So that's a huge, this whole communications net is a pretty important part of this.

When you go through those incidents like that, do you find, well obviously you probably find things you're like wow, we didn't think that would happen like that.

Or, things went really well, we didn't, we're really on top of this.

But do you, you obviously find things like well we need to do a little better about this.

Was there anything that that sticks out, that oh, that's something we're gonna fix before anything does happen again?

Or not?

- [Erin] I don't know particularly from this.

What we do after every exercise, we do a hot wash, like immediately right after, so that it's fresh in everyone's mind.

And, there are evaluators that come to these exercises.

And they evaluate certain components of it, so they can only focus on that.

So they go through and discuss their findings.

The responders and the participants, they kind of say, you know, I wish we would've done this or that.

Or it's really, it's really a great experience.

Then we capture those notes and- create more.

- [Jeff] Yeah I think the best thing for this one was the bringing folks together and seeing some of the different things that you can do.

We actually had National Weather Service here.

And people don't realize that they can do plume modeling.

And not only can they do plume modeling, but they can say, the weather's expected to change in two hours, - [Steve] This will- - So it could theoretically affect another neighborhood, things like that, your evacuation zones could change.

So I think from that standpoint, I think that was probably really the biggest one out of this one.

- [Steve] Right.

- That we really gained.

Because, truthfully, it was a full scale exercise.

And they're really doing what they kind of do day to day.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- So they're good at it.

- [Steve] Sure, yeah.

- So we don't see the things we have with that.

We have another one coming up in March, which is gonna test our emergency operations center.

And, we very rarely use the emergency operation centers.

And with technology changes, with virtual and some things like that, I anticipate more coming out of that one.

- [Steve] Yeah, but that's good.

- [Erin] Because it's a little bit more unique, but it is.

Because that's what you want.

You wanted to find that out today, versus during East Palestine.

- [Steve] Yeah, when the emergency's landing in your lap and it's like, oh wow.

Now, one of the things that I would assume has probably improved, although it's always a challenge, is communication among all of these different entities.

Because, unfortunately sometimes from county to county, sometimes within a county, people aren't even using the same radio systems, which is a problem.

More county to county now, 'cause internally now the counties tend to be a little more, they get together better on that and say, oh we're all gonna use Marx radios, we're all gonna use this version, we're gonna use this sort of thing.

Is that still a challenge though, to have a multiple county response?

Because Seneca County's using a different system.

You know, Henry County has to be called in, maybe the edges of Henry County, they're on a different system.

So, has that become more manageable or less manageable because of technology?

- [Jeff] I think technology in some ways is more challenging because back when I started in the old days, you had a computer, you could program the radios.

And you could do it on the fly.

The new radios are computer controlled through the system.

- [Steve] Okay.

- [Jeff] So your IDs have to be in the systems and do things like that.

And everything has to be, you know, and it's like your phone, they've got two factor authentication and all that sort of stuff now.

So I think in some ways it's a little bit more challenging.

And I think the flip side of it is you kind of expand.

You have to take the people off the normal day-to-day talk groups, channels that they normally use.

- [Steve] And bring them to a... - [Jeff] And move them somewhere else that's common.

And that really makes people uncomfortable.

Because they, you always get told never change in the middle of an event.

Well, now we've got these people coming in and you have to change.

So, it's kind of one of those things that kind of teaching people how to go through this.

And, again, that's one of those things, these larger communication systems are not designed to hold disasters on your day-to-day stuff.

They have special disaster channels, - [Steve] For that, yeah.

- talk groups, for everybody to go to.

And, since you don't use them, people forget about that.

So that's kind of one of the things that we think about.

And it's kind of like, yeah we need to start moving.

- [Erin] But it's good, during our exercises, we were discussing that.

Like okay, who would come, who would respond to this?

What radio systems are they on?

Would that work?

- [Steve] What do you need to do?

- [Erin] And if it wouldn't work, what would we do?

Could we pass out our cache of radios, to kind of marry those things, or what?

What would we do?

So... - [Steve] Yeah.

When we come back, I've got a question, because obviously you talked about the doubling of the security and all of that too.

Because the one thing you don't want, and we can talk about this, is you don't want somebody to be able to get into that system when you're trying to manage an emergency, or do something to create a communications emergency.

So we'll talk just a little bit about that when we come back.

Back in just a moment with Jeff Klein and Erin Konecki, from the Wood County Emergency Management Agency.

Back in just a moment, on The Journal.

You're with us on The Journal, and our guests are the Director of the Wood County Emergency Management Agency, Jeff Klein, and the Deputy Director, Erin Konecki.

Real briefly, we were talking about the use of radios and the linking and all of that and the communications chain.

Obviously, things are a lot more secure than they would've been back in the day when people are just using open on the air, radio frequencies, CB type radio kind of communication.

So, that's the good news there is, it's a little more complicated, but it's also much better protected than it would've been 20 years ago or 30 years ago.

- It is.

And there's scanners out there now that can hear the digital radio traffic and all that.

But, the encryption that they have on these - [Steve] Yep.

- is so much better.

And, you have to really be in the system, and the radio of the system has to recognize your radio.

