Feature: Preparing for disaster

The list of disasters, man-made and natural, seems to be growing by the day. The Asia Pacific is reeling from the loss of life and tremendous devastation that took place when large parts of Queensland flooded in December and January, followed by the earthquake in Christchurch in February a catastrophic earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident in Japan this March.

Life must go on despite the disasters however – resilience and planning for the worst will help your customers’ businesses to survive and to ensure the livelihoods of those who depend on it.

How do you get this crucial message across though? Just over half of Australian companies only develop disaster recovery plans after a catastrophic event; that is, if they survive the disaster, according to industry experts.

CRN spoke to a range of companies involved in disaster recovery to find out how to make businesses appreciate the importance of being prepared.

Christchurch recovers

The Garden City in New Zealand’s south island was still figuring out how to mend the damage from the September quake, which measured 7.1 when it was shaken by another one, on paper less powerful at magnitude 6.3.

Over 180 people are thought to have died in the quake that caused widespread damage to Christchurch. The quake is thought to cost NZ$16 billion in insurance claims and it has made a huge dent in New Zealand’s economy, with BNZ bank analysts expecting GDP growth for 2011 almost to halve because of it.

Even so, BNZ points out that “we shouldn’t assume the city has ground to a halt; this is far from the case”; the bank analysts have conducted phone surveys that say manufacturing companies in Christchurch were mostly operational as of mid-March, with the Port of Lyttelton being back at full capacity.

BNZ’s analyst team says ICT-based business will be more mobile and faster to return to normal operations but those without offsite backup records will find the going harder. On the ground, Steve Davis from the NZ Red Cross says there is “obviously a lot of damage in the central business district”.

While some key locations in the CBD didn’t collapse, they became unstable and people were unable to retrieve records, stock, IT gear and other material, he says. In some cases, buildings had collapsed and organisations would have to relocate elsewhere.It’s not all bad news.

Key IT infrastructure seems to have stood up “pretty well”, Davis says. Phone networks and internet access were still going on many areas albeit with somewhat degraded service. Davis believes cloud computing will have provided some relief for many organisations as the quake struck.

However, he adds that lack of good backup and disaster recovery plans will leave many companies hurting.

Stuart Speers, CEO of database specialist systems integrator Enterprise IT in Auckland, says, “I was astonished to see early video footage from Christchurch with several people carrying servers under their arms walking around dazed in the streets and still covered in dust.

“How critical is that server to them if it’s the second thing they think about after coming out alive!” Speers says. 

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