Running Head: EF-5 TORNADO 1 EF-5 TORNADO 2 EF-5 Tornado, Joplin, Missouri HCS/350 EF-5 Tornado, Joplin, Missouri On May 22, 2011, Joplin, Missouri experienced a supercell thunderstorm tornado that promptly intensified to generate EF-5 damage. The thunderstorm tore close to one mile path, which generated almost total destruction across the Missouri-Kansas state. The tornado caused the highest number of casualties in the American history of tornadoes. 162 people were killed thousands of other injured (Smith & Sutter, 2013). Furthermore, the Tornado picked up and carried away in excess of 15,000 vehicles including heavy tractor-trailers and buses for hundreds of yards. The National Weather Service reported that it found some vehicles completely rolled into balls of bent metals. The concrete barriers in parking lots that had been designed to stop cars, some weighing as heavy as 300 pounds, were plucked and tossed as far as 60 yards. The thunderstorm destroyed and damaged roughly 7,500 homes. Additionally, at least 500 businesses with property worth $3 billion were destroyed. It is the highest damage ever reported in America (The White House, n.d). Emergency instances attract the attention of public and private organizations as well as individuals locally and internationally. While emergency response is usually led by respective government institutions, hospitals, non-governmental organizations, and the people come in overwhelmingly to support each other in the course of offering help. In the EF-5 tornado experienced in Joplin, Missouri, for instance, emergency rescue operations were led by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). FEMA is an agency of the American Department of Homeland Security, which was created by the Presidential Reorganization Plan No.3 of 1978. FEMA had 820 employees who were supported by other personnel from 13 federal agencies. Joplin hosted numerous both state and non-state personnel who helped in the rescue mission. State and Federal emergency officials formed four joint task forces to take care of the arguably the largest recovery mission. They engaged in recovering critical infrastructure housing, schools, and removal of debris (The White House, n.d). FEMA constructed about 15 temporary housing sites across the affected area, which housed 586 families. Furthermore, FEMA, with the help of both federal and state governments, provided at least $21 million in grant, which was directed to help victims take care of house repairs and other disaster-related needs (The White House, n.d). The state government further established a Multi-Agency Resource Center four Disaster Recovery Centers with a specific goal of necessitating a direct meeting between recovery specialists and those affected by ...

1. Running Head: EF-5 TORNADO
1
EF-5 TORNADO
2
EF-5 Tornado, Joplin, Missouri
HCS/350
EF-5 Tornado, Joplin, Missouri
On May 22, 2011, Joplin, Missouri experienced a supercell
thunderstorm tornado that promptly intensified to generate EF-5
damage. The thunderstorm tore close to one mile path, which
generated almost total destruction across the Missouri-Kansas
state. The tornado caused the highest number of casualties in
the American history of tornadoes. 162 people were killed
thousands of other injured (Smith & Sutter, 2013). Furthermore,
the Tornado picked up and carried away in excess of 15,000
vehicles including heavy tractor-trailers and buses for hundreds
of yards. The National Weather Service reported that it found
some vehicles completely rolled into balls of bent metals. The
concrete barriers in parking lots that had been designed to stop
cars, some weighing as heavy as 300 pounds, were plucked and
tossed as far as 60 yards. The thunderstorm destroyed and
damaged roughly 7,500 homes. Additionally, at least 500
businesses with property worth $3 billion were destroyed. It is
the highest damage ever reported in America (The White House,
n.d).

