Areas throughout the southeast and other parts of the United States faced drought conditions of increasingly catastrophic proportions during late 2007 and early 2008, and North Carolina was no exception. Traditional conservation measures and restrictions to outdoor water uses were no longer sufficient to adequately reduce demands on water systems. To facilitate interagency dialog on ways to address the drought, the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources Division of Water Resources and the Department of Crime Control and Public Safety Emergency Management Division hosted a drought tabletop exercise. Water utilities used the tabletop exercise as well as a draft drought‐response toolbox to help them decide on response actions for worsening drought conditions. The tabletop exercises described in this article can be used by state water agencies anywhere in the United States to prepare for a drought. States and water systems can create and conduct drought exercises like the ones described here, add drought factors and actions to their emergency response plans, and work with other state and local agencies to include drought scenarios in other types of security and emergency response training exercises.

SynopsisThe paper is an investigation into the withdrawal rates of seven Scottish Offices and covers the years 1972-76 with an appendix giving the results for 1977.The rates were basically analysed by class and duration with further investigations mainly on the 1976 data by age at entry, sex, size of sum assured, premium paying term, premium payment frequency and by type of agent introducing the business. Comparisons were made of the level of withdrawal rates among the various Offices and also the variations from year to year separately. A graduation of the combined data for 1975 and 1976 for each of the five main classes was carried out.