So, to have those private conversations and things like that, that you don't have to worry about people listening- - [Steve] Who shouldn't be.

- Who shouldn't be listening.

And you know, part of it is it's not just the conversation.

It's just, a lot of times those conversations are snippets of things that are going on.

And when people hear it, they're not getting the right information.

- [Steve] They hear it.

- [Jeff] Right, they're gonna hear this or that and it's not- - [Steve] It's not in context, it's not in the larger.

- [Jeff] Yes.

So you hate to have those.

And we talked a little bit ago about the misinformation getting out, we don't want that.

- [Steve] Sure, yeah.

Now one of the things, and obviously we're, is to talk about the event that we know is gonna happen on April 8th.

Actually it's gonna start happening before that.

Is this eclipse, which is gonna sweep all the way from South America through, across Missouri, Kansas, whatever, and then go through Ohio and on into Canada.

We're hearing a lot about it.

Every county, the state, everybody who's involved in this has plans.

They're trying to get information out to make sure people understand that there will be an increased level of activity, we believe, in every jurisdiction that is near or at the center of this eclipse path.

So, what are some of the things that people, and I know they've heard some of this probably, but what are the things you really want people to understand and to prepare for?

And not take for granted that this isn't gonna be much of a thing.

Yeah, a few people are gonna show up in Wood County.

Big deal.

It is a big deal actually.

- [Jeff] It is a big deal.

And it was one of those things, that I think I'm probably like most people, when it first started it was like ah, this can't be this big of a deal.

But we've, I don't know how many people, well over 50 people we've talked to in county agencies, things like that, and everybody says the same thing.

That these people are coming, you know?

And when you look at our weather, statistically, according to the National Weather Service, a low of 30, high of 50, almost 0% chance of precipitate precipitation.

- [Steve] Perfect.

- [Jeff] But, 65% chance of being cloudy.

- [Steve] Ah, okay.

- [Jeff] And they said the farther you get away from the lake, the less cloudy that it will be.

Some conditions will improve.

But when we talk to the state, we talk to other people that have researched this and we follow people movement and things like that, people are gonna come.

They're expecting our population to double.

When you look at Wood County, it's got a lot of nice viewing areas that you can see off I-75.

So people that travel I-75 have got a memory marker that there's some places that I can go and I can maybe pull off and see some of these things.

- [Steve] Be the perfect spot to look up and... - [Jeff] It is.

And that's gonna be one of the things that's gonna cause a lot of issues with parking lots and things like that.

Because the information that we've gotten is pretty much everybody, when they start coming in, they're gonna find a parking lot and they're gonna park there.

- [Steve] Wow.

- [Jeff] And it's gonna start early in the day, you know as everybody's getting up, because everybody wants to get that prime viewing area.

- [Steve] Yeah.

Well and the other thing too is if you look at just the spatial part of it, there's all the load on all of the other systems that are involved here, whether it's cell phones, restaurants, food, whatever, water, I mean all of that, there's gonna be a load on that unlike we believe we've ever seen in that concentrated a timeframe.

- [Jeff] You know, the cell phone issue is gonna be similar to the tractor poles, the people that live around that neighborhood.

You know, they're kind of used to that.

But this could potentially gonna be for longer.

And a lot of people that aren't in that neighborhood aren't really gonna be used to this.

So now's the time to start thinking about some alternate communications.

Putting your phone on wifi calling.

A lot of people can do that, but you just have to remember that you have to be into the wifi router.

And also you have to have the passwords and all that sort of stuff in before you get there.

And, when you look at the expressway and the roads, one of the things that they're expecting is heavy traffic on I-75, which is gonna push people off onto Route 25 and 199, which is gonna push the local people- - [Steve] Off onto other- - [Jeff] Even farther.

And they're like, well yeah but you know, I live far enough off and this and that.

But if you have to cross I-75, if you have to cross Perrysburg, one of the eight, nine bridges in to Lucas County, it's going to be a huge issue.

I know in Perrysburg when they have an incident on 475 and- - [Steve] Everything.

- [Jeff] 475 shuts down, and everybody tries to go to the Waterville Bridge.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- [Jeff] From Perrysburg into Waterville can be an hour wait.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- [Jeff] And that's gonna be magnified.

- [Steve] And that won't be anything, - [Jeff] Yes.

- [Steve] that's minimal, compared to what we might see here.

- [Jeff] Yeah, very much so.

- [Steve] When you talk about delays on highways and things like that, what have been some of the experiences in the past on what would happen to like an interstate highway when you have that influx of people in that concentrated a time?

Does it bring it to a halt completely?

Or what, how bad does it get?

- [Erin] That's what we've heard.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- [Erin] We've heard a couple accounts from folks that went to the last one in 2017.

And, one individual said she was on a tour bus, and the bus was stuck in traffic for I think eight hours.

- [Steve] Wow.

- [Erin] Eight hours completely standstill.

And the individuals on the bus, the toilets filled up.

- [Steve] Sure.

- So imagine that.

And it's parked on the side of the road.

They ran out of food.

