Healthcare Facilities Network
The Healthcare Facilities Network podcast highlights the essential role of facilities
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Healthcare Facilities Network
Healthcare Facilities Storm Prep & Management Master Class
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Winter isn’t slowing down, and neither can healthcare facilities. In this episode, Paul Cantrell brings his 40+ years of experience managing extreme weather to the table, from blizzards on the Massachusetts coast to hurricanes across the Mediterranean.
We dive into practical strategies for storm preparation, in the moment management, and post-storm follow-up, which is an often overlooked but critical step for passing knowledge to the next generation of healthcare FM leaders.
Whether you’re dealing with snow, ice, thunderstorms, or hurricanes, Paul shares real-world lessons and actionable best practices to keep your facility safe, operational, and resilient.
This is not theory. It is field-tested guidance for anyone responsible for facilities operations, emergency preparedness, or leadership in healthcare environments. Equip yourself to manage severe weather confidently and strengthen your organization’s storm readiness.
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Opening And Mission Of The Network
SPEAKER_03I would actually conduct it with my staff and certainly in environmental services. Those are the post people that are uh have probably the the most uh contact direct contact with it, and write down. Um ask their opinions. You know, what what could we have done better? Build it into your uh plans uh uh for the next time. Um and then anything that actually uh was damaged or needs repair um or near misses, use this opportunity to go to leadership and say, this I need capital funds to go ahead and do this. They you have their ear at this time, and this will be documented. And make sure that it's documented inside um your environment and care um uh meetings.
SPEAKER_01I like that point that you have their ear during this point, maybe in a way that you don't get it in other times and locations.
SPEAKER_03Right. And so take the make sure that you actually advocate for yourself for whatever improvements need to be made so it doesn't happen again.
SPEAKER_00There's a major crisis facing healthcare facilities management. We have aging employees, aging buildings, and aging infrastructure.
Introducing Paul And The Winter Challenge
SPEAKER_01We've created the healthcare facilities network, a content network designed specifically to help solve for these three pressing issues in healthcare facilities management. We bring on thought leaders and experts from across healthcare facilities management, all the way from the C suite to the technician level, because at the end of the day, we're all invested in solving the aging issue. Thanks for tuning in. Look at our videos, and you will find that is a theme across our country. This is the Healthcare Facilities Network. I'm your host, Peter Mike. I would like to welcome my guest, Paul Kentrell, to the show. Paul, welcome. Thank you. Winter weather has had a really big impact across the country. And Paul and I were actually out to lunch, and we were talking, and Paul, as a former vice president of facilities and planning, design, construction, as a chief engineer in the maritime world where he traveled the ocean before he transferred over to healthcare facilities management. Paul and I were talking about this, and Paul's entire career really is based on preparation, anticipating the unknown, being ready for whatever comes your way. So as we were talking, I said to Paul, wouldn't it be great to do an episode, you know, 15 to 20 minutes in length, where we just talk about being prepared for whatever the weather throws your way. We've got a lot of weather coming our way. And we also know, right, Paul, we also know that as the healthcare facilities management industry continues to struggle with bringing in people who have worked in hospitals and who have worked in healthcare, one of the big risks they have is not only the environment of care and joint commission, but also handling winter weather. And Paul is a great guest to have on. As I said, he has retired, but he's still doing consulting, still working in the world. So, Paul, thanks for joining. Uh, before we hop into the topic of being storm ready, preparing for ice, snow, winter weather, anything to add to my little inelegant introduction there?
Framing The Plan: Pre, During, Post
SPEAKER_03No, hopefully that the the only thing that this would do is would um uh bring a sense of awareness to you know what potentially are the risks. And most of our discussion happened to be that it's probably not to the people of New England or uh northern uh United States, it's it's to the people that are unfamiliar with what this is because it'll catch you by surprise. Um it's not things that you normally prepare yourself for. Normally it's the high temperatures that you the people down south actually have at a battle and you know uh we're wear whacked with you know sub-zero uh temperatures occasionally, and it will bite you in the in in the in the rear. Um and if we can just kind of point things out, a couple of little tidbits to maybe that you might be able to take away, it'd be great. But these are things that you may not have thought about before. We all have had uh emergency preparedness and incident command uh drills through the um uh through your years, but this is a little bit different. It's it's different than handling it under uh, you know, uh having a paper drill. And this is this is more like maybe like uh putting it on a checklist for yourself, just to say, let's think, just think of and walk it through.
