Tsunamis?! But we live in SA!

This week, Dr. Rat­ner tells us about prepar­ing for the unex­pected. What’s in your emer­gency kit?

Dr. Rat­ner

Most of us here in San Anto­nio do not know that this week is Tsunami Pre­pared­ness week. Just because San Anto­nio is only a lit­tle more likely than Salt Lake City to suf­fer the direct effects of a tsunami there are lots of lessons we can learn from this week.

1. Really bad things hap­pen, even if they’re not very likely to hap­pen. So, do you need life vests? Prob­a­bly not, but you should think of some basic items and pro­ce­dures for any unplanned cat­a­stro­phe. Events that hap­pen far away can have rip­ple effects. Are you pre­pared if your plant closes down because you can’t get parts or your cus­tomers are unavailable?
2. We may not be at risk for a tsunami, but what about a flash flood?
3. How hard would it be to store 5 gal­lons of water and a few days of canned or dehy­drated foods, or some mac­a­roni and cheese for each mem­ber of your house­hold? You could fit a few days’ worth under each person’s bed.
4. Can you put together a small plas­tic type tool­box with a few screw­drivers, a pair of pli­ers, some duct tape, a util­ity knife, some zip ties, a hack­saw and a flashlight?
5. Take a few min­utes and dis­cuss with your fam­ily and your extended fam­ily where and when you will meet in the event of fire, black­outs or other disasters.
6. Once a month buy a few extra AA, AAA,C, D and 9 volt bat­ter­ies, and switch out your used bat­ter­ies with your cur­rent stock. This will prove very use­ful if there’s a power outage.

This is not an all-encompassing list, but it is easy, inex­pen­sive and really use­ful when the expected happens.

It’s not some­thing we want to think about every day, but if we’re pre­pared it can turn a dis­as­trous sit­u­a­tion into some­thing that’s just dif­fi­cult. The Amer­i­can Red Cross has some great resources and advice for all kinds of sit­u­a­tions here. And a tool to help you esti­mate how much you’ll need of every­thing here based on your house­hold. Always remem­ber we’re here to help at IUC, but we hope you have a happy and safe weekend!

The unex­pected strikes…unexpectedly.

Photo credit: United Nations Devel­op­ment Pro­gramme / Foter.com / CC BY