Tag: emergency supplies

This past year we’ve seen image after image of people emerging from the debris after tornados, trapped in long lines of cars to avoid a hurricane, escaping from a burning building in the midst of alarms and smoke. Were all these disasters totally unexpected? No!

Today, we are seeing more disaster images – people trying to escape sudden danger in Ukraine. And yet, that situation wasn’t totally unexpected, either. Let’s take a look.

The first images I saw yesterday were of Ukrainians who had rushed into underground subway stations to avoid explosions.

They were jammed in but seemed warm enough, and calm. Still, I didn’t see any supplies that would keep them comfortable for hours. Did you have the same questions I do?

• Do they have anything to eat?
• What about water?
• What about babies with no formula?
• How were hundreds of people able to use the toilet?
• Did they have any idea of what was going on above ground?

Today, the next day, the danger is no longer totally unexpected. People are taking action to protect themselves.

Today the news shows people fleeing Ukraine for neighboring countries. Some are walking across the border, abandoning household and pets “just to get somewhere safe!” Some are running out of gas in long lines of cars stretched across the countryside. Others, deeper inland in Ukraine, are crowding onto train station platforms, hoping to get a place on an outbound train.

Today, most of these people have a suitcase or backpack. But what about their future?

• How long will it take for them to get across the border?
• What will happen when they arrive?
• Where will they go? Or where will they end up?
• What about family members who have gotten separated?

I have questions about the people we don’t see in the news.

Those left behind. Those who are unable to walk or who have no money for trains or simply no place to go to. How are they faring now? What will happen to them in coming days?

Most of these questions remain unanswered as of right now. But the message for this Advisory is . . .

Emergencies aren’t always “natural disasters.” And they seldom are totally unexpected.

What’s going on today in Europe is a good reminder that there are many, many events that can result in emergencies. (In our business books we list 97 different threats!) But few of them should be totally unexpected.

It’s also a good idea to remember that many emergencies require the same or a very similar immediate response.

Of course, we can’t possibly be prepared for everything, but we can surely be prepared for an immediate response to whatever hits.

Here at Emergency Plan Guide we’ve examined that immediate response many times. A quick summary:

1. The more we pay attention – to the weather, the news, political developments, etc. – the more likely we’ll have time to pack up some essentials in case things come apart. Having a Go-Bag already packed keeps you from being one of the victims that ends up stuffing some clothes into a pillowcase or plastic bag and having to make do with that!
2. Having a family plan for re-connecting during or after an emergency can keep family members focused on immediate needs instead of spending valuable time worrying.
3. Building a store of essential emergency supplies means that empty shelves in stores won’t terrify you. (We’ve heard that stores in Kyiv are already empty . . .) Supplies need to include non-perishable food, water, warm clothing, lighting, prescriptions, list of emergency contacts.
4. If you have imagined and talked over how you might respond to expected emergencies – power outage, storm, riot, nuclear accident, hazardous chemical spill, whatever – you’ll have more confidence that you’ll be able to respond. Practicing with your basic emergency tools – radio, lantern, cookstove – will add more confidence. So will having a tank full of gas.
5. Should you take some basic preparedness actions now?

Mindset makes all the difference to effective preparedness.

The more Joe and I are active in the world of emergency preparedness and response, the more importance we give to mindset or attitude! What a huge difference between a wild-eyed “What shall we do???” and a firm “We can handle this!” 

Emergencies are part of life, to be expected. When they are anticipated, you’ll be far more able to get through them without them turning into a disaster.

Let’s treat the current situation in Ukraine as a valuable reminder of preparedness essentials.

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team

P.S. I know you know, but if this is a good time for a review, don’t forget our mini-series booklets.  They’re laid out with questions and answers. Easy to read, easy to get ideas from. Here are a few that might be particularly helpful for this review:

Pre-Disaster Plan. Number 1 in our series because it deals with the toughest challenge of all – getting started on a plan. Major emphasis on coping with disaster when you or other family members are not at home. https://amzn.to/3aEswjk

Emergency Cash. How much cash do you need to shelter in place? To evacuate by car or train? Where to get cash/money and how to store it? https://amzn.to/2VNLm2X

Custom Go-Bags. Able to take you and your family through the first 3 days of an emergency – as long as the bags are customized AND ready to be grabbed. https://amzn.to/2vEmrow

There are 10 more titles in the series. You can see them all here.

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So many disasters happening this week! Where’s the positive progress???

My attention has been drawn from the incredible wildfires here in California to political blowups in Washington D.C. to the aftermath of a monster tornado hit in Texas. I’ve read about home solar battery explosions, the threat of Boeing’s 737 MAX, vaping addiction and deaths among high-schoolers, and tonight, to ever-wider PSPS’s . . .there’s just more happening than I can keep up with!

