Utility professionals from across the Northeast region this month gathered at the Northeast Public Power Association Training Center for NEPPA’s 2026 Mutual Aid Disaster Exercise.
Through realistic disaster scenarios and tabletop discussions, attendees put their knowledge to the test, strengthened mutual aid coordination, and shared ideas to help improve response efforts across our public power community, NEPPA noted.
NEPPA Executive Director Mike Hyland facilitated the exercise and Dave Ketchen, Assistant General Manager for Massachusetts public power utility Littleton Electric Light & Water Department, made a presentation and offered insights.
“NEPPA’s Mutual Aid program is best in class,” Hyland said. “Not only do we deploy crews to help other municipal and cooperative utilities outside the Northeast – we also have a deep history of assisting Island restoration efforts such as that of USVI WAPA after Hurricane Marilyn and Hurricane Irma. Practice is important, but perfect practice strives for perfection. Exercises such as this helps educate and hone our Mutual Aid efforts.”
The exercise this year was an “Island Exercise” called Ketchen’s Kruise.
In his presentation, Ketchen discussed his recent experience serving as a Technical Advisor for the Commonwealth Utilities Corporation in the Northern Mariana Islands after they were hit by Super Typhoon Sinlaku. This opportunity arose through the APPA Mutual Aid Network when CUC reached out for help.
In a recent LinkedIn post, Ketchen detailed his experience as the Technical Advisor.
“Over the course of a few weeks in Saipan and Tinian, I had the privilege of assisting with restoration efforts and supporting the teams working tirelessly to bring power back to the islands,” he wrote. “This experience gave me a firsthand look at the unique operational and logistical challenges of running a utility system on a remote island. From supply chain constraints to infrastructure limitations, every day brought new and complex problems to solve.”
There were a total of 41 attendees from seven Northeast states for the fourth annual exercise supported by the NEPPA Mutual Aid Committee.
Attendees were broken up differently this year. In the past, NEPPA broke up by geographical region, Hyland noted. NEPPA’s Mutual Aid program has five regions.
This year, the exercise was broken out by job responsibilities -- Coordinators; General Foreman & Lineworkers; Operations/Engineering; Management; and contractors.
