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What Emergency Responders Learned From 'Operation Vigilant Guard'

Robert Ray
/
AP/file
Vermont National Guardsmen and civilians unload supplies for the isolated town of Rochester in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Irene on Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2011. The experience of Irene added realism to the exercises of Operation Vigilant Guard.

"The exercise started out with the plague," says Chris Herrick, Vermont director of the Division of Emergency Management & Homeland Security, "then we had earthquakes." Herrick is describing the limit-testing scenarios that Vermont emergency responders managed during a massive 10-day drill that just concluded.

"Operation Vigilant Guard" incorporated 5,000 people from the Vermont National Guard, state government, hospitals and scores of other response agencies to test Vermont's ability to handle large-scale disasters. We look at how the exercise was carried out and what the state learned from it with Herrick, and Lt. Col. Brian Cavanagh of the Vermont National Guard.

Also in the program, a Fairfax fourth grader describes attending dinner at the White House. Miranda Gallagher was chosen as the winner from Vermont for First Lady Michelle Obama's "Healthy Lunchtime Challenge" that invited kids to create a nutritious recipe with local ingredients.

And, we head back to Summer School for a lesson in handling birds of prey. Our visit with to the Green Mountain Falconry School in Manchester gets up close and personal with a Harris hawk.

Broadcast live on Monday, Aug. 8, 2016, at noon; rebroadcast at  7 p.m.

 

Patti is an integral part of VPR's news effort and part of the team that created Vermont Edition. As executive producer, Patti supervises the team that puts Vermont Edition on the air every day, working with producers to select and research show ideas, select guests and develop the sound and tone of the program.
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