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October 2008
Best Practices: Disaster management
Tornado damage forces Hinman Dental Meeting to cancel last day
By Nancy Mann Jackson
When a 200-yard-wide, EF-2 tornado ripped through downtown Atlanta at 9:40 p.m. on Friday, March 14, it uprooted trees, downed utility lines, shattered windows, tore off roofs and collapsed structures. The tornado’s 130-mile-per-hour winds also damaged the Georgia World Congress Center (GWCC) and adjacent Omni Hotel, disrupting the second night of the three-day 96th Thomas P. Hinman Dental Meeting — a highly respected annual educational conference for dental professionals.
Meeting staff and attendees, who were scattered across the city at various evening events, had no warning of the destruction, says Sylvia Ratchford, executive director of the Hinman Dental Society, a nonprofit group focused on providing continuing dental education.
With 23,000 attendees including dentists, hygienists, assistants and laboratory technicians, as well as more than 400 exhibitors, Hinman had to account for numerous people after the storm hit and make quick decisions about the meeting’s final day. As part of its existing communications plan, Hinman had distributed a list of cell phone numbers prior to the meeting for staff, executive officers, speakers and contractors, so Ratchford and top staff members began making calls. After phoning to ensure the safety of staff and officers, planners met with venue managers to determine the status of their facilities. “With an event cancellation insurance policy, we needed word from them to determine if the meeting could be held the next day,” Ratchford says. With little information available about the extent of the damage at that point, Hinman had to wait for more information from facility managers before taking further action.
A few hours later, facility managers determined that the meeting could not be held the next day, Saturday, March 15, because the GWCC had sustained heavy damage — holes in the roof and sides of the exhibit hall, extensive water damage from the sprinkler system and broken water pipes in some areas. Although canceling the meeting’s final day meant forfeiting several important events including registered attendance lectures, participation courses, videotaping sessions and a homes tour, planners had no choice.
Hinman’s show office was inaccessible, but luckily, Hinman’s PR partner had a list of media contacts with her. By 1:00 a.m., staff members had called local news stations and CNN with a statement about the meeting’s cancellation. The statement was posted on Hinman’s Web site and recorded as a voicemail on the office phone line. Staff also contacted Ambassadors, its housing contractor, to supply the statement to the 25 participating hotels to post on their conference TV channels and at the front desks.
In addition, Hinman staffed the meeting’s information booth at the Omni on Saturday morning. Each of the conference’s 60- plus speakers who had an individual host responsible for providing their transportation were contacted via cell phone to ensure the speakers were safe, had accommodations and were aware of the meeting closing early.
Hinman updated exhibitors on the status of the exhibit hall through its Web site and via e-mail. Exhibitors were most concerned about re-entering the building to get into their booths and retrieve their equipment, but it took until Monday for GWCC to assess the damage and make a decision about re-entry. Exhibitors had to stay in town extra days or send other staff members to collect their materials once they were allowed back into the building. Hinman kept volunteers and staff on site the following week to keep exhibitors informed and to help with the move-out process.
Hinman’s event cancellation policy was successfully settled in 90 days. “We refunded a third of attendee registration fees, all course fees and special events for Saturday and a third of the exhibitor booth space rental fees,” Ratchford says.
Although Hinman executives say having a plan in place that allowed them to quickly contact key individuals was helpful, they’ve since subscribed to a service that will allow them to send an instant voicemail message to a large group rather than calling each person individually, and also plan to use their registration database to send a similar e-mail blast message in the future.
Nancy Mann Jackson, a freelance writer and editor, writes for a number of associations and corporations. Contact her at nancy@writeshoponline.com.
Goal: Respond quickly, responsibly and thoroughly to a tornado that damaged event venues on the second night of a three-day meeting.
Strategy: Work with facility personnel to assess damages and make sound decisions, and follow existing communications plan to ensure the safety of attendees, speakers and exhibitors.
Results: The meeting’s final day was cancelled and money was refunded to both attendees and exhibitors.
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