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patients require transportation and definitive care, but can wait longer than red tag patients. Green tag patients have only minor injuries and may not even need to go to the hospital, but should be followed up in clinics or doctor's offices, or can wait until the hospital returns to normal operations. Black tag patients are either dead or have sustained injuries that are not conducive to the continuation of life, even with immediate definitive hospital care. These patients will be the last to be transported. An effective triage system is the only way to prevent the unnecessary depletion of limited medical resources, including ambulances, emergency department space, paramedics, nurses, and physicians. Now we'll talk briefly about how mitigating the consequences of a disaster can benefit us all. Mitigation is defined as acting before a disaster strikes to permanently prevent the occurrence of a disaster or to reduce the effects of the disaster when it occurs. Floodplain ordinances, fire codes, land use permitting, and hazard mitigation buyouts are all examples of mitigation practices. Floodplain ordinances and mapping identify areas prone to flooding and restrict the building of structures within those areas. Fire codes have a wide range of applications from requiring sprinklers to regulating hazardous materials. Land use permitting can prevent the co-location of potentially hazardous industries with residential areas. Hazard mitigation buyout projects, which reduce recurrent flood risks, have been used extensively since Hurricane Floyd. Thousands of flooded homes are being purchased, moved, or destroyed, and the land reverted back to its natural state. Changing storage methods can be applied to both interior and exterior storage. This includes practices such as storing oxidizers away from combustibles, blasting caps away from explosives, and limiting ammonium nitrates to a pile ten feet by four feet by eight feet with a separation of eight feet between piles to prevent spontaneous detonation. Hardening of structures include such actions as adding checkpoints in security, upgrading to shatter proof or bullet proof glass, retrofitting with fireproof roofs and materials, installing generators, and extending the perimeter by moving parking away from facilities. Reducing the attractiveness of potential targets may be accomplished by changing hazardous materials storage practices, the hardening of structures, good planning, increased visibility of security, and the use of media to educate the public on restrictions at events (i.e., no book bags allowed). Orange County received a planning grant from the State Emergency Management Office to study some issues in the region. The first issue is do we have the ability and resources to evacuate an entire county or large portion thereof as a result of an extraordinary event? This question was raised by the Orange County Board of Commissioners upon realizing that existing Shearon Harris disaster plans only address evacuation of a ten-mile radius around the site, and that no countywide evacuation plans exist to address any type of disaster. The second issue was raised because of the anthrax mailings last fall and planning meetings with public health officials. The issue is, dealing with infectious agents, do we have the ability, authority, and resources to quickly quarantine an entire county or portion thereof? Orange County will coordinate a regional hazard vulnerability assessment and facilitate the entire study for the participating counties—Alamance, Chatham, Durham, Guilford, Johnston, Orange, and Wake. This initial study is being conducted through the emergency management agencies and will result in a published report for local and state governments. Thank you for your attention tonight. Nick has a few closing remarks. Nick Waters: I hope you found some of that useful in your own planning and review of your plans. The testing of the assumptions is a very crucial part—that is something we must do. We must look closely at our daily obligations. Too many times we commit to doing things and agree to take on fundamental tasks and emergency planning and not consider the fact that our daily workload may prevent us from doing a good job of that. The example of the fire department—they are trained, they are willing, they are equipped, and they will do decontamination unless they are committed to a major fire or some other major incident. The other point I want to review with you is the psychological effect. Too long, psychology of