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2.2.4 DROUGHT A drought is a long period of time with significantly lower precipitation levels. Droughts can cause water shortages, which may lead to voluntary or mandatory restrictions on water use. Very severe droughts can reduce available water to the point where water demand exceeds supply, which may create a health risk. However, these severe impacts are usually limited to rural communities. Communities that rely on imported water are also at risk of drought events in the areas where their water comes from. Droughts affect all of Redwood City equally, although any resulting water conservation efforts may have different impacts on different residents and businesses. As most of the City's water comes from the Hetch Hetchy watershed, approximately 140 miles away, droughts in this region may be more harmful than local droughts. Droughts are a regular feature of California's climate, and have occurred multiple times in Redwood City's history. Most recently, a statewide drought occurred from 2012 to 2017, and was considered the most severe drought in at least the past 1,200 years. Other substantial droughts have occurred in 2006-2009, 1987-1992, 1976-1977, and 1928-1934, and presumably earlier years. Droughts are expected to continue to occur on occasion in Redwood City. It is likely that climate change will affect droughts by altering temperature and precipitation patterns, resulting in more frequent and/or more intense drought events throughout California. It is unclear how often droughts that pose a significant threat to Redwood City's water supply may occur, but such events remain a possibility. 2.2.5 TRANSPORTATION INCIDENT A transportation incident is any sort of vehicular crash. The vehicles involved are usually cars, trucks, or other automobiles. Less common are railway, aircraft, and watercraft crashes. One vehicle may crash into another, or a single vehicle may experience a crash due to human error, mechanical failure, poor conditions, or other factors. Vehicles crashes have a risk of injuring or killing people in the vehicles or nearby. Vehicular crashes can cause congestion and potentially damage buildings or facilities. If the vehicles are carrying any hazardous materials, the crash may rupture the storage container and cause a hazardous materials incident. Small-scale vehicular crashes occur daily in the City, although the majority of these do not cause significant injury. More serious crashes are a rarer occurrence in the community although chartered bus service through the City is increasing raising the likelihood of a large-scale transportation incident. All expectations are that vehicle crashes will continue to occur, although improvements in vehicle technology may help reduce the rate of crashes or the rate of resulting injuries. 2.2.6 PUBLIC HEALTH EMERGENCY (EPIDEMIC AND PANDEMIC) Public health emergencies refer to widespread infections of diseases, which often significantly harm persons who contract them and may be fatal. Such emergencies often begin as an outbreak, which is the sudden emergence of a disease in a specific area or an increase in the rate of the disease far above normal levels. If multiple such outbreaks appear to be similar in nature and coming from a particular source, it is termed an epidemic. If the epidemic spreads worldwide, it is dubbed a pandemic. Influenza is a common 12