The Palaceside Building held an earthquake-response drill on the 21st. About 50 took part, including Mainichi Building Co. staff and personnel of the first-floor west Disaster Prevention Center and the sixth-basement Central Control Room.
Centered on first moves after a major quake, it is run three or four times a year, imagining day and night.
This day started at 10 a.m. The scenario, though, was night, about 11 hours later.
The point is first response by the 24-hour Disaster Prevention Center guards and Central Control Room facilities staff alone, assuming no Mainichi Building employees are in.
Under an "intensity lower 6" scenario a temporary HQ was set at the Disaster Prevention Center. "Glass may fall in front of first-basement Mainichi Hall" — guards kept people back =photo right above and rescued the injured =photo left. "Fire near the first-floor center" — initial extinguishing with extinguishers =photo below. Then "leak on the first-basement east floor," "elevator stopped with two trapped," and other steps were checked in time. Mainichi Building staff were posted at each "scene" to watch the response.
Staff not in the field trained at the fifth-floor office on setting up a disaster HQ, imagining they had rushed in at night =top photo. Radios were set in a meeting room and information from radio and phone was written on a whiteboard.
The Palaceside Building will keep drilling toward a safer, more secure building.