2. Emergency instances attract the attention of public and
private organizations as well as individuals locally and
internationally. While emergency response is usually led by
respective government institutions, hospitals, non-governmental
organizations, and the people come in overwhelmingly to
support each other in the course of offering help. In the EF-5
tornado experienced in Joplin, Missouri, for instance,
emergency rescue operations were led by the Federal
Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). FEMA is an agency
of the American Department of Homeland Security, which was
created by the Presidential Reorganization Plan No.3 of 1978.
FEMA had 820 employees who were supported by other
personnel from 13 federal agencies. Joplin hosted numerous
both state and non-state personnel who helped in the rescue
mission. State and Federal emergency officials formed four
joint task forces to take care of the arguably the largest
recovery mission. They engaged in recovering critical
infrastructure housing, schools, and removal of debris (The
White House, n.d).
FEMA constructed about 15 temporary housing sites across
the affected area, which housed 586 families. Furthermore,
FEMA, with the help of both federal and state governments,
provided at least $21 million in grant, which was directed to
help victims take care of house repairs and other disaster-
related needs (The White House, n.d). The state government
further established a Multi-Agency Resource Center four
Disaster Recovery Centers with a specific goal of necessitating
a direct meeting between recovery specialists and those affected
by the storm. More than 7500 individuals were reached through
this initiative (Smith & Sutter, 2013).
Similarly, non-governmental organizations stepped in to
demonstrate their support for the people of Joplin. Red Cross,
for instance, stepped in with a diverse range of medical
equipment to help the affected residents. It opened a shelter in
the Missouri Southern State University gymnasium, which
hosted displaced residents (Smith & Sutter, 2013). Besides,

3. campuses around the affected areas hosted search-and-rescue
teams while colleges were home to the Federal Mortuary Team,
whose responsibility was to identify victims. The tornado
completely destroyed the John’s Regional Medical Center, the
only well-equipped medical facility in the affected area. In its
place, several medical facilities teamed up and set up a
temporary hospital to take care of surgical and other medicinal
needs. The temporary medical facility was upgraded to a
modular structure after three weeks (The White House, n.d).
Nine months thereafter, it was upgraded to a component hospital
with a 120-bed capacity.
The affected residents needed help even after the
completion of the recovery mission. In this regard, several
organizations gave long-term commitments to the people of
Joplin. For instance, the Small Business Administration
supported the business community that lost their shops by
approving $41.3 million in low-interest disaster loans to help
them rebuild their businesses. Similarly, AmeriCorps provided
volunteers to oversee several long-term operations. AmeriCorps
assembled more than 350 members from across America to
serve in the Joplin community. Their core roles were removing
debris, coordinating donations, helping homeowners with
casework, and operating distribution warehouses. Additionally,
that team has successfully coordinated a broader volunteer
effort. The White House (n.d) reported that one year after the
incident, at least 25 members of the AmeriCorps were still
living in Joplin, helping the community with legal services and
other efforts to rebuild.
Funding is always an important element in any emergency
rescue operation. The success of such operations depends on the
level of funding. The event of an emergency such as the tornado
experienced in Joplin region initiates the implementation of
legislative propositions regarding emergency funding (Smith &
Sutter, 2013). For instance, the Missouri governor, Mr. Nixon
Jay, in accordance with the state legislation on emergency

4. funding, issued an executive order that allowed higher funding
to assist response and recovery. Consequently, the State Board
of Pharmacy and the Missouri Department of Health and Senior
Services was given permission to suspend the operation of all
statutory in order to serve the interest of the public health and
safety. This executive order increased funding for purchase of
medical equipment(The White House, n.d).
Emergency issues introduce unexpected scenarios that, in
some instances, affected by legal provisions that were enacted
without consideration of such adverse conditions. In such
instances, it is the obligation of the state or federal offices to
provide a waiver to some laws and regulations that are likely to
hinder emergency rescue operations. In the Joplin case, for
instance, the state government was forced to waive some laws
and regulations. St. John’s Hospital was completely destroyed
(Smith & Sutter, 2013). Consequently, the hospital was forced
to move its operations to modular units and tents. As per the
state law and regulations, the hospital needed several
bureaucratic clearances to make such an adjustment.
Nonetheless, the state provided a two-year waiver to run a
psychological unit in a wooden building. The hospital staff
further noted that the hospital got licensing clearance so easily
because of the waiver.
The EF-5 tornado that hit Joplin, Missouri, came as a
surprise to the civilians and the weather department alike.
Rescue operations kicked off immediately the storm was over. It
started with federal and state departments and later joined by
civilians and non-governmental organizations. It is notable that
the support to the affected community did not after the rescuers
completed their work. The state, federal, business community,
and private entities continue to support the civilians for years
after the incidents. The support given to the affected community
was important in helping it recover completely (Smith & Sutter,

