SUMMARY

Transportation Emergency Response Application (TERA): Migration Options Beyond 2025

The Transportation Emergency Response Application (TERA) is a scenario-based training system that provides training/exercise scenarios and materials for command-level and operational roles in public transportation agencies, state departments of transportation (DOTs), and airport emergency operations centers (EOCs) for natural and manmade disaster incidents. TERA was delivered through an automated, functional exercise simulation system, the Emergency Management Staff Trainer (EMST), in Adobe Flash, a technology that is no longer supported and will not run on most computer operating systems and Internet browsers. The TERA scenario learning objectives, scripts, injects, and artifacts can be valuable resources for creating training and tabletop exercises for transportation emergency management.

The objectives of TCRP Project A-36A were to:

• Identify migration/repurpose options for the core features, training capabilities, scenarios, and content of TERA to one or more modern, sustainable platforms; and
• Determine prioritization of the scenario learning objectives, scripts, injects, and artifacts created under ACRP, TCRP, and NCHRP that have the most value as resources for tabletop exercises.

This project included research to identify the audience for those resources and the potential approaches and applications through which those resources could be made available, and to develop recommendations for transitioning and extending TERA into the future, if it was determined to be still useful for transportation agencies.

The project was conducted in four distinct phases: (1) a planning phase, (2) an information-gathering phase, (3) an analysis phase, and (4) a recommendation phase.

Planning Phase

In the planning phase, TERA scenarios and associated materials were reviewed, and most scenarios were found to still be relevant for transportation agencies. Changes or additional scenarios for any future TERA migration are recommended for bomb threats, active shooters, wildfires, flash flooding, extreme heat, and extensive civil unrest. In addition, the TERA contagious disease scenario should be reviewed in light of the actual experience of transportation agencies responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Information-Gathering Phase

The information-gathering phase included a survey, interviews, and applied research. Transportation and emergency management agencies were surveyed on their current training and exercise practices, training needs and platforms, and familiarity with TERA. A total of

96 responses from multiple transportation modes—aviation, highway, and public transit—were received. Most survey respondents (86%) were not familiar with TERA. Those who did use TERA were asked how they used it. Agencies have used TERA for annual tabletop exercises (airports) or occasionally for past exercises (DOTs) to help organize staff within the department and at outside agencies into Incident Command System (ICS) structure and roles. The majority of agencies conduct emergency management (EM) training, and most use scenarios in their training.

Interviews with training organizations were conducted to develop an understanding of existing training methods, training materials, and other resources as well as current and future capabilities. Interviewees included the National Transit Institute (NTI) at Rutgers, Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service (TEEX-TAMU), and the Transportation Safety Institute (TSI). NTI provides courses with scenarios, roles, and levels of training. A course on crisis communications, similar to TERA, was extensively taught and shared during COVID-19, with role playing and static, scenario-based exercise components but without the live features. TEEX-TAMU’s emergency response training simulation tool, EM*ES (Emergency Management * Exercise System), incorporates scenarios and resource-ordering processes. It provides features that were included in EMST/TERA, such as simulations of multiple roles in the incident operations center (IOC), customization features for roles and scenario building, and multitier scenarios. TSI, at the behest of its sponsoring agencies, provides safety training for all modes, including some emergency management–related scenario-based training.

A representative of Engineering & Computer Simulations, Inc. (ECS), the developer of TERA and host of EMST, the National Guard Joint State Response Training System, was interviewed. Migrating from Adobe Flash would have required a complete rewrite of the application. ECS investigated maintenance and migration options for TERA and EMST, but there was insufficient client interest or funding available at that time for the required effort.

As a further element of the information gathering, existing emergency management simulation and training applications and emergency management and other federal training catalogues were reviewed to identify existing training courses with capabilities similar to those of TERA.

Analysis Phase

The analysis phase was based on the results of the survey responses and interviews and on prior reports. It found that TERA was still useful to transportation agencies. For example, representatives from DOTs indicated that their agencies would use TERA now if it were still available.

In addition, it is feasible to adapt TERA content for use in existing training and training platforms. Some agencies have used TERA assets such as scenarios and injects to support their exercises while working from non-scenario platforms such as WebEOC, or as the basis for a PowerPoint for a small airport’s emergency management tabletop training. An existing exercise simulation platform such as EM*ES could use the TERA assets as the basis for creating interactive simulation exercise scenarios and training sessions for transportation agencies and communities. NTI confirmed in the interview that the TERA assets could be used to create a new in-person emergency management training course that would have learning objectives similar to those of TERA and could include role playing.

On the basis of the research from this project, it was determined that more information about and promotion of TERA assets and capabilities, through an awareness campaign and development of a user guide, would increase utilization of TERA by transportation agencies

across multiple modes. Further, TERA could be migrated to a new platform cost-effectively. The types of resources required to migrate TERA to a new platform would depend on the type of platform. In general, the migration would require (1) personnel familiar with the platform to modify scenarios and input other required information, (2) subject-matter experts (SMEs) in emergency management and TERA to assist in the process, and (3) project management and testing resources. The level of effort required to migrate TERA functionality beyond scenario content (e.g., authoring/editing scenarios, automated feedback, and simulated roles) to the available platforms would vary depending on the platform selected for migration.

Responsibility for TERA maintenance and governance would depend on the platform used for the migration. If TERA were on a commercial platform, governance would be more complicated since the commercial requirements of the platform company would take precedence over the needs of TERA users. The decision made by the original developer of the TERA online tool to not migrate the platform to new technology is an example. If TERA became part of a training institute, then TERA governance would be with the institute or consortium member, following the processes of other government-funded and supported transportation tools and training. If TERA were migrated to a website hosted by AASHTO, APTA, or another industry association, then governance would come from the association and its members, the transportation community.

Recommendation Phase

In the final phase of the project, recommendations were developed for the future of TERA—an approach to promote TERA content for interested parties, a budget and scope for producing a guide to adapting TERA content and a how-to or user guide, and a budget and request for proposal (RFP) for specifications for migrating TERA to a new platform, if feasible.