Avoiding the pitfalls of outdated disaster recovery plans

When Superstorm Sandy hit the New York City area in late 2012, the New York Stock Exchange closed for two days. In one sense, the NYSE was fortunate: many businesses in the region went without power for weeks. Eighteen hundred flights were cancelled. The New York City transit authority suspended public transportation and closed Manhattan bridges and tunnels. Twenty-five percent of cell towers were damaged, a‡ecting service from virtually every mobile telecommunications carrier.

Superstorm Sandy wasn’t the worst storm to ever hit the northeastern United States. But because enterprises now depend on technology, including the technology that makes information and applications continuously available, Sandy tested many businesses’ disaster recovery plans. It challenged organizations to think about the availability of key resources—including people, technology, data and space—in ways they had not before.