5. 2013).
References
Smith, D. & Sutter, D. (2013).Response and Recovery after the
Joplin Tornado: Lessons Applied and Lessons Learned. The
Independent Review, 18(2), 1086–1653
The White House. (n.d). Joplin: One year later, Retrieved from:
https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/joplin
Group projects – MKTG 410 – Consumer Behavior
Group projects will help you to practice collaborating with
other people. This is an important aspect of any future jobs that
you might take. In this class, you will have the opportunity to
work in a group to apply learning from theories into real life
examples.
Students are expected to form groups of five members by Oct
2nd to work on the projects. The sign-up sheet is provided
through blackboard. Make sure to sign up to the correct group
since it might not be possible to change the group number after
you have signed up.
Although I will offer couple of minutes in class in each session
for you to discuss the progress of group project, you are still
expected to meet out of class to work together. You can either
meet in person or via Zoom and other available collaboration
technologies. You are expected to submit one paragraph every
week (for five specified weeks) about the progress of the
project. Specifically mention when and how you met, which
group members were present, and what are some of the ideas

6. that have been discussed. You should make this submission
through the assigned area on blackboard. Each week, one group
member is responsible to submit the weekly report. You should
mention the name of the person who submitted the report as
well.
· Make sure to cooperate with others in your group. There are
some rare cases that one student will completely become
unresponsive to intragroup communications and does nothing
related to the project. In order to address this matter of free
ridership, the members of a group can unanimously fire a team
member by Oct 10th, 2019. The fired student then will have to
write a project of his/her own (10 pages long).
· If there is a concern that one or more of the group members
are not cooperative enough, other group members can ask for
peer evaluation. Peer Evaluation is a confidential survey that
will be filled by all the students after the final submission of the
project. This is how it works: if the team members in a group
evaluate a given student with 80, 85, and 90 for his/her
performance (average= 85) and the grade for the project is 90.
The student will receive (.85*90=76.5) as his/her grade for the
project.
Here are the deliverables of your group work:
· Submit the final group project idea by Oct 9th
· Weekly group progress report
· Diversity assignment by Nov 4th
· Final group project (written report and presentation) on Nov
27th
There are two independent projects that you will need to work
on in your groups. One of them is the final group project (15%
of final grade) and the other one is the diversity assignment (5%
of final grade). More information about these projects are
provided below:
Final group project. Students are required to form groups of five

7. by signing up to groups on blackboard by Oct 2nd. The
objective of this project is to deepen students' understanding of
the utility of the consumer behavior concepts discussed in class
and to sharpen your appreciation of the difficulties encountered
when trying to apply those concepts in a real business context.
This project accounts for 15% of your final grade. The project
requires each team to develop a well-detailed and supported
profile of consumers of some product or service to be selected
by the team members. In order to understand consumers it is
necessary:
(1) To describe them in terms of demographics and lifestyles,
and identify a useful basis (or bases) for segmenting the market
(2) To highlight those factors that affect consumer's perception
of the product consumption
(3) To understand the impact of learning on consumption
(4) To determine how consumers attitudes form and change by
marketing communication activities of the company
(5) To explicate the nature of the typical purchase decision
process for the product category
（The #5 is the part of the task I need to complete And I need to
answer follow questions:
what are the positive sides of marketing communications
(ads,promotions etc.)
How wold you change the marketing communications
to improve it?
I have to write three pages and discuss：
-identify me pro duct / prand
- provide pictvres of the ads or links to the Comexcial
-Answer the above
The brand we analyzed in our group is Walmart.
Your presentation and final report should cover all of five
questions mentioned above.
This project has multiple deliverables. First, each group is
required to email their topic (consumers of a product or service)
to me by Oct 9th for my approval. Second, you are required to
make a 10-minute final presentation (end of quarter) and a 15-