(Oh yes, PSPS is the newest acronym, standing for Public Safety Power Shut-offs. That’s the deliberate shut-down of power by the utility companies here in California in an attempt to avoid more fires during this hot, dry, and windy weather.)

So I decided to turn away from all the bad news and focus on some good news.

And I’m starting with a note from one of our readers that was positive progress personified!

Here’s what I received earlier this week from Suzi.

Hi Virginia! On my birthday in September I asked my family to lend me a hand to create a dedicated emergency supplies cupboard. We emptied a cupboard, built some shelves, and stocked it with all of our Go bags, a big first aid kit, an emergency radio, lanterns, gloves, etc. Nearby is a closet where we store sleeping bags, a tent, and canned food. I’m a CERT/CMAP member and I feel like I’ve finally made good progress on my preparedness to-do list. I enjoy reading your advisories and I continue to learn about how to react in an emergency. If you’d like, I can send you a snapshot of my new cupboard. Thank you!

Well naturally I responded to her invitation with an enthusiastic “Yes, please!’

So she wrote: Here is the dedicated cupboard! It’s a space we made under the stairs. On the door you can see the list of phone numbers for family members. We also have an extensive notebook with pertinent financial info, birth certificates, etc. One of the best items in this cupboard is an Icon Lifesaver Jerrycan which allows us to filter any questionable water (lake, pool, tap water under a boil water order). https://iconlifesaver.com/product/lifesaver-jerrycan-starter-pack/

Check it out and let me know what you think!

Suzi’s note and photo have inspired a lot of questions and comments.

Such a good idea – finding useful storage space where there wasn’t any before!

Stairs and staircases are a perfect example of “lost” space that can be recovered.  Two-story homes often have whole strange-shaped rooms under stairs, perfect for storage. Any home with a porch may have space underneath that can be converted to emergency storage. Some of our neighbors have storage bins fastened to the roof in their garage (over the garage door tracks). We even use part of our Public Storage unit for storing emergency supplies. (The facility is located within walking distance of our home.)

Sometimes you have to create storage space if you want to make positive progress. What’s been YOUR most original and/or useful discovery?

What stands out for me in the photo of Suzi’s supply cabinet?

• The list of important phone numbers and contact information fastened to the inside of the door! It looks as if it could easily be removed and stuffed into a Go-Bag, too, if necessary. (Joe and I have so many bits of “important information” that we have had to scan and store them on flash drives. But since we likely won’t have computers in an emergency, we have to have them on paper, too. The trick is to know exactly where they are.)
• Items in see-through containers. This cupboard is awfully neat; as it fills up, as it is bound to do, having items in see-through plastic holders will make it so much easier to find what you’re looking for. I remember finding see-through soft zippered suitcase packing cubes at Amazon that might stack wonderfully on these irregularly-shaped shelves.
• Duct tape. No need to comment about that except to be happy to see it! Do you have scissors and a knife? Not everyone can tear it easily. (This comment applies to all tools. Only collect and store tools that work and tools that you or family members can use safely.)
• Icon Lifesaver Jerrycan for purifying water. I can’t identify it in the picture –  Is it hidden deep in one of the shelves? — but the more I hear about long-lasting outages, the more sensible a water purifying system sounds. (As you know from reading my Advisories, I have a number of small water purifying devices from LifeStraw, and have read good things about the family-size Berkey purifier.)
• The full-sized First Aid Kit. One of my neighbors opened the trunk of her car today to get out a shopping bag, and I saw a small first aid kit fastened near the wheel well. I didn’t say anything but I wondered . . . How long had it been there – in the heat and cold? How much useful stuff could possibly be inside such a small box? I think we’re often too casual with our first aid supplies.
• The LED light. That’s a great one – so compact!  (Here we have to be ready for an earthquake so we have a flashlight or lantern in every single room including one on each side of the bed.)

Suzi, your picture inspires one additional planning piece . . .

Just in studying the picture and in writing about all these emergency supplies I realize that at some point you may have to add another piece of paper to the door: a diagram listing everything in the cupboard and showing where it is located! 

As you know, I love lists and use them for just about everything, but I must admit to one challenge I haven’t solved. And that’s a good way to pack/store/keep track of my CERT duffel bags. We have a variety of them on the floor in a closet, and unfortunately I pull one or the other out for a different purpose – demonstration, first aid exercise, actual turnout to look for a missing person — add just what I want for that day, and then put the bag back at the end of the day. The next time I can’t remember what’s in which bag and find myself sorting through them all . . .  

