Iowa State Fair focusing on keeping event safe

For most people, a trip to the Iowa State Fair is the last place where they would look for trouble.

Fair manager Gary Slater and his staff want to keep it that way.

Fair officials have a crisis management plan to deal with six threat levels although marketing director Lori Chappell said emergency procedures at the 445-acre fairgrounds have not gone above level 4 and coordinators have not had to set up an incident command in the seven yearly fairs that she has worked.

Emergency planning at state fairs have been getting increased scrutiny this year after high winds recently toppled a huge outdoor stage at the Indiana State Fair, killing five people and injuring at least four dozen. The Wisconsin State Fair also was the scene of some violent mob attacks this month at the venue on the outskirts of Milwaukee.

Iowa State Fair officials already had beefed up their security measures with the assistance of the Iowa State Patrol and Des Moines police following early-morning disturbances last year that included two stabbings, two assaults on police officers and 27 arrests outside the fair's gates. However, the biggest concern for the well-being of fair goers has been and continues to be the potential for severe weather, fair officials said.

“It's the hardest to predict,” Chappell said. “We learned that from the tragedy at the Indiana State Fair that you can be prepared, but you just never know. Sometimes you just don't see it coming.”

Iowa State Fair officials keep in close contact with National Weather Service personnel who are on site at the fairgrounds during the event's 11-day annual run when threatening weather develops, and they have a two-page severe weather policy document that covers notification procedures, coordination, evacuation and post-event search procedures for circumstances that include responding to the potential of a tornado on the ground ripping through the fairgrounds and adjacent campgrounds.

“We've got a system in place, if we ever needed to, to get the word out throughout the fairgrounds,” Chappell said. “We've been at heightened alert and kind of ready, but we've just been incredibly blessed and fortunate that the storm has dissipated or passed us by or whatever the case may be that we've never had to enact any of that or go through it. But still it's good to be prepared and to be on your toes at all times.

The fairgrounds action plan calls for officials to set up an incident command system if severe weather appears eminent and procedures for emergency officials to direct patrons and on-site campers to a dozen of the fair's safest and sturdiest buildings to accommodate the potential for tens of thousands of people who might be on the grounds when a severe storm hits, she noted.

The fair also has a separate severe weather relocation procedure for moving more than 10,000 people from the grandstand that Chappell said could empty the structure within 15 to 20 minutes. Also, unlike the temporary stage that collapsed in Indiana, the Iowa fair has a permanent 40-foot-by-60-foot stage with a 27-foot clearance that was constructed to building code standards and has various weight load limits to maintain the structural integrity.

“I feel very confident that our stage set-up is very safe and sound and that we load it properly,” the fair manager said. “Every band every year has more equipment and more stuff. Our stage sometimes isn't big enough for them. Some acts have refused to play here because our stage isn't big enough for them.”

The focus of emergency preparations is to plan for the worst and hope for the best, said Slater, who would make the call should an evacuation of the fairgrounds need to be ordered.

During the off-season, fair officials work with Iowa Homeland Security, emergency management, public safety, National Weather Service, public health and local police and fire agencies to review emergency procedures and conduct practice drills for a variety of potential disasters that include a tornado strike, criminal activity, a terrorism-related attack, a building collapse – virtually any situation that would require crisis management, Slater said.

“The field of weather meteorology is not an exact science so that makes it more difficult along the way. In the end, we have to keep our patrons, our employees and volunteers safe and that's what we'll do to the best of our ability,” he said. “Sometimes in even the best of plans people get hurt. It's a matter of mitigating any type of crisis and making it better than it would have been had you not had a plan at all.”