FLOOD04959

• County: Garfield
• Community: Rifle
• Stream Name: Rifle Creek
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Title: City of Rifle Flood Hazard Mitigation Plan - The May 15, 1993 Flood
• Date: 9/1/1993
• Prepared For: Rifle
• Prepared By: Rifle, Colorado Office of Emergency Management
• Floodplain - Doc Type: Flood Mitigation/Flood Warning/Watershed Restoration

Lessons Learned

The response was handled remarkably well.
One reason is the level of preparedness main-
tained by local officials. Garfield County con-
ducted a table-top Flood/Dam Break Exercise on
February 5th, which was followed on April 8th
by a Functional Exercise, hosted by the City of
Rifle. The Functional Exercise involved re-
sponse to a severe flooding situation, including
the actual evacuation of three schools in town.
The exercise gave the people involved a 'much
better sense of what their role would be during

City of Rifle Emergency Operations Center

an actual emergency. Additionally, the Depart-
ment of Local Affairs hosted a Flood Aware-
ness/Preparedness Public Officials Conference
on the 15th. of April, which was attended by Rifle
City officials, The conference helped attendees
focus on flood related issues and concerns. Some
other factors which contributed greatly to the
response effort were the friendly working rela-
tionship between the different agencies involved
(primarily the Rifle Police Department and the
Rifle Fire Protection District) and the use of the

City of Rifle FWod Hazard Mitigation Plan

Incident Command System. These two factors
helped eliminate the types of "turf battles" that
can be so prevalent during a crisis.

City and Rifle Fire Protection District officials
have identified areas of the response they would
like to improve. The City of Rifle's Emergency
Operations Center (EOC) is inappropriate. Dur-
ing the initial stages of the emergency the EOC
was located in the Dispatch Center in Rifle City
Hall. This quickly became cramped and noisy.
Calls from the press were being fielded with
emergency calls, contributing to a heightened
state of confusion. It was quickly decided to
move the EOC to a conference room in City Hall.
However, there were no phones in the room so
phones had to be routed through the ceiling pan-
els from adjoining offices during the actual emer-
gency. The City Hall location itself is less than
desirable because of the possibility of inundation
in an extremely severe flood event (such as the
failure of Rifle Gap Dam) and its proximity to the
Rio Grande Railroad line and Interstate 70. If

Truck. Washed Down Rifle Creek

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