In late September, Hurricane Fiona moved across Atlantic Canada, toppling trees, tearing down power poles and leaving many without power. As hurricane season winds down and winter storm season approaches Maine, what threat might the next extreme weather event pose to Maine? And what level of preparedness does Maine have for these events?

James Wilson, South Portland’s fire chief and emergency management director, was recently featured on Maine Calling, discussing the city’s plans for extreme weather events. In this segment, he urged the city and residents alike to take the steps to prepare for flooding, loss of power and other emergency situations.

How South Portland is prepping for future risk

South Portland Fire Chief James Wilson recommends that every household plans ahead through the creation of an emergency preparedness plan for extreme weather events. Above, the ice storm of 1998.

South Portland has seen an uptick in power loss as a result of severe storms. The October storm of 2018, which caused significant damage to city power lines and resulted in a backlog and delay in repair time for the entire power system, is just one example of extreme weather events impacting our city. What is the city doing to prepare for future storms?

1.) South Portland’s emergency preparedness plan: The plan guides the preparation of an Emergency Operations Center in times of weather emergencies and incorporates on-call scheduling of all emergency personnel, including fire, police, and public works who can be deployed at immediate notice.

2.) One Climate Future: South Portland and Portland’s joint climate action plan forecasts the impact of future extreme weather scenarios and what both cities will do to adapt and mitigate further damage by building climate and community resilience. To learn more about One Climate Future, visit oneclimatefuture.org.

How you can prepare

Chief Wilson recommends that every household plans ahead through the creation of an emergency preparedness plan for extreme weather events. The city of South Portland has emergency preparedness plans available at southportland.org to help with preparation of what Chief Wilson called “bug out” or evacuation preparedness bags, safety plans for pets, evacuation routes and building and home design or retrofits to provide resilience in an extreme weather event.

To view emergency preparedness plans, visit www.southportland.org/departments/fire-emergency-management/.

Interested in learning more? Listen to the Maine Calling segment Chief Wilson was featured on at www.mainepublic.org. Click on Radio and scroll down to Maine Calling.

Our Sustainable City is a recurring column in the Sentry intended to provide residents with news and information about sustainability initiatives in South Portland. Follow the Sustainability Office on Instagram and Facebook @soposustainability.

Steve Genovese is a Greater Portland Council of Governments Resilience Corps fellow serving in the South Portland Sustainability Office on an 11-month term. He can be reached at sgenovese@southportland.org.