Dear Reader, what’s your best suggestion for keeping track of my stuff in duffel bags?

So hasn’t this been an Advisory of a different style!? Thanks to Suzi for getting us all started in taking another look at our emergency supplies and how and where we have them stored. Again, please share your own positive progress stories. They help us all!

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team

P.S. Another cool thing about Suzi’s cupboard is that when it’s closed the valuable items inside are hidden from the casual observer. It’s important to be discrete about preparedness supplies so as not to draw uninvited attention.

P.P.S. I invite you to add to this conversation. The more positive progress we share, the more we’ll all be rewarded with good ideas! Drop me a line via the CONTACT form and we’ll see how to package your suggestions for everyone’s benefit.

How would you rate your everyday survival habits?

It’s such fun to get caught up in whether your next knife should be full tang or folding, or maybe assisted folding. Whether you need a sleeping bag that has synthetic insulation or goose down. Whether to buy last year’s model hand-held radio (to save a lot) or splurge on the very latest version.

These are fun decisions and here at Emergency Plan Guide we engage with them just like you do.

But these decisions are one-time. What we want to talk about today are:

Simple survival habits as second nature.

As you know, we are part of a neighborhood emergency preparedness group. A lot of what we do is aimed at getting other neighbors to take even their FIRST step toward preparedness!

Actually, we work on at least a dozen survival habits, trying to turn them into second nature to improve the readiness and resilience of the whole community.

Below is a recent list of survival habits we’re trying to instill in everyone around us. As you look through the list, ask yourself.

• How well do you measure up?
• What steps would you add for your neighborhood group?
• How will you share the list with them?

20 Easy and Smart Automatic Survival Habits

1 – Heading to the grocery store? Buy just one or two extra cans of food for your emergency supplies. You don’t have to stockpile everything all at once!

2 – Adding to your emergency food supplies? Be sure to get things you like and eat regularly. That way, you can eat from the front of the shelf and replace at the back.

3 – Building a better emergency kit for your car? You may be able to get a used backpack or tote bag at Goodwill – cheap, serviceable, and unnoticeable.

4 – Keep your car half full of gas all the time. (I keep mine 3/4 full!) Nothing worse than being caught in a traffic jam, watching that gas gauge go down and down!

5 – Keep your car locked when it’s parked, even at home. An unlocked car is an invitation a passerby might not be able to resist.

6 – Whenever you go into a building – theater, store, school – get in the habit of noting the location of other exits. In an emergency you may want to avoid the way you came in. This survival habit may save your life in an active shooter situation.

7 – Update the emergency info on your refrigerator at least twice a year, when the time changes. Have there been changes in your medications? The phone numbers of your emergency contacts?

8 – Don’t have the Vial of Life info on your refrigerator? Here’s what we did with our group.

9 – Need help? Can’t call loudly enough to be heard outside your home? Consider adding a simple whistle to your key ring or someplace else where you can reach it in an emergency.

10 – Flying? Keep your shoes on for the first 3 minutes after take-off. That’s the most dangerous time, and if you have to evacuate you don’t want to do it bare-footed!

11 – Teach your grandchildren their first name and last name. Absolutely necessary if they get separated from their parents.

12 – When you’re planning for emergencies, start your planning with the most likely emergencies, not the most severe. For most people, the most likely emergency is a power outage. Not too hard to plan for! All you need right away is emergency lighting and a way to keep warm.

13 – Heat wave and no A/C? Don’t try to tough it out! Put up shades to block the sun coming in the windows. Take a cold bath. Drape yourself with wet washcloths and towels.

14 – Power out during cold weather? Pick a small room, hang or tape blankets over the windows and door, get into bed with blankets.

15 – Best emergency lighting? Inflatable solar lanterns and/or battery-powered lanterns. It should go without saying that you have a flashlight in every room, with extra batteries handy.

16 – After a couple of days of eating out of cans, you’ll really appreciate having condiments to spruce up the taste! When you are out, collect packets of BBQ sauce, honey, jelly, soy sauce, ketchup, syrup, etc. for your emergency food stash.

17 – Canned meat may not taste so good, but it will give you the same protein as fresh meat – and will last for years. Add canned chicken, tuna in oil, and spam to your supplies.

18 – Don’t forget to refresh your first aid kit. Throw out dried up bottles or anything that’s gotten wet. You may want to add liquid skin as a new way to treat scrapes and cuts.

19 – Be sure to store an old pair of shoes, comfortable for walking, in your car. Heels or flip-flops won’t work if you have to hike for help!

20 – If you haven’t done it yet, freeze some plastic containers filled with water. (Leave space at the top for the water to expand.) Use the containers to keep your freezer fully packed. Saves energy when you have electricity, provides emergency water when you don’t!