Pre-Event Priorities: Power And Staff
SPEAKER_01You know, as Paul and I were talking about this, because we could really go in so many different directions, all to do is to segregate it into like three parts of the conversation. You know that ice and snow is coming, you know that winter weather is coming. So what do you do pre-event? How do you prepare? And then once we're through the pre-event, the storm is occurring, what do you do during the event? What can you do? How do you react? How do you uh manage your building? And then what's sometimes forgotten is post-event. So what do you do once the event is passed? Maybe your sub-zero temperatures are here, but you're left with two feet of snow on the ground, even though the sky is blue. So we want to look at pre, we want to look at during, and we want to look at post. And I'll object to one thing Paul said there. Paul said that um this might be for people who uh who are just learning the world. But I'll say too, Paul, I think that just even as a nice refresher, like folks who have years of experience, you got 30 years of experience. Sometimes it's always nice though to pick up what's somebody else doing or what what can I miss? So I would, I would say, and it's the TV producer in me. Uh I would say that I think there's there'd be nuggets to learn for anybody, even if you've been doing it for 30 years, or even just to confirm, you know what, that's what I am doing. I'm in good shape. So with that said, Paul, I won't contradict you any other time during this conversation. Let's look, uh, let's look pre-event, please. Ice and snow readiness. What should a director of FM, a manager of FM, what should a facilities management department be doing when they know inclement weather in the form of snow and ice is on the way?
Protecting Pipes, Vestibules, And Heat Trace
Loading Docks, Space Heaters, And Policy
SPEAKER_03Well, um, I think first of all, you you want to make sure that you're um I you've identified and thought it through as far as the what are my biggest risks? One, freeze. Two, power stability. Um and three, I I would think is uh staff availability. Where's my support gonna come from? So let's just uh take power um just to start with. Obviously, because of you know uh regulations and uh I know that you're conforming to them, which is making sure that your generators are actually run in top tip top shape, they may they've been maintained, um, and the fuel quality is is there in that you've already um maintained your 96-hour requirement. But if you know that this is coming, you know that it would if you need to start you to use your generators, you're going to start to consume it. Well, you already have you've been tipped off uh you know a few days beforehand. Go ahead and actually top off your tanks, even though it's going to give you more than the 96 hours. It's just a good thing to go ahead and top it off. I would also recommend is make sure that you have identified where are my substations, what substations feed this hospital. Um, every hospital you know has you know uh two lines that should be coming in. Take a look down there. Make you know, uh take a drive or a walkthrough uh down where the the lines pass. Be observant, see you know, uh have the the lines been cleared away from the power lines, you know, from uh uh tree branches. Where is my risk? Um know you know know uh where this comes from. Um and then because one of the things is you know that whether it's you know a snowstorm, an ice storm, or a hurricane or whatever, it uh just a very bad um storm altogether, with somebody driving in uh I don't know how low, you know, uh how local you may be to, let's say, a mall. Well, there's an awful lot of people going up and down the street, they can be hitting poles. That's where you know, instability. Where's my risk? Understand that. But also certainly when it comes to you know um ice storms, one of the biggest things is that you've got lines or trees that limbs that fall down and you know uh create a quick short. Um it may be better to consider um and have this discussion with leadership beforehand and say, if it gets bad and it gets in, you know, um a little brownout here, another little brownout, um, because what those brownouts do is they send uh bad voltages through your building and they can affect all of your electronics. Uh one of the things to consider is I will take all of my emergency loads and transfer them over to my emergency generator. If your your system um the electrical system uh becomes a little bit too unstable. Consider that. Um then there's you know heating, water, and life safety. Where's the biggest risks uh in um in those systems? Well, obviously you sprinkle the electrical system. Usually that's the one that actually uh catches you by surprise. Why? It's because water, it's standing water, it's untreated water that is sitting in your pipes. And if your particular area hasn't been exposed to you know these severe uh cold weather patterns, you might be a little bit at more at risk, especially with the age of some of the pipings and in all of the older uh community hospitals. What's above the ceiling? Uh, where would that be? In the vestibules. Vestibules between your first first set of doors and your second set of doors. Even though there may be a little bit of heat there, there may be no means of heat getting up above your ceiling. So you may want to consider uh taking out a little a small panel here or a small panel over there so that there is heat going through that vestibule uh to get up to the ceiling because it that vestibule comes out, projects out of the building. So you have the two sides and you have um uh the temperature that's being exposed from the top as well. And there may be, and usually, like what happens in a vestibule, they'll have metal ceilings and uh metal panels, and that is actually insulated. Well, that's great. The problem happens to be is you have a a void area of two feet all the way across uh to an exposed area. So make sure that you you know take that into consideration. Um think about your heat tracing systems. Is that turn are they turned on in whatever areas that you may have it? Or you know, let's say a you know condensate return line or um even just a an eye wash uh uh station line that uh you need to feed. Remember what it is that is most at risk is it's untreated, non-moving water. If it's moving, just even if it's a little bit, um it's less likely to go ahead and freeze. Uh another major area to be looking at is uh loading docks. Um make sure that the you know the heating system works in your loading docks and have the have the discussion you know with um the people in materials management as well as security to say make sure that those doors are only open long enough to uh to receive whatever items that need to be. Um it it still happens, occasionally they'll forget about it, and they'll walk into the other space and forget that the door is actually open. Um because uh uh I think everybody's you know uh materials or uh supply area, it's very similar. It has usually a space or debarcation area, and then um you can go back into your main storage areas. Think about uh um what you have access to as far as space heaters, temporary space heaters, but make sure that they're of the uh hospital grades. They're not that you know that effective, but um you have to you know make sure that you know from uh a fire perspective um that you're not introducing another uh potential problem.