There were some elderly on the bus and they were having some difficulty.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- And, that brings with it a whole different gamut of things that could be a problem, with response to try to assist these individuals if they needed medical help.

- [Steve] Yeah well and that was the next question would be so if you end up with gridlock, or whatever version of this you want to call it, if you're trying to respond to another, like a fire or something, or a horrible accident, you now have to contend with the fact that all of the roads, like especially in a rural area, where typically there's not, you can jump on a county road or whatever and get there, maybe there's gonna be people parked all up and down the edge of that county road.

Now suddenly getting through there isn't as easy as it normally is.

Time starts to become an enemy of everything.

Are, when you look at this too, and I guess you talked about food and water, are you guys coordinating?

I mean, like with the grocery stores, the big, like the Krogers, the Meijers, the whatever.

Are they planning to stock up?

Are you aware of any kind of thought process they might be having about?

- [Jeff] We're working with that.

- [Steve] Kinda like the tractor pool, they're gonna make sure we have plenty of ice, you know?

- [Jeff] You know, one of the big challenges that we're seeing is trying to identify some of those things.

Most of the chain stores, bigger places like that, don't really deal with local folks, like us, because they wanna maintain the flavor.

- [Steve] Sure.

- When you go in to a certain grocery store, you expect them to have it throughout the country.

- [Steve] Yeah.

- The brand loyalty type thing.

And because of that they kinda lock it down.

So there are groups with the state EMA, that are working with them, to try and find out what some of these plans are.

Because you know, that's the thing, if all this happens, everybody has very limited storage.

So there is the potential that locally we could have some shortages, you know the bread and all that sort of stuff.

- [Steve] Sure.

- [Jeff] So that's one of the messages for the local people is kind of hit the grocery store a week before, get some of those staples that you need.

Worst case scenario, if it doesn't play out like we thought, there are no food shortages, you've got food.

- [Steve] You're okay.

- [Jeff] You'd rather have- - [Erin] You don't have to go to the grocery store the next week, you're fine.

- [Jeff] There you go.

- [Steve] Better that than oh, we're out of everything and there isn't anything, yeah, yeah.

- [Jeff] And that's the reality, is if that happens, it's not like we've got this secret source that we can bring all this food in.

It is what it is.

- [Steve] Yeah, yeah.

- And and that's where it's kind of getting local people to kind of prepare a little bit.

You know, make sure the gas tanks are filled up.

If you go by and see the gas station, and there's not a lot of people there, fill your gas tank up.

Because that was one of the other issues they had, - [Steve] Oh yeah.

- was fuel stations running out of gas.

- [Steve] Running out of gas.

- [Jeff] We got some diesel.

- Now we've got vehicles stranded along the expressways and things like that, 'cause they're in longer than they thought they would be.

- [Steve] Yeah, all these little emergencies, that roll out from this larger event, that create more issues.

If there's one thing that people should, you've pretty much talked about them too.

They can go to your website, and obviously all your social media, and find out how to prepare for this, how to be aware of it.

And there's lots of FAQs on there, there's all kinds of things to deal with.

If there's one thing, though, what would you tell people that day?

Would you say maybe you should leave, not to say leave Wood County.

But I mean, because I know there are places, towns where there are events sometimes the locals go.

We're not sticking around for the event.

It's crazy here.

But is there one thing people should do, if they only do one thing in preparation for this?

Is it food?

Is it fuel?

Is it... - [Erin] Well if you have to limit it to one, I would give this big blanket statement, which actually includes everything.

So a well prepared, well forecasted blizzard.

So just think of it like that.

Your food, your fuel, you wanna stay home, not schedule doctor's appointments, have your baby formula, your medications filled, everything well in advance, so that you can just stay at home and watch and enjoy it.

- [Steve] Yeah, not get caught up in the- - [Erin] Make it a bad day, where you're mad because you can't get from A to B or... - [Jeff] Everything on the road's gonna be affected, garbage, mail, all that sort of stuff.

So the more people that we can keep off the roads and stay home and enjoy it, and if everybody wants that day to just stay home and enjoy, well we're telling you, April 8th, stay home and enjoy it.

- [Steve] That's the day you do it.

Everybody, everybody will be off on April 8th.

Okay, good, good.

- [Erin] And if the locals are prepared, then we're only needing to assist the travelers through, so... - [Steve] Good, okay.

Well Erin Konecki, Jeff Klein, thank you so much for coming on.

And hopefully it'll all roll out, and we'll be able to enjoy it without any of the issues that we hope don't happen.

So, we appreciate you coming in and talking about this.

And again, you go to woodcountyema.org and find all the information, all the things about this, and how to prepare for it too.

So appreciate you guys doing this, and just the regular things you do on a day-to-day basis because obviously this is an event we know is gonna happen, but you guys are there when things just come up out of nowhere.

And things have to roll out well and consistently to take care of those emergencies, and we appreciate your work on that.

- [Erin] Thank you.

- [Jeff] Thank you very much.

And appreciate the opportunity to be here.

- Great.

You can check us out at wbgu.org.

You can watch us every Thursday night at 8:00 PM, on WBGU-PBS.

We will see you again next time.

Goodnight and good luck.

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