8. page (max) report of your project (due at the presentation date).
All group members must be present at the presentation date. For
more information about the group projects, refer to the assigned
section in blackboard. You must submit weekly progress reports
for this group project.
Format: Your paper should be double-spaced with 1-inch
margins, and you should use 12-point, Times New Roman font.
All the sections listed above together should be about 15 pages
long. Number your pages. Be sure to also include a
reference/bibliography section.
Diversity Assignment. This group project aims to study the
multicultural marketing activities by companies. You are
expected to work on this project throughout chapter 13 when we
discuss subcultures. As a group, think about one product or
brand that is targeted to a specific ethnic subculture.
• What are the positive sides of the marketing communications
(ads, promotions etc )?
• How would you change the marketing communications to
improve it?
• You have to write three pages and discuss:
– Identify the product/brand
– Provide pictures of the ads or links to the commercials
– Answer the above questions
• Submit your work as a group through blackboard by Nov 4th
end of the day.
Final Group Project
Walmart
Julia Madrid
Mou Zhang
Nawaf Alhayef
Nora Perez Ruiz
Rosa Servin
* The project requires each team to develop a well-detailed and
supported profile of consumers of some product or service to be

9. selected by the team members. In order to understand
consumers, it is necessary:
(1) To describe them in terms of demographics and lifestyles,
and identify a useful basis (or bases) for segmenting the market
(2) To highlight those factors that affect consumer's perception
of the product consumption
(3) To understand the impact of learning on consumption
(4) To determine how consumers attitudes form and change by
marketing communication activities of the company
(5) To explicate the nature of the typical purchase decision
process for the product category
Rosa: The success of every business, company, organization, or
retail depends on how many customers they are able to sell their
product or service. We all know that but do we all understand
what it takes or how much effort it takes to be able to convince
the consumer to even consider your product in this modern,
dense with competition world?! Businesses spend a good
amount of time and money to psychological research of their
ideal consumer, they need to know what people buy and why,
the consumer’s identity, social status, decision-making process,
and so much more additional information. Customers, on the
other hand, want companies to understand them and offer them
the best product they need and want for the best price they can
afford, and obviously, Walmart is doing a great job at that,
considering they are number one on the Fortune 500 list and for
the sixth year in a row.
Demographics is one of the oldest and widely used ways to
segment the consumer base, it is been around for so long that
businesses nowadays are starting to forget about it and try to
move on to more modern and interesting approaches. But there
is a reason why Walmart still relies heavily on this aspect of
segmentation. The world is changing, families are not what they
used to be, fertility rates are declining, the age and income
distribution are shifting, and all of this is affecting the
businesses. The decreasing birth rate and more and more people

10. deciding to have fewer kids or none at all mean fewer people
shopping. Another interesting point is that the younger
generations’ lives are completely different than the baby
boomers, they used to have more buying power, more
opportunities and less debt, so they were able to spend more
money shopping. The population is aging, there will be over 60
million people over the age of 65 in the next five years, and
unfortunately, a lot of retailers fail to notice this fact, adjust
their target audience and stop favoring the 24-to-44 age
demographic.
Walmart has a vast and growing consumer population because
they have a wide-range target audience. Their low prices and
great quality products attract people from all demographics and
lifestyles. You can walk into any Walmart and know its a one
stop shop, from their grocery section to their automotive
services. This welcomes all busy mothers that don’t want to go
to 3 different stores to pick up a quick dinner, diapers and get
an oil change all at the same time.
Segmentations have also been used to help keep their stores
organized and maximize consumer spending. For example,
keeping all of the clothes segmented by age, and gender,or
keeping the food all the way in the back. Walmart has a segment
for all types of people.It does not matter their age, or gender
there are products and services for everyone. It takes a lot of
planning on how a store will be set up. Usually Walmarts have
their food areas all the way to the back of the store to insure
that you walk through 1 or 2 aisle before you get to your
destination and on your way there you find something you need
or would like. They also have all different kinds of departments
that will attract people from all different intrences. They have
the outdoors area next to the hunting gear so you can see
something that you might be missing. They also have the
automobile, tool and housing department together because these
aisles are targeting a handyman kind of person. All of the
electronics are part of the store to attract students and other
gamers. All of these segments have a purpose and a target

