Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) National Dam Safety Program (NDSP)
Securing the Nation’s DamsCASE STUDY
practice area
Risk, Safety and Mission Assurance
About FEMA NDSP
FEMA’s National Dam Safety Program oversees 91,000+ dams protecting critical infrastructure and communities nationwide. When a dam fails, the consequences are catastrophic—potentially affecting millions of lives and billions in infrastructure. Yet before Longevity’s involvement, FEMA lacked a analytics-based national framework to rapidly assess damage, coordinate multi-agency response, and prevent cascading failures across interconnected infrastructure systems.
OUR EXPERTISE
Mission Assurance Compliance
CHALLENGE
After a dam incident or failure, rapid and coordinated assessments are essential to protect lives, property, and critical infrastructure.
However, FEMA faced challenges with:
- Inconsistent post-incident data collection across regions
- Limited interagency coordination during dam failure investigations
- Lack of standardized procedures for field inspections, data analysis, and infrastructure interdependency assessments
Business Impact
Longevity’s partnership with FEMA has resulted in:
100%
compliance with HHPD grant program requirements
200+
Field personnel trained
50
States with buy-in and adoption
SOLUTION
Longevity partnered with FEMA to enhance national dam safety operations through targeted key initiatives:
POST-INCIDENT DAM ASSESSMENT PLAN & SOP
Longevity developed and delivered a Post-Incident Dam Assessment Plan with a detailed Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to guide FEMA and its partners through post-incident data collection and analysis.
The SOP defines:
- Interagency coordination among federal, state, and local stakeholders
- Field reconnaissance and perishable data collection, including high-water marks
- On-site dam inspections covering structural, hydraulic, and geotechnical performance
- Meteorological and hydrological condition assessments
- Evaluation of emergency response activities and preparedness
- Dependency/interdependency analysis to assess cascading impacts on other critical infrastructure
Interagency Coordination
- Improved coordination among federal, state, and local dam safety agencies
- Coordinated FEMA NDSP Strategic Plan Implementation and reporting across Interagency partners
Program Management
- Real-time reporting dashboard enabling FEMA leadership to track hazard abatement status and resource allocation nationwide
RISK REDUCTION
- A data-driven standardized national framework for dam incident and failure investigations
- Reduced risk to downstream communities through analytics-based inspection and assessment
- Faster, data-driven decision-making for safety and mitigation planning
OPERATIONAL IMPACT
- 100% compliance with HHPD grant program requirements on inspected rehabilitation projects
- Enhanced oversight of dam rehabilitation projects under HHPD
Lessons Learned & Replicability
The NDSP engagement demonstrated several best practices applicable to other federal infrastructure programs:
- Early Stakeholder Engagement: Involving state and local agencies in program enhancements ensured buy-in and adoption across all 50 states
- Pilot Before Scale: Testing enhanced analytics at the capital region identified implementation challenges before national rollout
- Training Investment: Hands-on training for 200+ field personnel ensured consistent application of new risk management and safety procedures
- Continuous Improvement: Quarterly review cycles with FEMA leadership incorporated lessons learned to drive high-value improvements to the program
RISK, SAFETY & MISSION ASSURANCE
Mission Assurance for High-Stakes Environments
Longevity delivers integrated Risk, Safety, and Mission Assurance services that strengthen organizational resilience, protect critical assets, and ensure operational continuity in complex, high-stakes environments. We partner with agencies and enterprises to proactively identify threats, enforce safety and security protocols, and embed assurance across all mission-critical functions.