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Critical Facilities Analyses

Critical facilities analyses focus on determining the vulnerabilities of key individual facilities, lifelines, or resources within the community. Because these facilities play a central role in disaster response and recovery, it is important to protect them to ensure that service interruption is reduced or eliminated. Critical facilities include police, fire, and rescue departments; emergency operation centers; transportation routes; utilities; essential governmental facilities; schools; hospitals; etc. In addition to identifying which critical facilities are generally vulnerable to hazards due to direct location in or close proximity to high-risk areas (e.g., 100-year flood plain), further assessments might be conducted to determine the structural and operational vulnerabilities.