SPEAKER_01We know, especially in office spaces, people are always bringing in their heaters. Maybe they put them down at their feet, they plug them in, maybe they've daisy chained all these cores together to get their heat. You're a new director, you you're you're somebody who's coming in and you're walking around your space and you see these things. What should they look at? They being the new director, because there's got to be a proliferation of heating sources now, what should they be looking at to understand or to know if it's even allowable in a healthcare space?
SPEAKER_03It should actually already be in their uh policies and procedures within the hospital because this these are things that are actually inspected for by Joint Commission and and uh DNV. Uh those are very unsafe. In fact, you know, it's it's been a progression over the years that you would kind of walk through and you'd find out that, hey, you know, uh materials management ended up getting them something, or yeah, even in your own, even in their own facility staff that they came in and they gave them gave them heaters. And it was like, where the heck did this come from? Oh well it came from your facility staff. It was like in the facility staff, if they're not properly trained, um uh they're doing it for the right reason to provide comfort, because I um if you had 10 people in one room, there's gonna be different uh varying uh uh uh answers to what my comfort level is. Yeah, we all know that, we've all seen it. We're just like, wait a minute, it's still 70 degrees, but at that 70 degrees, I may not be satisfied. Um so we know that that that happens, and it it's all trying to be done for the right reasons, but you have to actually confiscate them. You cannot allow that to happen. These things slowly uh you know uh come into play when there is a problem in the you know with the you know the uh their systems or a weakness to the air handlers, let the air handlers that are in there or whatever. That's how they usually infiltrate over the years. Uh the thing is that you start have to start to go through and um look for them and then confiscate them. And be you just just say that you're enforcing the you know your own policies. Yeah, because every hospital, every hospital has that built into their policies. The thing is, it's whether or not you're actually instituting it. But the problem happens to be is that okay, I'm taking them. And sometimes the facility staff give them so that they don't have to you know answer the nuisance calls. Well, yeah, you're gonna take those away. You now have to have that in your back of your mind, and you should be putting it onto some sort of paper. This is where I found it. This is where I found more than one. I maybe you might have been, you know, um trying to address you know, um uh lack of capacity. Who knows? Um, but you're gonna have to have a follow-up to it and then actually you know create an action plan for it.
BAS Freestats, Coils, And Exposed Lines
SPEAKER_01I like the word infiltrate. They infiltrate over time. Two other questions before we kind of move away from the preparation. Suppose, Paul, that somebody just heard what you said, which is all really good, you know, your electricity, your lines, your tracing, your um your uh, you know, your plumbing lines and all. But suppose somebody's like, I don't even because we know this, right? That there's not not every organization as good as built, not every organization has plans, not every person who's thrown into this director role even knows where they should look. Any advice for that person?
