Exercise Excellence: Michigan Applies All-Hazards Lessons Learned

May 12, 2026 | Annie Evans

In March 2025, the Department of Energy hosted a national level exercise designed to promote radiation readiness. This exercise, called Cobalt Magnet 25, brought together a wide variety of interdisciplinary partners from federal, state, local, and international governments among other partners. Michigan was the host jurisdiction for this exercise.

ASTHO’s Director of Preparedness, Adrianna (Annie) Evans, sat down with representatives from the Michigan Department of Health and Human services (MDHHS) to learn about their experiences with Cobalt Magnet 25, how they applied lessons learned one year later, and how those lessons learned may be transferrable to other threats.

This blog is the second in a series, “Exercise Excellence,” that shares insights and perspectives from emergency preparedness exercises. This second blog will focus on ways Michigan highlighted all-hazards lessons learned from Cobalt Magnet 25.

What did Cobalt Magnet 25 illustrate about coordination across complex emergencies? Has this helped to improve coordination across subsequent emergencies?

Jason Smith, Emergency Management Coordinator: Cobalt Magnet 25 highlighted that coordination across complex emergencies, radiological or otherwise, requires intensive planning and sustained exercise play. The exercise underscored the importance of establishing shared objectives among all partners and securing executive level support and direction for hazards of this magnitude. It also demonstrated that the intersection of public health, environmental health, agriculture, and natural resources is critical for effective response.

Many of us have experience with FEMA's traditional nuclear power plant drills and exercises, which primarily focus on the plume phase, which can limit the depth of play and may not always address broader, longer-term coordination challenges.

Terra Riddle, Director, Division of Emergency Preparedness and Response: These types of complex emergencies depend on pre-established interagency relationships, clearly defined command structures, and real-time information sharing. For me, radiological response was a new area. The big takeaway is radiological responses will be everyone's problem everywhere. All of our jurisdictions need to have basic knowledge of radiation and response processes. As a result of this exercise, we’re looking at conducting routine trainings for jurisdictions that don't have a nuclear facility.

Another key takeaway was that health care facilities need formal guidance from the state for reporting and procedures. We played that aspect of the response and talked about information sharing, triage, and more. The health care facilities helped us understand that the state must act quickly to set them up for success. Slight variations on information will feed misinformation and create complications. The radiation scenario gave a good example of how differences in dosing measurements between the United States and Canada could create unintentional casualties. This helps us think about what other situations where these differences may play a role.

Jay Fiedler, Director, Bureau of Emergency Preparedness, EMS, and Systems of Care: These factors are inherently more challenging in a radiation-based scenario. Radiation brings an element of uncertainty to coordination activities in an event or in an exercise. Having the opportunity to practice that on this scale is really valuable.

Smith: Our coordination has improved, but it is still a work-in-progress. Cobalt Magnet 25 was promising and highlighted areas where we need additional blue-sky planning. MDHHS does not necessarily assume a lead role for this type of scenario. Our radiological program is elsewhere within state government. We identified the need for right-size plans for hazards of this magnitude, including medical surge, mass care, and medical countermeasures. This exercise showed strengths in coordination with the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy and their radiation protection programs, as well as Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, particularly around post-plume and ingestion pathway objectives. Another key takeaway was the intersection between both Emergency Support Function 6 — or mass care — and Emergency Support Function 8 in addressing needs for vulnerable populations. Cobalt Magnet 25 offered a suite of learning opportunities through partners like CDC, Radiation Operations Support Specialists, as well as Oak Ridge Associated Universities, which would be even more impactful if conducted more frequently.

Why are these exercises important for jurisdictional readiness?

Smith: Exercises like Cobalt Magnet 25 are critically important because they address an intimidating hazard with many unknowns. They provide a rare opportunity to test boundaries and engage partners beyond those typically required by FEMA, all within a low stress, no-fault environment. These exercises push the envelope to build a shared understanding of roles and responsibilities for agencies and individuals who don't often manage this type of threat. Exercises of this nature provide an added realism that immerses participants in the scenario.

Riddle: When we exercise like this, little details come into the spotlight. Suddenly we're investigating things at a minute level that are critically important. Exercises test plans under realistic conditions, clarify roles and decision-making processes, strengthen interagency coordination, and reveal gaps before a real-world incident.

Fiedler: An exercise of this scale puts the entire team through a process of training, planning, making connections, exercising, and hot wash and after-action review. They push us in different ways than a tabletop or discussion-based exercise so we can truly identify gaps and spaces for additional learning, planning, and collaboration.

What lessons learned did Cobalt Magnet 25 highlight and how can they be applied to different types of emergencies?

Smith: One year after Cobalt Magnet 25, progress is still very much ongoing, but several key initiatives are underway. We are strengthening and modernizing our radiological nuclear planning annex. We are establishing a multidisciplinary partner work group focused on post-plume response and recovery. This will help us dive into the ingestion pathway criteria to clearly define our roles.

We are placing a stronger emphasis on One Health initiatives to address cross-sector impacts. We're developing a webinar series for local health department personnel; this will be a four-part series covering the initial response all the way to sustained recovery. We're actively engaging with local emergency management programs to clarify public health functions such as medical countermeasures, registry development, and sheltering support. We're increasing collaboration Emergency Support Function 6 leads, Michigan 211, and Michigan Poison and Drug Information Center personnel to better serve vulnerable populations.

These efforts really reflect a commitment to building this capacity, sustaining momentum from Cobalt Magnet 25, and ensuring MDHHS is better prepared for complex radiological emergencies.

Riddle: Radiological response has been a priority for us for several years, but training and planning has been elevated in a new way over the past year. There's new energy, new focus, and everyone is talking about it. We’ve applied lessons learned through our partner work plans in many ways, like advancing and enhancing crisis communication planning efforts. Currently, we're doing a lot of training and tabletops as a stepping off point.

Fiedler: Some of the key takeaways from our Emergency Coordination Center (ECC) perspective were really focused on our response processes. How do we continue to develop effective command and control elements that support all emergencies, not just a radiation response?

We had some federal partners embedded in the ECC, particularly the Regional Emergency Coordinators from the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response. This gave us an opportunity to engage with them on how they approach emergencies and response activities at the federal level and bounce ideas back and forth. We have some follow-ups with them to talk about processes that they use and how we can adapt them to use in our ECC as well.

Radiation Readiness Resources

Learn more about radiation readiness through the following resources:

External Resources

• National Alliance for Radiation Readiness Website
• Discussion Guide for Public Health Decision-Making in a Nuclear/Radiological Response by CDC
• This is a TEST: Community Reception Center by CDC
• Radiological Emergency Response: Planning and Past Responses by EPA
• Protective Action Guides by EPA
• Radiological Emergency Preparedness Program Manual (PDF) by FEMA