The data for this section was collected through semi-structure interviews with ADP, NCEMA and Civil Defence strategic (Gold) level officers. The inquiry for this section was limited to Gold level officers because of the need to clarify the meaning and explanations of Major Emergency (ME) and Contingency Planning (CP). This data relates to the first research objective, which is “to define major emergencies and contingency
planning from literature and UAE context”. Themes sought in this inquiry relates to the
description of ME as an overwhelming event or as an event that escalates as a process until it exceeds capacity for response. To this end, the interviewees were asked to explain what ME and the circumstances they consider as ME in the UAE.
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To this inquiry, all the interviewees (A3, B6, and C3) state that there is no definition of ME in the UAE or in their organisation. However, they provided different explanation and personal views of an emergency situation to inquire of its similarity to ME.
Interviewee A3 explained that definition for emergency situation is: “a sudden unexpected event beyond the normal response capabilities and requires the intervention of an organisation or more”
Interviewee B6 said: “…no definition of ME, but an emergency situation is event that occurs suddenly and requires the support of several parties to respond and using the emergency procedure guide we are able to reach the desired result and complete the response task”
Interviewee C3 have similar views as B6: “In general, there is no definition of ME, but it can be a definition of emergency situation which is; any event that may happen abruptly and impact on society and human beings”
Although information provided was for an emergency situation which is just routine emergency that does not escalate nor prove difficult to manage, and that can be managed by one agency in the UAE and not ME. The answers provided by the interviewees were ran through Nvivo software to identify if any of the themes relevant to definition and description of ME identified in the literature review exists in the definition of emergency. Figure 4.1 shows the outcome of the word frequency query for this investigation in content analysis format.
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It can be noticed from Figure 4.1 that emergency in the three main organisations responsible for response to any scale of emergency is considered as “event that happen abruptly/unexpected”, “response beyond normal capabilities/organisations, “that require several organisations/parties”.
However, phrases like “response beyond capabilities/ organisations” tend to be the closest to the explanations and characteristics of ME reviewed in chapter two. This phrase may also be considered as similar to explanation of ME as an event with overwhelming onset or as an emergency situation that escalates through a process that it becomes ME which exceeds normal capability for response. However, when same responses were analysed using Nvivo text search query, Figure 4.2 shows the outcome.
Figure 4.2 Text search query for explanations of Emergency in UAE
It can be seen in Figure 4.2 that while there is lack of definition for ME, there is also limited data on definition of emergency and characteristics that explains it. However, it can be noticed (words in red) that emergency is described as “sudden unexpected event beyond the normal response capabilities” or the “emergency situation or any event that may happen abruptly” or “occurs suddenly”. ME on the other hand can be foreseen or sudden, therefore the evidence of ME is lacking in the definition and description of emergency in the UAE.
Following this, all three interviewees provided description of incident or circumstances that may be considered as ME in UAE. Interviewee A3 stated that, from his experience the events are:
“Critical incidents that may or may not include VIP people, something that will impact the reputation of the country, and one that requires the intervention of one of more
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organisations”. He supported his statement with an example of flood incident that
happened in March 2016 “Incidents that leads to death, involves large number of injured people, affects the reputation of the institution or the state and may affect or affects the economy”.
He adds “… If it has serious consequences on a large scale and requires the direct intervention of top-level strategic and more than one organisation and multiple
organisations to respond”. “...Requires the activation of strategic level of response
because response goes beyond the capacity of emergency team at the local level of the emirate. It requires the support of the leadership of the incident from all other
organisations (governmental and non-governmental organisations).” From this response,
it is only the last statement (underlined) that is closest to meaning to the nature of ME and its occurrence.
Interviewee B6 mentioned that: “Incidents such as rains and floods, fires started and that occur by the proportion of large losses and efforts, wars and earthquakes and landslides”. “.. a huge and large event”“...need national and local response to deal with. Will, also require response from several quarters and one that will further raise the status and readiness of the institution”.
Interviewee C3 mentioned that; “It is a sudden event that threatens the lives and properties of people and need major emergency organisations to handle and support from every quarters of the country or city. Examples are major fires, floods where the
repercussions are more serious if neglected.” “…it will be a large-scale event that
requires national level involvement. One or more city (emirates) will need to management it. It will require level one (local), level two (federal) and level three (national). Example
of this scale of event is the H1N1 which was national level event”.“… it will be effectively
managed by several organisations, and the role and responsibilities of each sector are
showed in the general framework of the response”. He refers to the website that “The
general framework of response can be found at NCEMA website”.
It can be noticed that the explanations provided for ME are also similar to the definition of emergency analysed using content analysis and Nvivo software. There is no reference to words like escalation, overwhelming onset (although large scale may qualify for this),
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but reference to reputation of the organisation or the country. C3 also emphasised that ME can be effectively managed by several organisations using the response framework, but the case studies examined does not reflect any effective response. Since the answers provided further confirms gaps identified through the case study evaluation that the understanding of MEs is limited, the next section examines current position or perspectives on contingency planning.