Roof Loads, Snow Removal, And Safety
Contractor Support And 24-7 Coverage
SPEAKER_03One of the things, even though we're you know you're using the equipment all the time, which is your air air units, you've got to also make sure that you've gone through, you know, you're building automation system and made sure that all of your freestats uh are fully functional. Now, sometimes people uh in your own staff will have uh uh gone through and turned off a freestat because they were trying to get past and and handle the situation. Well, the problem happens to be is if you go through an event like this, you're gonna be waiting you're gonna be you know coming back to work when everything starts to thaw out, and there's gonna you're gonna need to replace coils within the AC units, within uh a good percentage of your AC units. And they will they will go and they will go fast, especially if they're untreated. No, in other words, untreated being no glycol um you know in your system. So uh be very aware of that. Make sure that you've taken the time to look at um all of the air handling units. Um try to understand, try to think about your building and say, okay, how is this constructed? Do I have any exposed pipes that is outside, including insulated pipes? People have walked on insulated pipes um and cut back uh insulation to get to something and not gone back and appropriately, you know, um fixed that line. Make sure that you've actually inspected it, but those are on the outside. Think about lines that are actually on the outside of the building, but on the inside, so uh but on the outside wall. Okay. But on the inside within the wall, but where they may have, you know, run a sink and put in a new sink. Well, that area right there, you know, but let's say behind the sink, where they had you know brought these lines up, uh, is the hot and cold water. Think about what needs to be done there. I don't know how much exposure it is, but try to consider it. Most lines are usually brought up on the you know within the inner wall so that they're protected. And one of the things that you could do is if you had to, is you you just open up the valves of the hot and the cold water and you just a slight uh movement or um a very small stream of water coming out of uh uh you know both the hot and the cold. Um same thing for you know whether it's a toilet or um uh an eye wash station, consider it, you know, especially let's say in the in the your um uh mechanical rooms. You've got an eye wash station, nothing's moving, and um it's in my mechanical room, which I have these big you know open vents to go ahead and supply the air into uh my equipment to help cool. Um, do I need to pull back my my dampers so that there's a little bit less coming into the uh mechanical room? Uh also check the you know fire pump room. Um that's a mechanical space by uh by itself. What how is that set up? Is this open to outside air? Is there gonna be anything you know running? Uh where's my sensor lines? Um make sure you've checked those. Another thing to consider is when it snows, it's gonna end up on the roof. One thing that a lot of people do uh take for granted is that our roofs are built strong enough to go ahead and hold hold the load. Now you may go through and you say, Oh yeah, well, we've never had a problem. Okay, well, the only thing that you usually think of is maybe, you know, where's my leaks? One of the things that you have to take, you know, you've got to consider is how much of a load is it gonna be? Because it could be, you know, it snows, and then after the snow, it ends up with a you know uh a slight you know uh rainstorm, and then it goes back into a deep freeze. Well, all that water didn't drain, it actually just compacted that snow, then it froze. Now it's gonna end up with say with another you know, uh following you know uh system that comes in and snows again. How much of a uh a load is my roof going to be able to withstand? Be aware of that. Um, you may end up getting to a point where you have to, and this is gonna sound weird. I mean, I know that when I came into the healthcare world, you know, 20 plus years ago, um, I was like, you Us to shovel off a roof. Um I'd never had to be exposed to that, but yeah, uh you may have to we've actually been it, uh we've actually done it with snow, we've had snowblowers, but you have to have the type of the right type of roof in order to have a snowblower up there. Uh you have to know which roofs to do it. You have to have safety equipment up on the roof to you know for your staff. Um, and then you have to have full knowledge of where it is that I'm gonna throw this, whether it's that or whether it's you know, throwing uh snow off of a parking garage. Where am I putting it? I can't do it over an opening, I can't do it over a walkway. I have to make sure that there is not going to be any personnel below there um when you throw it out. So um, and then before the storm, you actually make sure that you end up putting up uh um some enough de-icing, uh, you know, so let's say um uh ice melt to be able to go ahead and get out to um a rooftop you know air handling unit. Have a shovel, have a bucket, you know. Here's my extra ice melt, so I can go ahead out there in the middle of the storm. Because you know as well as I do, you know uh these things don't go down in the middle of you know uh fine weather. It's always in the worst of weather, whether it's the the peak of the heat or it's the it's the uh uh most severe, you know, um lower temperatures. Make sure that you're planning for 24-7 coverage, but that also means for somebody, you know, our hospitals that don't have um that have limited staff, reach out to uh your contractors. Consider having discussions with them to say, I need to have other people here. I need somebody that number one is going to know your your HVAC. How these are the people that are gonna be, you know, more than likely are going to have to respond with intelligence of those types of systems. So you have to have an electrical, somebody that knows your electrical system and somebody that's at uh uh knows your HVAC and building automation system. Make sure that you've you know done that beforehand. Um and then make sure that you have uh the appropriate PPE you know for your staff or who's whoever's you know covering this. Um during it, during the event, obviously, you know, you're you're launching your uh electrical, um, and then if you have brown, you know, you uh uh the brownouts are a little bit too, or brownouts or blackouts, whether it's flipping on or flipping off, um consider, truly consider putting um your system, uh all of your emergency system on emergency generators. Um it has help certainly helped me through the years uh of some severe storms.
SPEAKER_01If you like this video, please like and subscribe to the network. And more importantly, share it with your colleagues in the healthcare industry. Together, we can solve the aging crisis that's impacting all of us. Was it the severity of the storm? How did you judge whether or not to flip it over or not? Was there a threshold for you?
