Mr. Gerard Akaka, an Associate with Booz Allen Hamilton, has 20 years of combined experience in Emergency Management (EM) planning and operations, Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear (CBRN), training & exercises, and cybersecurity. Mr. Akaka served in the U.S. Air National Guard from 2001-2013 as an Emergency Manager where he assumed roles as a training instructor, operations manager, and exercise planner. He served on two tours of duty during Operations Iraqi and Enduring Freedom where he implemented emergency management programs and maintained emergency response plans. Mr. Akaka continued to support a wide range of programs and projects within the Department of Defense (DoD) and State governments with Booz Allen Hamilton. He has assumed planning roles to the State of Hawaii Catastrophic Hurricane Readiness Response Plan Initiative, on behalf of the Federal Management Emergency Agency (FEMA). He also assumed extensive roles as an international military partnership engagement planner and a multi-functional exercise planner within the U.S and abroad. Mr. Akaka currently serves as a DoD cybersecurity analyst providing risk assessments for military missions and operations.

Marcus Landon Aydlett is the Warning Coordination Meteorologist (WCM) at the National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office in Guam (WFO). There since June 2010 as a forecaster, he became the WCM in May 2020, serving as the WFO’s liaison to its vast Area of Responsibility which encompasses the western North Pacific islands from Palau to the Marshall Islands, the Territory of Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. With a passion for communication and outreach, he engages the region through heavy weather briefs and early warning communications to regional homeland security partners, 3 U.S. Embassies, USAID, and other territorial and national partners. He’s also advanced weather communications on Guam by partnering with Guam’s KUAM-TV to deliver a weekly weather segment on the Monday morning news broadcast and writing a bi-weekly weather column in the local Pacific Daily News. Internationally, Aydlett represents the U.S. as part of the U.S. delegation to the U.N.’s Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific/World Meteorological Organization’s 14-member nation Typhoon Committee, where he serves as Vice Chair of the Disaster Risk Reduction Working Group.