Tommy Yeung
Lingnan University Library

In spite of the fact that I have been responsible for reader services for many years, rarely do I need to think about a major disaster that calls upon crisis management in my library.  Libraries in Hong Kong are solidly built in concrete such that the buildings are immune from typhoons and rainstorms.  The fire prevention measures are set at a high international standard.  It is also fortunate that we are not in an earthquake zone.  Therefore, my attention is primarily focused on service development and enhancement rather than preparation for a sudden crisis.

I was away from my library attending a training workshop organized by the HKU Libraries and the Association of Research Libraries when SARS forced the suspension of school classes.  As the disease had been spreading in the community, there was mounting public anxiety.  At that time we knew little about the disease or the virus itself and were not sure what should be the proper actions to take.  Although I had not been in the library for five days, I called back to office everyday to check what decision and actions had been considered and taken by my university.  Library staff were encouraged to take preventive measures, e.g., wearing face masks at service counters, that we believed might help.

The decision to suspend university classes came out of a sudden.  As we had considered different scenarios and planned beforehand, as soon as the university sent out a formal announcement on class suspension, all staff and students were informed by email on arrangement of due items and library services matters.  We did not receive too many enquiries on book renewals, library services, etc.  The library management also quickly re-adjusted the number of staff on duty in the next couple of weeks to reflect the decreasing service demand.  All responses took place in the afternoon of 28 March.

Although librarians were not on the frontline to combat against SARS, we took up new responsibility during the period.  From 31 March, we started to offer a special topic on the Lingnan Digital Library (http://www.library.ln.edu.hk/misc/special/sars.html).  This special topic provided links to important and useful websites that would enable our users to obtain remotely the latest information on the disease and related information.  We also digitized more than a dozen media programmes on SARS for public access.  As we see, there were excellent examples of creative use of IT in offering information services from some library institutions.  Cases included the deployment ofvideo-conferencing technology in instruction, online conference, etc.  Libraries were keeping up with our roles in information services.

My observation is: librarians are well alert of the changes in our external environment and quick to make decisions in responding to new circumstances.  We tried our best to ensure the flow of information even in the time of emergency.  With the advance of digital library technologies and the support of computer networks, we can assure our users that even though the libraries do not permit physical access or users cannot come to libraries for any reason, we are still able to serve them and support their information needs.  The crisis of SARS has just proved our strength.