NEWS RELEASE
East Carolina University News Services
Contact: Donna Kain, kaind@ecu.edu, (252) 737-2705 or
Christopher Jackson, jacksonch@ecu.edu, (252) 328-5718
Event Date: May 28, 2014
_____________________
Fifth annual hurricane workshop to highlight preparation, resilience
GREENVILLE, N.C. (05/20/2014) – East Carolina University and the North Carolina Division
of Emergency Management are hosting a hurricane workshop, focusing on preparation and
resilience. The fifth annual event will be held 9 a.m.–3 p.m. May 28 in the Murphy Center at
ECU’s Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium.
The free workshop is open to anyone interested or involved in disaster mitigation related
primarily to hurricanes. In order to attend, registration must be completed at
https://terms.ncem.org/TRS/home.do.
The event will feature a 60th anniversary retrospective of Hurricane Hazel, the devastating storm
that slammed the North Carolina coast in 1954.
North Carolina Emergency Management Director Mike Sprayberry will lead the event,
beginning with an update on North Carolina’s Coastal Regional Evacuation and Sheltering plan.
Speakers from local, state, and national agencies, the media and academia will include:
 Jason Glazener, community planner with the Wilmington District US Army Corps of
Engineers, speaking about projects related to evacuation.
 Jamie Rhome, unit leader of the National Hurricane Center Storm Surge, demonstrating
hurricane forecasting improvement projects.
 Anuradha Mukherji, ECU assistant professor of geography, discussing results of her
recent research on building local resilience.
 John Cole, National Weather Service (NWS) Warning Coordination meteorologist at the
forecast office in Newport, and Steve Pfaff of NOAA and the NWS Storm Ready
Program, presenting the Hurricane Hazel retrospective, part of a series of events leading
up to the Oct. 15 anniversary of the storm.
 Skip Waters, chief meteorologist at WCTI, and Nate Johnson, meteorologist and
executive producer for WRAL, discussing the roles of traditional and social media in
forecasting and informing the public about weather hazards.
 John Dorman, director, and Ken Ashe, assistant director, of the North Carolina
Floodplain Mapping program highlighting impacts of the Biggert-Waters Flood
Insurance Reform Act of 2012.
Lunch will be provided to registered attendees.
The event is hosted by the N.C. Division of Emergency Management and ECU’s Center for
Natural Hazards Research, and co-sponsored by North Carolina Sea Grant.
For more information about the event, contact Donna Kain at kaind@ecu.edu, or Christopher
Jack at jacksonch@ecu.edu. For additional registration information, visit www.ecu.edu/hazards.
###