11. audience to help entice the consumers.
NAWAF:
To determine how consumers attitudes form and change by
marketing communication activities of the Wal-Mart Company
Customers comprise of a very important asset to a business. The
success of any company depends partly on other input factors
and largely on the number of customers it can sell its products
and services to. it is common knowledge that all businesses
should seek to expand their market share by attracting and
retaining the existing customers but most people in management
do not know the strategies to use to convince customers and
attract them to their business and product in this modern
competitive times. Wal-Mart has spent a great amount of money
on marketing since it was formed and even after becoming the
leading retail company in the world, it still spends a fortune on
marketing.
Before presenting anything for sale to the customer, Walmart
starts by knowing the customer. Demography is one of the key
attributes that are used in customer segmentation. Different
Walmart stores display and present products to the customers
based on the characteristics of the populations have at different
times. The Approach used by the company in the 1980s may not
be applied today. The changing demographic factors such as
family size, age, and income distribution affect the decision
making of the company’s marketing department. For example, a
decrease in birth rates and the existence of smaller family sizes
as well as more people has led to a decline in sales of children's
products and focusing more on the aging population. Lack of
focus on the population characteristics may lead to losses and
eventual closure of the business.
Businesses spent more time and money on marketing to
convince their ideal customers to keep on buying from them to
keep the business running and revenue coming. The marketing
process starts from research and development where the
company engages in surveying to know what the customer

12. needs, at what time, price and the reason why one product is
more demanded than the other. Customer needs keep on
changing due to changes in psychological welfare, social status,
demographics, consumer’s identity, changes in government
policies and availability of alternative goods. These factors
contribute to changing the consumer attitude towards a product
and the producer must keep the customer informed as much as
possible to keep the relationship alive. On the other hand,
customers want a company that understands them, their
decision-making process, the amount they are able and willing
to pay for a product and service and the quality of the product
that can serve them the best. When there is a disconnect
between what companies avail to the market and what the
customer needs there is likely to be a poor relationship between
the two parties due to the presence of unsatisfied needs. Wal-
Mart has been doing a great job to win the customers and
creating an environment where the customers can feel free to
shop based on the information presented to them, and the
product and service delivery process of the company.
Benchmark Assignment—Disaster Response, Part 2 instructions
Review the vignette you selected in Week Three (Joplin, Mo.
EF-5 tornado)
Research an after action report for the disaster discussed in the
vignette you selected in Week Three. Use your web browser to
search for an after action report. Consider using the search term
“after action report” with the disaster name. For example, if you
selected the first vignette, you can use the search term “Joplin,
Mo. EF-5 tornado after action report.” You will use what you
read and learned about the disaster from the after action report
to create an emergency operation plan in Week Five.
Write a 1,400- to 1,750-word paper in which you:

13. · Evaluate the use of resources detailed in the after action report
for the vignette you selected.
· Evaluate the technology available during the disaster in the
vignette you selected.
· Critique decision-making processes used during the emergency
response in the vignette selected.
· Critique the implementation of the incident command system
and management of support personnel during the emergency
response in the vignette selected.
· Generate three recommendations that would advance the field
of emergency management after a disaster like the one in the
vignette selected.
Cite 3 peer-reviewed, scholarly, or similar references to support
your paper.
Format your paper according to APA guidelines.