Huntsville Leaders Discuss Cyber Security Lessons Learned from April 27 Tornado

Huntsville Leaders Discuss Cyber Security Lessons Learned From April 27 Tornado Outbreak

Group shares tornado outbreak lessons, improvement plans

Michelle Stark WHNT News 19 Anchor & Technology Correspondent

1:31 p.m. CDT, June 28, 2011

HUNTSVILLE, AL—

The massive tornado outbreak on April 27 knocked out power, disrupted essential services and took down communications infrastructure all across the Tennessee Valley. Local business and government leaders hope finding lessons in those failures will make the community safer.

Tuesday morning, roughly 180 people attended the “Resilience of Our Critical Infrastructure and Cyber Security Summit” at ADTRAN, Inc. in Cummings Research Park. The event, hosted by CyberHuntsville and Energy Huntsville – initiatives for the Tennessee Valley – was planned as a way to improve the area’s cyber and traditional infrastructure.

"The problem with preparing for the types of disasters we've had is you can never prepare for exactly what will happen," said David Ivey, Program Director for Alabama Supercomputer. "Each one will be different."

Ivey’s company stepped in with another local tech company, API Digital, to fix Huntsville City’s cyber network after the tornadoes and subsequent power outage took it down. As WHNT News 19 explained in a special report in May, the failure briefly disrupted normal communication channels between the city and public during a critical time.

Ivey spoke as one of many panelists Tuesday and said he had a simple message. Flexible disaster plans are a must – especially for Redstone Arsenal and Research Park.

“We really can't afford to have those operations down from a productivity standpoint but also from a national security standpoint,” Ivey said.

One idea being floated at the conference was giving Redstone Arsenal its own alternative power source. Ivey stressed the value of businesses having “remote” operations ability (i.e. ways to send people out of state to get work done.)

Organizers hope the lessons and solutions discussed at Tuesday’s conference will do more than defend against weather-related crises.  The sensitive nature of Huntsville’s missile and defense industries make it a prime target for cyber-attack and local leaders want to see strengthening of cyber and communications networks area-wide.

The U.S. Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Homeland Security both had representatives onsite for the summit – eager to learn about the root causes of key failures. They were also eager to share tips for disaster planning and preparedness from the federal viewpoint.

“Responding to a disaster is regional. What you do in Huntsville is going to affect other regions around it,” Bill Bryan, Deputy Assistant Energy Secretary, said.

In a strange coincidence, storms knocked out power to much of Research Park on Tuesday morning and the summit had to be powered via generators. Organizers used the incident to note the weaknesses still inherent in the Huntsville-area power grid and the need for increased local and federal investment.