2021 Consequence Management Hotline Drill After Action Report

Abstract

In March 2021, a functional area drill was held at the Remote Sensing Laboratory–Nellis that focused on using CBRNResponder and the Digital Field Monitoring (DFM) tablets for sample hotline operations and the new paper Sample Control Forms (SCFs) for sample collection. Participants included staff trained and billeted as sample control specialists and Consequence Management Response Team (CMRT) field monitoring personnel. Teams were able to successfully gather and transfer samples to the sample control hotline staff through the manual process, though there were several noted areas for improvement. In July and October 2021, two additional functional area drills were held at Sandia National Laboratories that focused on field sample collection and custody transfer at the sample control hotline for the Consequence Management (CM) Radiological Assistance Program (RAP) program. The overarching goal of the drills was to evaluate the current CM process for sample collection, sample drop off, and sample control using the CBRNResponder mobile and web-based applications. The July 2021 drill had an additional focus to have a subset of samples analyzed by the local analytical laboratory, Radiation Protection Sample Diagnostics (RPSD) laboratory, to evaluate the Laboratory Access portal on CBRNResponder. All three drills were able to accomplish their objectives however, there were several issues noted (Observations: 25 Urgent, 29 Important, and 22 Improvement Opportunities). The observations were prioritized according to their impact on the mission as well as categorized to align with the programmatic functional area required to address the issue. This report provides additional detail on each observation for skillset/program leads and software developers to consider for future improvement or mandatory efforts.