Supporting EPA’s Emergency Response Efforts following Hurricane Harvey
CSS staff served as lead technical advisors on a multi-agency environmental response team after Hurricane Harvey.

Providing Field and IT Specialists to Address Hazardous Materials and Support Data Management

CSS staff served as lead technical advisors on a multi-agency environmental response team after Hurricane Harvey. Teams traveled by boat and over land to locate, evaluate, retrieve, and document orphan drums, vessels, and tanks holding five gallons or more of hazardous materials. Our field specialists conducted air monitoring at all locations, documenting activities with logbooks, iPads, and global positioning system (GPS) tools. We uploaded the resulting data to EPA’s data management systems. Once the retrieved orphan containers arrived at EPA’s staging area in Port Arthur, we sorted them by type and obtained a daily count of all collected items. CSS mobilized additional IT staff on site to support the data management performed by EPA, the US Coast Guard, and other responders. Our staff entered data into the main EPA databases from batches collected in the field by the response teams, then confirmed data quality and integrity using data collection tools and tailored database queries. Our IT specialist created “ad hoc” queries of the main EPA database to provide the Incident Command team with real-time information on the status of cleanup efforts. We also generated and distributed daily reports on the status of storm-related water, ground, vessel, and non-vessel pollution to EPA management and other stakeholders.
Additional Projects

Quick Response Guides for Emergency Response
CSS prepares tactical, field, and quick response guides used by EPA OSCs and other first responders to address a wide range of contaminants.

Onsite Analytical Support Following Hurricane Harvey
CSS helped EPA protect the communities affected by Hurricane Harvey from volatile and semi-volatile water contaminants.

Decontamination Field Tests for EPA
CSS staff helped design, plan for, and implement field tests of decontamination technologies and methods using MB for EPA’s Consequence Management Advisory Division.

Get in touch
Contact us to learn more about our projects, capabilities, solutions, and service offerings.