During-Event: Brownouts And Generator Strategy
Intakes, Filters, Drifts, And Walkthroughs
SPEAKER_03If it held if it, you know, if there was a cup a couple just in in in an hour where we ended up going through these brownouts, and one of the reasons why, it's because usually that you have the brownouts because uh a branch has gone down on your your supply lines, a branch has gone down and crossed two phases, right? And with that, even though you have protections within your system, and you have protections that are out there at your substations, there's still a bit of that charge that goes through. And I've watched it. I mean, we've done a number of repairs over the years that you end up getting whacked, but certainly with the sophistication of all of the air handler units and the building automation system that we have, and uh all the electronics that we have maintaining um all of our systems, whether they're chillers, whether they're uh the control panels for you know your boilers, or all of the controls that are outside in your system, they get whacked and you end up losing a number of different pieces of equipment. And you know, you would say, Well, how did that happen? Well, they become so uh irregular in failure, because it's it could be anywhere within within the context of the hospital. Um, and because your your safeties, which are breakers or the safeties with within the utility company, don't re don't react fast enough, you get that spike through your system. So I would actually make sure that uh during the event, make sure that you uh obtain knowledge of where we're at, where you are at with drifts, the height of the snow, um, where the wind is coming from, and where it's blowing to, because you've got air handlers on the roof, you've got air handler intakes on the side, you know, sides of the your, whether it's the hospital or clinics or whatever it is that you're you're uh you're at, or um they could be freestanding beside the hospital. Um and make sure that when you're looking at those things, don't forget about your emergency generator. And the reason why is number one, uh what's the infiltration of uh the snow going in? If it's to the air handling units, the biggest risk is going to end up being two things. One is a potential freezing uh of uh your coils, second is that your intake filters get completely soaked and plugged. Um and once they get uh um wet, uh, which does not normally happen, um if you're not monitoring it, it can it can freeze up on you. So be aware of where you're at and people make sure that people are actually uh continuing to monitor uh their equipment, certainly taking walkthroughs through the mechanical spaces, um you know, around where the vestibules are, around the loading docks and uh where uh and construction sites, because construction sites you kind of forget about it. I've been out of that's uh that construction site for the last month and a half, and it's still closed off. No, well, somebody better be getting in there because uh every single system that's over there is dead. It's in other words, it's not moving within pipe. And then make sure that there's plenty of communication back and forth to incident command. Uh but to a lot of manipulations during this time uh in and manual overrides could occur during these these events. Make sure that anything that is manually overridden, whether it's physically out in the plant or fit or um electronically within the controls, make sure that there's a log. And there's there's a few reasons why. Number one is you have to put it back into your normal state of what it was before you went into this. Number two is there should be an action plan that somebody says, okay, why did we have to do this? Let's find out what the root cause of this is, and so make a long-term plan for to go back so we don't have to do that, or somebody wouldn't have to do that in the next time. And this should be that your system should all be in the ready state at 24 hours a day. And so everybody fit you know believes that it is. But if you went over there and you made an adjustment and without logging it down anywhere, and the next person that comes in to try to troubleshoot it, well, I didn't realize it, but somebody closed down on the you know uh one of the valves or uh put a limit on it or overrid it. Um it's a it's a it's a terrible way to work. So make sure that you end up you know logging those down. And the first thing is is when you're coming out of this, because the biggest risk is gonna end up being not that you got through the temperature, because the following day, that following morning, hey, guess what? The sun's coming up, it's bright, bright out, and it's gonna end up being 45 degrees. Oh, from uh uh, you know, from you know five degrees uh above zero, um, it goes to a 45 or a 55 degree day. It's happened here, it's happened in New England. Guess what? The surprises are going to come, the things that you didn't account for. Well, it was this it was the sprinkler line that was uh it was the last elbow in the it was the last place, last sprinkler had it in the line was down in the corner of a building and it was above the ceiling. Well, it's been there for you know 25 years, and then you uh in this storm, it ended up blowing. That's what's gonna happen. That's when it's gonna happen. Be prepared for that. Um, continue monitoring it. Don't take it for granted, especially if it's even uh coming into a weekend, have personnel there so that you're actually helping support, be able to uh react to it.
SPEAKER_01I was thinking, you know, just thinking back as a weather nerd, what was it like 2023? Was it three years ago when we got like where it went down to like 15 below, 20 below on a weekend? And remember, you heard the reports of sprinklers busting everywhere.
SPEAKER_03Oh, I was in it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, right. I was gonna say, were you on site that weekend for most of it?
