The Bay Area is no stranger to wildfires like those that devastated Southern California last month. Fires in the hills near UC-Berkeley in 1991 destroyed approximately 3,500 structures, killed 25 people and caused an estimated $1.5 billion in damage. This summer, blazes near the Dish demonstrated that Stanford, too, could be affected by fire. And while the University did not experience any serious damage, the summer’s fires, in conjunction with those that burned recently in Southern California, have caused some to question the University’s plans in case of a campus-wide emergency.

According to campus biologist Alan Launder, Stanford narrowly escaped damage during the summer’s blazes.

“Had the winds been blowing in a different direction during late June’s fire,” Launder said, “there was real potential for some structures being destroyed.”

Launder added that faculty houses at the fringes of campus are most at risk from wildfires because they are adjacent to the foothills where fires start.

“If a fire got going in the faculty houses, and if conditions were right: hot, dry, lots of wind,” he said, “then it could spread further into campus.”

The University has a detailed emergency response system in place to deal with fires and other natural disasters. Stanford’s response model is based on the Incident Command System (ICS), a procedure used by the U.S. government to respond to major emergencies.

Top Stanford emergency management officials including Director of the Department of Public Safety (DPS) Laura Wilson, Associate Vice Provost for Environmental Health and Safety (EH&S) Larry Gibbs, Emergency Management Program Manager Keith Perry and Associate Vice Provost for Facilities Operations Chris Christofferson all responded to The Daily in a joint email when asked about the University’s emergency response system.

“The University has a robust emergency management plan that is managed by EH&S and supported by numerous departments within the University, including Public Safety,” they said.

Stanford’s response plan is based on what the officials called “an all-hazards response,” meaning that a single plan exists to handle many different potential emergencies.

“I am sure what most people want to hear is that we have a specific plan for fires and a specific plan for a chemical spill and a specific plan for a flood,” the officials said. “The problem is that there are infinite [varieties] of any situation, so you really cannot plan out exactly what will be done, which is why you need a general way in which calls are handled and managed.”

The University’s first response to emergencies involves the activation of the Situation Triage and Assessment Team (STAT), which includes staff from the DPS, EH&S, Facilities and other operational departments. The STAT team was recently activated last Tuesday when a 5.6 magnitude earthquake rattled campus. The group meets immediately either over the phone or in person to share status updates and decide what action needs to be taken.

If an incident has broader implications for the operation of the University, the officials said, the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) is activated. The President, Provost and other senior administrators are then called in to assist in the management of the incident.

While the summer’s fires did result in STAT meetings, they did not require the activation of the EOC, the emergency management officials wrote.

“Had the fires reached the magnitude of what has happened in Southern California, the EOC would have been activated,” they said.

The summer fires did encourage further initiatives to improve preventative measures against wildfires on campus.

Wilson, Gibbs, Perry and Christofferson explained that as a result of the fires, Buildings and Grounds Maintenance enhanced firebreaks in the foothills and trimmed brush and trees near residential neighborhoods. Additionally, the Department of Sustainability and Energy Management installed new fire hydrants to supplement existing ones.

The foothill fires also encouraged efforts to develop a system for notifying students, faculty and staff of emergencies.

“We had been exploring tools for mass notification prior to the fire,” they said, “but the fire served as good example of the need for enhancing our existing systems.”

Should fires similar to those that occurred in the foothills last summer happen during the school year or in the middle of campus, emergency management officials said they would not need to make adjustments to existing plans.

They added that in addition to the actions taken by STAT and the EOC, the chance of fires spreading through buildings on campus is limited by fire suppression systems.

“All undergraduate residences are outfitted with fire sprinklers as are many of the major buildings on the campus,” the officials said.

In the event that fires did get out of control and there was a credible safety threat, Wilson, Gibbs, Perry and Christofferson wrote that an evacuation could be ordered.

“If the fire were as extensive as in Southern California, the President might decide to close campus for a period of time,” they explained. “We would then come up with a plan for helping students disperse from the campus to their homes or perhaps be housed with local families.”

This evacuation procedure would be coordinated through the EOC, which would ensure that a variety of Stanford services were mobilized to assist the move.

“Parking and Transportation Services might be tasked with using their bus fleet to drive students to another location. Vaden staff might be tasked with treat[ing] the injured,” the officials said. “Residential and Dining Enterprises might be tasked with setting up tents and cots and feeding people.”