CIMA Research Foundation has recently decided to name the situation room in professor Franco Siccardi’s honor, president emeritus of the Foundation. The room carries out more than one function: it was born in 2001 as a prototype of the regional operating rooms and, especially in the early years, had the aim of forming experts that did not exist before. Today these professional figures are part of the staff working in functional areas and in the operational rooms of the Civil Protection Department (DPC).
But today it is no longer just this: operating 365 days a year, it carries out direct support for the DPC and it is also a real laboratory where are tested the application tools and procedures developed by CIMA Research Foundation. If these instruments pass the tests are implemented in the regional operating rooms and in the decentralized functional areas of the Civil Protection.
But there is more: thanks to the Situations Room international projects are carried out. In fact it is possible to obtain direct connections with the hydro-meteorological services of many foreign countries using tools developed by the Foundation. Thanks to this capacity, CIMA Foundation has been able to put themselves at the service of other foreign countries such as, for example, Venezuela, Bolivia, Albania, some Caricom states (Caribbean Community), Lebanon, Serbia. Moreover CIMA uses the professionalism and experience in forecasting and risk management by increasing capacity-building activities to organize intensive courses both at home and in beneficiary countries. With the Caricom countries, a support service for local warning activity was also carried out during the hurricane season.
Finally, the Situations Room supports the legal area of CIMA Research Foundation monitoring and managing event reports, summary information sheets on the effects on the ground caused by hydro-meteorological events that produce victims. The contact person responsible for CIMA Research Foundation area is informed through an accurate documentation while, automatically, the judiciary opens a procedure of inquiry towards the actors involved.