Overrides, Logging, And Rapid Thaw Risks
SPEAKER_03Uh well, one of the hospitals that I was uh um I oversaw um was an old, it was actually some of the things that I'm even speaking about right now here was the uh the community-based hospital that we had, you know, uh was a member of our system, had blown a leak, uh blown a pipe. Uh it actually was actually what I was just speaking to, which was uh a line that was uh in the corner of a building with uh three sides that were exposed, which being uh left, right, and above in a void space that had been there. I mean, the piping had never changed, uh, but uh just got to it in the right place uh right place um and got cold enough to go ahead and freeze. Well, so I was already down there. Well, what one of the things that you don't want to forget about are the other outbuildings, the clinics, you know, the ground shops, the security buildings, um as you go through. One of the things that because you are man 24-7 here at the hospital, you're not um over there, and maybe not as uh your staff may not be, I guess, educated as to what the systems are and you know where the lines go. Um it's difficult, but make sure that you're thinking about whatever it is that you're setting up for protections at the hospital, that you've set them up over there as well and continue to be monitored.
SPEAKER_01Especially on a weekend where those outbuildings aren't probably in use, and you've always got people in the hospital, but not out there.
SPEAKER_03Right. Um and then coming out of it, um, you know, you certainly gotta go through all of the you still have to go through, you know, all of your mechanical rooms, making sure that we're gonna be able to do that.
SPEAKER_01Um we're talking post-event here.
SPEAKER_03Stormboard coming out. Okay. Um you've got to make sure that you've you document um you know all of your near misses. Um what were the temporary repairs that you did that you give a log of?
SPEAKER_01Can you give an example of like a near miss you would chronicle?
Outbuildings, Clinics, And Weekend Exposure
SPEAKER_03You could have gone out there and there could have been a you know uh a drift that was actually occurring just outside of the emergency generator, and it actually gone up to the inside uh uh to above the height of your um emergency generator intake, air intake. It's like, whoa, you know, we've got to clear clear that away. It almost happened. Nothing shut down because of it, or nothing exploded because of it. Um, another thing would be uh on another corner of a building, we had a gas heater, uh, a gas hot water heater, and it had okay, gas hot water heater, you have an intake and exhaust. Um it was under where the intake and exhaust were, happened to be in a particular point around the building where the because of the direction of what the wind was, it came around the end of the building, swirled by that where that swirl occurred that happened to be on a corner of this particular building, and within that inverted corner, you had the intake and exhaust from the units. Where's the pipes? The pipes were under uh probably another uh foot and a half, we were under another foot and a half of um snow above the uh intake and exhaust from the uh gas hot water heater. Um so we dug that out. And actually, as it turned out, luckily, um uh that what it had done, it hadn't kicked itself off yet. Uh most of them, uh certainly all the newer ones, they they will have safeties to go ahead and um shut itself off. Um but those are something else. That's another near mess, okay, to make sure that that makes it onto your list of what my what my rounds are, make sure that that you know doesn't happen again.
SPEAKER_01You know, when you're out walking around, obviously if you got a lot of snow, sometimes you can always do this. But relative to the exterior of the building envelope and your your hardscapes, your parking lots, your walkways, you know, everything that leads up, what should you do post-storm? I mean, I imagine at a minimum you're out there checking things out, make sure you don't have buckles, potholes that are developed. But what what should you be doing? What should you be focusing on exterior of the building?
Post-Event Debrief And Near Misses
SPEAKER_03Uh I didn't really go into any of the you know um what's the parking lots or anything else because all right, that's a whole different ball game. Um and you know, I would limit, I would have limited um what my parking availability was going to end up being, so that you can maximize and clearing it um and getting almost everything that you can off. Obviously, be prior to the you know um um to the to the event, you need to go ahead and get in and just in and uh dispense with um putting out all of your you know ice melt, uh snow melt, sand, um, shovels in the appropriate at just about every single entrance or exit. Or I if you can limit the entrance, you know, uh the open entrances uh to both staff and uh patients and visitors. Um prior to the event and during the event, prior to the event, outside on the in the parking lots, certainly, you know, every single campus is has different undulations, right? Well, one of the one of the biggest surprises that uh one of the biggest things that could potentially happen is around the loading dock and uh the trash dispenser area, out those both are out on the uh out on the pavement. Well, you have main drains that are outside of the building. Well, certainly with trash, debris, winds, you know, that could all be swirled up, could get wet, and end up on the parking lot uh itself. That could make its way over to the drains. That drain, you could find yourself, depending upon what your you know, uh your grade, your the grades are uh around your facility, um, you could end up waiting out there trying to get to it because enough trash came out of the dumpsters uh or was not properly picked up beforehand, and around the grading itself, it's now plugged it, plugged, and now everything is melting. Great point. So uh don't forget to make sure that you have checked all of those.
SPEAKER_01Sounds like you speak from a little bit of experience with that one.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Um so obviously going back to uh you know, coming out of it, um you uh put everything back uh uh back to normal, um, you know, conduct a uh debrief. I would actually conduct it with my staff and certainly in environmental services, those are the people that are uh have probably the the most uh contact, direct contact with it, and write down. Um ask their opinions. You know, what what could we have done better? Build it into your uh plans uh uh for the next time. Um and then anything that actually uh was damaged or needs repair um or near misses, use this opportunity to go to leadership and say, this I need capital funds to go ahead and do this. They you have their ear at this time, and this will be documented. And make sure that it's documented inside um your environment and care um uh meetings.
