- Home
- Emergency Planning
Emergency Planning
While the safety of staff and visitors is obviously paramount, successful emergency planning can reduce the risk of man-made or natural disasters wreaking havoc on museums, libraries and archives and their collections.
“Even small, non-life-threatening incidents such as leaking pipes can cause damage to documents or artefacts and disruption to services,” says Graham Matthews, Professor of Information and Library Management at Liverpool John Moores University. “Effective planning can prevent or reduce the impact of such incidents and thoroughly prepare staff to react appropriately to such an event and to recover from it in the medium and longer term.”
An effective disaster control plan should be more than just words on paper, he says. It should be a framework for action that is tested regularly through simulations and exercises and frequently reviewed and updated. It should also be concise, flexible and easy to use in an emergency. - Read the full article
Getting Started
The Museum and Gallery Commission (now Museums Libraries and Archives Council) ‘Standards in the museum care of collections' series contains some useful information relating to emergency planning. Get advice on what to include in your emergency plan, protection from fire and protection from flood here.
Guidelines and Factsheets
'An emergency is an incident that becomes out of control threatening human safety, and damages or threatens to damage, facilities and resources essential to the running of an organisation.'
The National Preservation Office aims to introduce the concepts of and a framework for disaster/emergency planning and to give sources and models useful to those responsible for disaster/emergency planning and risk mitigation.
From Disaster Planning on the National Preservation Office website
- Management (NPO)
- Prevention (NPO)
- Preparedness (NPO)
- Reaction (NPO)
- Recovery (NPO)
Recoding an emergecny
If you are unfortunate enough to experience an emergency situation it is advisable to record the incident as soon as possible after the event. The Incident Report Form template below explains why and offers a structured format.for information. It was originally developed byt the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council.
Blue Shield
The UK and Ireland Blue Shield (UKIRB) is an initiative from the National Preservation Office which aims to help safeguard the nation's cultural heritage against disaster. It is affiliated to the International Committee of the Blue Shield (ICBS).
Resources from outside the Cultural Heritage Sector
The pages from the link above were produced as an output from an Arts and Humanities Research Counci funded project, 'Safeguarding heritage at risk: disaster management in Uniuted Kingdom archives, libraries and museums' undertaken at Liverpool John Moores University, March 2005 - October 2006 by Professor Graham Matthews,Yvonne Smith and Gemma Knowles. Further details about the project:
© All material on Collections Link, copyright MDA and other National Organisations 2006, all rights reserved
