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Event Will Simulate 7.8 Earthquake to Test Region's Preparedness
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 12, 2008--GlobalOptions Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: GLOI), a leading provider of domestic and international risk management services, today announced that its Crisis Management and Preparedness Services Division, James Lee Witt Associates (JLWA), has provided technical advice and counsel to the organizers of The Great Southern California ShakeOut project and to the Art Center College of Design program "The Los Angeles Earthquake: Get Ready Project" and its reality game, After Shock.
The Great Southern California Shakeout is a preparedness exercise jointly organized by the Governor's Office of Emergency Services and the California Office of Homeland Security. It will test the ability of emergency responders and the public to deal with the impact of a magnitude 7.8 earthquake -- similar to the recent earthquake in China -- through a number of exercises conducted throughout Southern California over a three-week period, beginning tomorrow.
One event of the project is the implementation of a reality game created by the Art Center College of Design, which is based in Pasadena, CA, and The Institute for the Future, headquartered in Palo Alto, CA. After Shock is the world's first massively collaborative disaster simulation program based on a major earthquake in Southern California. Witt Associates provided assistance with disaster communications and mitigation techniques essential to this reality project. Residents and others are encouraged to register to participate in After Shock by visiting http://aftershock.net.
"We were very fortunate to have developed the research for this project three years ago, shortly after Hurricane Katrina," said Mariana Amatullo, Vice President of International Initiatives and Director of the social impact program Designmatters at the Art Center College of Design. "We wanted to anticipate and improve on what we saw as a gap between disaster communications and disaster expertise and relief. The goal was to find new opportunities for the public to be a little more resilient and empowered."
"James Lee Witt Associates has been able to bring real world problems in the arena of disaster preparedness to this interactive simulation," said Mark Ghilarducci, Vice President of James Lee Witt Associates. "We were able to bring together experts in science and real people in an accessible way to help people think critically and realistically in an earthquake."
Witt Associates' Ghilarducci is scheduled to speak about preparedness issues at a free multimedia event. "The Get Ready Rally" will take place at the Nokia L.A. Live Plaza on Friday, November 14.
Additional information about the virtual earthquake program and its sponsor organization, the Art Center College of Design, can be found at www.shakeout.org. ; www.artcenter,edu/getread ; and www.iftf.org.
James Lee Witt Associates
Founded in 2001, James Lee Witt Associates (JLWA), a unit of GlobalOptions Group, is a crisis and emergency management consulting firm based in Washington, DC with offices in Atlanta, Chicago, and Sacramento. JLWA has unrivaled experience and hands-on knowledge of public safety, disaster mitigation, continuity of operations, and emergency management issues.
GlobalOptions Group, Inc.
GlobalOptions Group, with headquarters in New York City and offices in 16 cities, is a provider of high-end risk assessment and mitigation services to Fortune 1000 corporations, governmental organizations and high-profile individuals throughout the world. GlobalOptions Group's services currently include risk management and security, investigations and litigation support, and crisis management. These engagements take GlobalOptions Group staff around the world and are typically highly-sensitive engagements where GlobalOptions Group is interacting with senior leaders in corporations and governments. Its overall mission is to identify, evaluate, assess, prevent and correct issues that may threaten people, organizations or strategic initiatives for corporations or governments. www.globaloptionsgroup.com.
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