SALEM, N.J.-Comcast Cellular Communications Inc. provided 60 wireless phones to Public Service Electric & Gas earlier this month for a nuclear emergency response test. The phones essentially replaced landline communications during the drill.
The exercise tested cooperation among the utility, county, state and federal agencies that would respond to a nuclear emergency that included radiological release. In the event of an actual emergency, Comcast most likely also would provide a cell site on wheels, said the company.
The exercise was the nation’s largest in the last eight years, with more than 100 agencies from Delaware and New Jersey participating. More than 250 representatives from a variety of organizations took part in the exercise, including the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and several state and local agencies.
During the final two days of the exercise, state and federal agencies created the Federal Radiological Monitoring and Assessment Center and the FEMA Disaster Field Office at PSE&G’s Salem County, N.J., facility. The Comcast phones were used to coordinate activities there.
The facility would be responsible for dispatching field monitoring teams that would survey for radiological conditions, coordinate relocation centers for those that were evacuated, coordinate the location and disbursement of claim and recovery funds to the public and direct people’s return home.
