The development of the 2024 FEMA Region 9 American Samoa Joint Catastrophic Plan focused on supporting federal, territorial, and local governments in managing widespread, long-term impacts from natural catastrophic incidents. The project emphasized integrating federal response and short-term recovery efforts with the unique requirements of American Samoa, ensuring coordination across affected islands and with federal partners.
The project team formed and maintained a core planning team, a collaborative planning team, and a senior leadership steering committee, involving key stakeholders from utilities, public health, the military, and emergency management disciplines. The team conducted a thorough analysis of potential impacts on populations and identified federal, regional, territorial, and local capabilities. This analysis led to the development of critical planning factors, assumptions, and considerations that informed the creation of a robust catastrophe plan.
Throughout the project, the team supported interagency and intra-agency meetings, workshops, and working groups, ensuring that the final catastrophe plan was comprehensive, aligned with existing plans, and effectively addressed the unique challenges posed by catastrophic incidents in American Samoa.