A common fear of a new employee is anything crazy happening during their first week on the job.
Last week, that nightmare became a reality for John Lyons, who recently became Shamong’s new office of emergency management coordinator.
“So I’ve been on the job for about five minutes and this big snowstorm is thrown at me,” Lyons said.
Using the term “big” may not have done justice to the scenario. Winter storm Jonas was a record-setting one that caused many regions much distress and was responsible for 60 storm-related deaths nationwide.
At least 14 states received more than a foot of snow. It was the single biggest snowstorm on record for at least six locations in four states — New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland.
Shamong recorded about two feet of snowfall.
Luckily, Lyons is the Pinelands Community Emergency Response Team management leader who has been a township resident since 2000 and a Burlington County resident since 1995, so he had a good idea of how to handle the situation. He put together an impromptu emergency operations center with various radio communications to keep in touch with the county, public works, the fire company and neighboring town Tabernacle for the entire weekend.
“We had a lot of communication going on to monitor conditions and talk about issues,” Lyons said.
Jan. 9 marked the first day of the official Shamong OEM Facebook page, a vehicle of communication created just in time for the storm.
“Social media is very important in emergency management nowadays,” Lyons said.
There were more than 300 people following the page in the first few days. The page reached more than 2,700 people through the posts put out during the storm.
There was a tremendous hunger for information about what was going on in the town, Lyons said. The OEM group was able to supply residents with regular updates through a combination of this social media page and phone calls.
Lyons and his wife are in charge of the page and are willing to answer any questions a follower might leave. Folks are encouraged to use civil language, being that this is a tool for the community. So far, Lyons has been overwhelmed at how positive the people of Shamong have been even during a chaotic time like the storm.
As far as the town is concerned, there were no power outages or damage reported so far, but Burlington County is conducting a preliminary damage assessment. The state will be interpreting how hard each municipality was hit by the storm and then decipher whether they reach the threshold that requires the state to declare a disaster and provide FEMA relief.
“It depends on what the overall impact was financially,” Lyons said.
Township committee members expressed their gratitude toward Lyons for keeping his composure and ensuring a job well done.
“On behalf of all of us here, I want to thank you for taking on this role,” Mayor Timothy Gimbel said. “We are in very good hands.”
“I have great resources available to me. So far, it’s been a 100 percent pleasure meeting the fire company and the EMS squad. Everyone I’ve talked to has been nothing but helpful,” Lyons said.
The State Police also approved of how Lyons and his crew handled his first test as Shamong’s OEM coordinator.
Deputy Mayor Michael Di Croce received multiple calls from the NJSP complimenting Shamong’s road department and the residents for staying off the roads.
“They lost many hours of sleep because they were at it for so long,” township administrator Sue Onorato said. “It was taxing. It was a very big storm, and there comes a period of time where your body just wears out and you have to take a break, but with this group, their adrenaline gets pumping and they have a hard time doing that.”
