RI officials hold hurricane drill

CRANSTON, R.I. (AP/WPRI) — Rhode Island emergency management officials are testing the state's response to a major hurricane.

The state's National Guard and Emergency Management Agency are holding a hurricane simulation. It started Monday and runs through Friday.

Dubbed "Vigilant Guard," the statewide exercise is designed as practice and to help identify ways to improve the state's planning and response to a natural disaster.

National Guard members from Rhode Island and surrounding states are participating, as are emergency officials from all the New England states and New York.

Monday's scenario involved a category 3 hurricane making landfall around 4:30 a.m.

Brigadier General Mark Jannitto of the Rhode Island National Guard said the aim of the simulation is to prepare for a storm similar to the hurricane that devastated the state in 1938.

"I think we still suffer from hurricane amnesia," Jannitto said. "We've forgotten the effects of a real, true category 3 hurricane, and what that can do."

Overall, 1,100 National Guard members are taking part in the simulation.