Drains, Parking, And Access Management
SPEAKER_01I like that point that you have their ear during this point, maybe in a way that you don't get it in other times and locations.
SPEAKER_03Right. And so take the make sure that you actually advocate for yourself for whatever improvements need to be made so it doesn't happen again.
SPEAKER_01Where did you like to be? Where did you like to stay? How visible were you during it?
SPEAKER_03Oh, uh depend it depends upon uh which how bad the storm was. I mean, if it was an ice storm, um I'm I've planted myself right there in the uh you know uh um facility operations uh room, going through the building up uh uh building automation system, ended up going through and you know, performing um you know, inspections or uh, you know, uh on the campus uh with snow removal, uh checking out um things out on the roof, um helping document whatever I needed to do. Uh but then I actually was in uh charge of multiple hospitals, and I was actually going from campus to campus. Um and uh I might take a walk through, uh certainly go down through um the main control room, and then you know go through whatever you know they might have been might have found uh and found out what their difficulties were, and then take a quick through some of the hot spots in within each of the you know within each of the hospitals and then drive to another hospital uh to see how that one's doing. Um yeah.
SPEAKER_01So it sounds like throughout whatever phase you're at, the importance of documentation and not just kind of moving through this thing problem solving, but moving through it and creating documents and post-action and pre-action so that you can be better the next time.
Documentation, Wind Direction, And Leak Mapping
SPEAKER_03That's that's critical. I mean, anybody can get through it. I mean, yeah, but how many times do you want to be there? How many people do you need to go ahead and put your finger in it in a hole in a dike? That's that's not being helpful, that's not being a leader. Um you want to make this so that this is operationally fully functional um to reduce the amount of risks because the situation could be different next time. And it may. I mean, the storm came from the east and it was you know plowing, you know, plowing toward the west. Well, guess what? It could be a um a southwestern wind, and that could be you know open up a whole set of different problems.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's very true. And you've probably you know, through your maritime career, you had to be observant of it all the time, but just even like knowing the wind direction and knowing what that wind direction causes for your building, because all wind's not equal and all directions are aren't equal.
SPEAKER_03Well, we used to um uh I mean I can I I can say that certainly during you know major uh uh major thunderstorms, that was one of the big things. We you know, okay, well what roofs need, you know, what roofs uh were in the uh worst condition? And then we would try to identify where the leaks are coming from. And you would get to a certain point. And certainly this was, you know, when I had first just gotten to this one particular hospital and try to make a list. Make a list of every single leak that there was, and say, okay, afterwards, this is what we're going to do. And then we'll start to you know pop ceiling tiles and you know get up above the ceilings and find out, well, where the heck could this have come from? Or try to do this even during the event so that you can see where the water's coming from. Well, and then we ended up come making a plan. All right, this is the you know, this is the roof that needs to be replaced. This is this roof over here could be repaired, repaired, repaired. This is what it is, this is uh, you know, uh where it's come exactly where it's coming from, etc. etc. Well, then you get down to the short list. It was like Wait a minute, nothing leaked for the last five storms or major storms. Well, what it was, it was actually wind-driven. It was coming in from the side of the building, which we didn't know until we got to this particular point in time. And it was by tracking them. Because we did it by event, we did it, you know, so what's the follow-up? Where is it coming from? Yeah, it was uh it was it was a it was a learning experience. So yeah.
Maritime Lessons And Riding Out Storms
SPEAKER_01Now I yeah, I mean, even you know, I obviously don't have a hospital that I'm accountable for, but like even with my house, I kind of know which wind direction I'm gonna get a leak. I could you just go, you observe, right? And that's one of the critical skills in your role as a director. Like, it's easy to just kind of go through motions, but the observation, the documentation, getting to know your building. And, you know, as I was listening to you talk, I was thinking this is really one of the things we're dealing with in a negative way because we're losing that institutional knowledge that comes from dealing with snowstorms, ice storms, thunderstorms. And what does this event mean for me if it's coming that way? Those people are walking out the door, which goes to why you document during the storm so you can pass it on. Last question to Paul Cantrell, vice president of former vice president of FM and PDC, and uh a maritime chief engineer. What was Paul? Is there a storm that sticks out in your mind for its severity that you went through and and managed through?
SPEAKER_03Is there a memory for you that sticks out of something that was it wasn't the one ashore because that was those were all easy.
SPEAKER_00It was offshore?
