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Article Excerpt
Introduction
On January 7, 1994, the disabled tank barge Morris J. Berman ran aground a few hundred yards offshore of San Juan, Puerto Rico. The resulting 750,000-gallon (26,000 barrels) No. 6 fuel oil spill fouled several miles of prime beachfront during the height of the winter tourism season. The spill impacted and threatened historic properties dating from the pre-European contact period through the Spanish colonial era. Natural resources ranging from intercoastal biota to waterfowl and the nesting grounds of the green sea turtle were also impacted as a result of the Berman spill. More than 1,000 persons participated in the response and cleanup effort, incurring total costs in excess of $130 million (WQIS, 2001).
The Berman spill is noteworthy as the first major incident in U.S. coastal waters following passage of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90). A statutory provision passed in response to the disastrous aftermath of the 10.8 million-gallon 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill (Birkland, 1997; Federal On-Scene Coordinator [FOSC], 1993; Kurtz, 2004). The Berman spill tested many of the preparedness and response provisions incorporated in the OPA 90 policy mandate. Provisions that compelled the respective members of the spill response network to assume high-reliability organizational characteristics. The Berman incident provides an excellent case study for assessing whether these characteristics were indeed incorporated into the spill response network. And if yes, assess the ability of this incorporation to respond to the Berman spill and avoid the organizational foibles that plagued the Exxon Valdez response.
This article begins with a literature review of high-reliability organizational characteristics. Emphasis is given to those characteristics most applicable to the case study. Following this is a discussion of the key preparedness and response provisions contained in OPA 90. A linkage between these policy provisions and high-reliability characteristics is established. The article then assesses the implementation of these characteristics through the lenses of the Berman spill.
High-Reliability Characteristics
Organizational Networks
At the most basic level, high reliability is concerned about three things. First is the avoidance of error. With respect to oil tanker transportation this can be defined as spill prevention. Clearly in the case of the 1994 Berman spill this goal was not met. This analysis pointedly omits a detailed discussion of the prevention shortcomings associated with the 1994 incident, leaving this matter to a companion article. Also of importance--and a subject of close scrutiny in this article--is the concept of preparedness. While we can speak about preparedness as a discreet function limited to the internal workings of an organization, high reliability recognizes that the operation of today's critical infrastructure is not under the control of a single organization. Take for example waste and water supply management, telecommunications, the financial services industry, and electricity production. Much of the generation and supply of these critical operations occur across organizations. The barrel of crude oil that eventually ends up in the gas tank of the average American's car must first be transported through a variety of processes and hands. Opportunities for error and devastating system breakdown exist at each step in the process (Roberts, 1990). British Petroleum's 2005 Texas refinery disaster and subsequent 2006 massive 267,000-gallon oil pipeline leak on Alaska's North Slope are two recent examples (Associated Press, 2006; Loy, 2006; Mouwad, 2006). Increasingly, we are obligated to speak of organizational networks as the landscape in which high-reliability performance and preparedness must operate. These networks are tasked with inculcating high-reliability characteristics across organizations instead of within any one organization. This task is made increasingly difficult as networked operations become more complex (Chisholm, 1992; Kapucu & Van Wart, 2006; Perrow, 1999; Roe, Schulman, Van Eeten, & De Bruijne, 2005; Schulman, Roe, Van Eeten, & De Bruijne, 2004).
Training and Trust
One primary ingredient of a well-prepared high-reliability network is an emphasis on training. Robust training is a valuable asset in high-reliability networks. Training through crisis simulations provides opportunities to practice emergency operation skills. The response patterns and tendencies learned through training reappear during atypical situations. Training provides a valuable alternative for the trial-and-error methods often utilized during emergencies and crises (Crichton, Lauche, & Flin, 2005; Weik, 1987, pp. 113-114). Training provides opportunities for learning about the types of operational errors that may occur and the steps that can be taken to mitigate negative outcomes resulting from such errors. This in turn instills confidence among individuals. Perhaps, more importantly, training is instrumental for instilling trust across organizational networks. Networks are noteworthy for their divergence. Divergence of missions and goals, divergence of occupational specialties, conceptual skills, and institutional memory all act to inhibit trust. Regular training across organizational networks can act to break down the very diversity that inhibits trust. Training creates opportunities for face-to-face communication that otherwise may not occur. Such communication enhances bonds of trust across networks. These paths of communication can be reliably opened and utilized should a crisis situation come about (Kapucu & Van Wart, 2006; Roe et al., 2005; Weik, 1987, pp. 116-117).
Backup Resources
Beyond training, another key component of high-reliability preparedness and of particular relevance to oil spill response is the provision of backup resources. Referenced in the literature through such schemes as redundancy, duplication, slack, and overlap, these methods emphasize the need for adequate backup resources and their timely mobilization in the event of operational failure (Landau, 1969; Lerner, 1987; Rochlin, 1993; Weik, 1987). Postinvasion discussions over the U.S. failure to prearrange an appropriate mix of reserve troops and supplies necessary to keep the peace in Iraq provide an excellent example of how complicated this process may become. Ideally, the appropriate backup method and level of resources allocation are sufficiently worked out during the preparedness phase. If operational failure should then occur--say, for example, failure of a ship's primary power system--resources are already in place to step into the situation. The preplacement of backup resources, however, is not easily accomplished. Much of the literature on organizational efficiency and reinventing government connotes backup resources with inefficiency. Operations that duplicate and create redundancy are shunned as wasteful (Gore, 1993; Lerner, 1987, p. 335; Osborne & Gaebler, 1993). A tension is thereby created between the preparedness mandate to have reliable backup resources and the ability to demonstrate efficiency.
Organizational Structure
Finally, preparedness must wrestle with the matter...
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