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The University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo and Hawaiʻi Community College will be participating in the Great ShakeOut on October 15. Millions of people worldwide will practice how to drop, cover and hold on at 10:15 a.m. on October 15, during Great ShakeOut Earthquake Drills.

“While we do not expect everyone to ‘drop, cover and hold on,’ we hope that you will take this opportunity to become aware of what to do should an earthquake occur during university classes or activities,” says Ken Ikeda, environmental safety specialist at UH Hilo.

Get involved

Members of the UH community can sign up online to receive UH alert text messages on cell phones.

As a part of emergency planning and preparedness, UH Hilo and Hawaiʻi CC will be utilizing various means of emergency communications to inform the university community of the drill. At 10:15 a.m. on October 15, a UH alert test message will be sent out and the emergency notification system will be activated via synchronous clocks in classrooms and common areas. The LED clock bars will scroll the message across the screen and make an audible announcement.

Hawaiʻi Community College will also utilize the emergency features of “blue light” phones to announce the drill.

“While we understand that this may be a temporary inconvenience, we hope that the activation of our emergency communication systems for a short period of time will allow people to become familiar with the university’s ability to provide timely notification in the event of emergency,” says Ikeda. “In addition we hope that participation in the Great ShakeOut will raise awareness to the potential hazards of earthquakes in Hawaiʻi.”

For more information on the Great ShakeOut and the UH Hilo emergency operations plan, go to the UH Hilo Stories article.

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