SPEAKER_03Yes, it was offshore. What was that? I was in a hurricane and uh yeah, we were uh we were in some uh where were you some pretty bad um it was in the Mediterranean. Um the winds were holland, we had 35 uh foot foot seas. Um and when I say 35 foot seas, we were on a tanker at the time. The tanker was we had you know 10 foot of freeboard, so that meant 10 feet from the you know flat water's edge to uh the main deck. We had waves that were coming down the main deck that were 20 feet, 20 to 25 feet above the main deck. Wow. Um and it's not like it's uh uh it's it's very powerful. You don't understand, you don't know uh until you've kind of gone through that and just actually seen it. And then I've been in I had been in a number of hurricanes before then. Uh actually uh that was one of the earlier ones, but this ripped off it ripped a section, the season that actually ripped a section of the uh the bow, ripped the bulkhead right at right away from the main that uh the main deck on the on the forecastle.
unknownWow.
SPEAKER_03Uh and then there were pipe, I mean being on tanker, all the pipes are exposed going up into down through the center, center line of the um uh the hull. But um yeah, it was a lot of lot of repair while we uh a lot of repairs while we're underway and uh trying to get ourselves ready to come back into port and um we had to make the best of it.
SPEAKER_01I've always wondered last you know when you're in something like that, like there's nowhere to go, right? I mean you just have to ride that out. In your mind, what's that like? Like when you know you're just stuck and you're gonna be there, do you look to an ending, or are you just kind of in the moment saying, okay, this is what I gotta do to get to the next moment? You know what I you know what I mean with that question? Like, can you allow yourself to think of being out, or are you just kind of trying to survive in the moment?
SPEAKER_03Well, I yeah, yeah, I mean, there's only certain certain amount of hours that you're gonna be able to put in into it, and um, you know, you might be up to 20, 24 hours and say, okay, but is there anything else that we didn't, you know, that might have broken free? I mean, you got to think about it. I mean, there could be oxygen or acetylene bottles that are actually, you know, uh break free uh you know, out of whatever rack system you may have had, or you have all of these drums of uh different lube oils that were you know spread around because you happen to be you're you're in the world trade. You weren't in just you know running up and down the coast where you can get you can almost go to a you know shopping mall. Sorry, you had to take all of these extra barrels and everything else. Well, those are 55 gallon uh drums of oil. One of those things breaks down, it does a lot of damage, even though you've chained, you know, uh you didn't you didn't have enough chains to do all of them individually, so you wrap a whole bunch of them. Once that gets starts getting hit hit with waves, and forget about it. I mean, even if it's down in the engine room and you've had stuff that was you know in place for a while, but you'd be on calm relatively calm seas, and you all of a sudden you end up with um there's another one, actually. I'm just thinking. Uh I was in another hurricane and uh we had 50 foot. Uh the captain came into my office and he says, Well, let's go check. Have you ever seen a 50-foot wave? And I said, No. It was about, you know, it was about eight o'clock at night. I was still at my computer. And um uh so he said, let's just go out here, go take a look. We walked out there and he says, Well, go find the top of the wave. And I was like, I had the flashlight, and I looked, I was like, and I was looking up at it, and I was like, that was over 50 foot. Um and I mean, we were, you know, we knew it. I mean, I'm sitting at the computer with my legs spread apart like this, trying to actually type, and and I'm trying to hold myself in place at the position, you know, at my desk. Um, and everything in my office is trying to move.
unknownYeah.
Closing And How To Be A Guest
SPEAKER_03Uh that's an that's actually another experience is to to observe. I mean, usually what happens when you end up going to sea for a long period of time, uh, and you have calm weather, you become lax. And if the mates don't tell you, hey, we're gonna be hitting some you know bad weather, um, it's like watching your entire living room go from that side there, whip across over to that side, and then 30 seconds later, 15, 20 seconds later, it's on its way back. And now you've got to go tackle each piece of what's been you know flying across your room. It it could be everything that was in your bookshelf. It could be, you know, chairs, uh, and the chairs aren't the chairs have some substantial weight to them that are in your office, but they're all flying across on a uh on a VCT you know flooring. It's uh it's eye-opening.
SPEAKER_01Fun memories, huh? So, Paul Cantrell, thank you for making us storm ready. I really feel like a uh a goofy TV person with that. Thanks for making us storm ready. Thanks for your uh thanks for your insights. I appreciate it. Okay, my pleasure. This is Peter Martin for the Healthcare Facility Network. As always, thanks for tuning in, and we will be back in the future with another episode. Take care. If you want to be a guest on a future episode of the Healthcare Facilities Network, go to healthcarefacilitiesnetwork.com and let us know who you are and what you want to talk about because together we can solve this critical aging issue.