I DO! Having lived my whole life in the Bay Area and going through the Loma Prieta quake of '89, I would say I'm a little obsessed with earthquakes. Not that I like or enjoy them, but that I am constantly thinking I'm feeling one and checking the USGS Earthquake page on about a weekly basis. This past weekend I was awoken by a quake at 3:30 am. I live in a big brick building built in the 1930's and it hit me that I may need to think about updating my emergency kits and finally getting that family disaster plan written!
I started doing some research and found that the USGS website has a great page on preparedness and offers free handbooks on how to write a family disaster plan, build disaster kits taylored to your household and what to do during and after a quake happens. These handbooks can be read online, downloaded, or you can request a physical copy. I have ordered a few copies and would be happy to supply to anyone who wants one. Might be a good thing to actually keep IN your disaster kit...
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/prepare/
Another great resource is the American Red Cross website. They offer disaster preparedness classes either online or on-site at our place of business or neighborhood community center. If you live in an apartment building, you can even arrange to have someone come to your building and provide information to you and your neighbors about making a building safety plan. They also help with making pet disaster plans as well. We can't forget about our fuzzies in an emergency!
http://www.redcrossbayarea.org/general.asp?SN=5011&OP=7973&SUOP=8235&IDCapitulo=VA24T92924
Hopefully we will never need to use our disaster plans and the contents of our disaster kits will continue to expire unused. But it's always better to be safe than sorry!
I started doing some research and found that the USGS website has a great page on preparedness and offers free handbooks on how to write a family disaster plan, build disaster kits taylored to your household and what to do during and after a quake happens. These handbooks can be read online, downloaded, or you can request a physical copy. I have ordered a few copies and would be happy to supply to anyone who wants one. Might be a good thing to actually keep IN your disaster kit...
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/prepare/
Another great resource is the American Red Cross website. They offer disaster preparedness classes either online or on-site at our place of business or neighborhood community center. If you live in an apartment building, you can even arrange to have someone come to your building and provide information to you and your neighbors about making a building safety plan. They also help with making pet disaster plans as well. We can't forget about our fuzzies in an emergency!
http://www.redcrossbayarea.org/general.asp?SN=5011&OP=7973&SUOP=8235&IDCapitulo=VA24T92924
Hopefully we will never need to use our disaster plans and the contents of our disaster kits will continue to expire unused. But it's always better to be safe than sorry!
RSS Feed