A national disaster exercise that began last week involves the evacuation of thousands of federal personnel from Washington, D.C., the Washington Post reported (see GSN, April 29).

In National Exercise 2-08, which continues through Saturday, terrorists release a poisonous gas from a tanker in Washington state while Oregon authorities must handle the unintentional escape of nerve agent from the Umatilla Chemical Depot.

Meanwhile, the capital region is faced with a terrorist threat and a major hurricane making its way up the East Coast.  Over three days this week, the federal government is using cars and helicopters to move large numbers of employees to temporary sites in Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia.  The drill is intended to test the ability to maintain “continuity of government” in the face of a crisis (see GSN, April 7, 2004).