Do all these ideas sound familiar?

Have you taken any of these steps and/or practiced them more than once? Have they become automatic survival habits?

I hope the answer is yes!

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team

P.S. Here’s something that you may find it interesting in light of the things we’ve talked about lately.

It turns out that Amazon (where we are Associates) has a service called PRIME PANTRY where you can buy everyday first aid, household, cereals, packaged items, etc. – what they call “everyday essentials” – and have them delivered for free. You don’t have to buy huge quantities, either.

Click on the ad to find out more. This may be a convenient way for your group to stock up on some of the things you want for your survival kits.

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Your CERT investment

How are you using your CERT training? (Check all that apply.)

• I’m adding more and better gear to my green CERT bag.
• I’m working on immediate family members to develop better “situational awareness.” Not always with much success.
• When the subject comes up, I encourage neighbors and co-workers to take the training.
• I have joined a neighborhood emergency response group.
• I have decided to START a neighborhood emergency response group.

As you may have gathered by now, Joe and I don’t think getting CERT training is enough. Oh, yes, it’s valuable.

But “saving” it just for yourself or your family is like getting a double barreled shotgun and only ever using one barrel. Or getting bunk beds and only ever sleeping in one. Or getting . . . well, you can come up with another example of letting half of a really good thing go to waste!

In this case, it’s wasting all the good information that will help OTHER PEOPLE save themselves in a disaster.

Because that’s our philosophy, we’re always thrilled when we hear from people that they have made a successful effort to share good information.

A Better Return on Investment

Two weeks ago I heard from an Emergency Plan Guide Advisory reader that her mobilehome park was having a big Disaster Team meeting with several speakers. She reported that over 70 people had already signed up! Why? . . . free pizza, salad and beverages provided by Park Management!

Naturally that news made me want to share the meeting that we held last week in our community. We didn’t get 70, but almost that many people. And what made it different was the sponsorship of our local hardware store.

Plan a successful emergency response team meeting

Over the years I’ve written up “lesson plans” for neighborhood meetings and events. So here’s another one that perhaps you can use to “spread the word” in your own community. If the woman in the picture actually buys a fire extinguisher, we may have saved a home — or even a neighboring home!

All the meeting ideas presented in the Meeting Idea Books follow the same format:

• Title
• Objective
• Procedure
• Materials Needed
• Comment

Title: We can call this one: “Building a Stronger Community.”

Objective: To encourage people to pick up a few everyday tools and equipment appropriate for day-to-day repairs AND emergencies.

Procedure: Joe and I approached the manager of our local Orchard Supply Hardware (OSH) about putting on a special “pilot” program for our community. We wanted to get people to the store to buy some important emergency preparedness items.

After a tour of the store, and a number of discussions with OSH and our team leaders, we agreed on the following format:

• We would promote a “show and tell” meeting at our clubhouse.
• The store would send a sales person to our meeting along with a number of examples of emergency equipment – fire extinguishers, multi-tools, lanterns and flashlights, smoke alarms, pre-built emergency kits, etc.
• Members of our neighborhood team would also bring and demonstrate emergency items they own – pet container and pet survival kit, headlamps, various bottled water supplies, etc.
• Nothing would be for sale. Rather, all attendees would receive a one-time DISCOUNT COUPON. All they had to do is take it to the store, shop from their list, and get the discount at the counter.
• We’d have a door prize and refreshments.

Materials needed: The store selected (with our input) all the items they wanted to show, and brought them complete with price tags. Our team members brought their own things, some of which were not available at OSH. All we needed to create from scratch were the various promotional items for the meeting – flyers, newsletter article, email announcement – and the discount coupon. For the meeting itself we needed several tables for display, cups and napkins for the refreshments, plus two microphones (one for the M/C, one for the person doing the demonstration).

Comment: Our goal was to host a “community meeting” and not a commercial for the store. We made sure all advertising emphasized our Emergency Response Group. And having a mix of OSH and team speakers and show and tell items kept everything well balanced.

As much as I thought this meeting might be “ho hum,” (How many times can you talk about fire extinguishers?!) we got more than the usual number of thank you notes! We kept the speakers on track. And afterwards people crowded around the tables to pick up and examine ALL the articles, including those fire extinguishers and packets of water!

We haven’t heard yet about sales success, but I did send the store some ideas for follow-up meetings plus bullet points for a press release.

All in all, the meeting did what I hoped it would do – reach out to some new neighbors, introduce some new emergency preparedness ideas, and above all, demonstrate that we are a community and as a community – the more we all know, the safer we all will be!

If you are trying to come up with an idea for a meeting in your neighborhood or perhaps at work, try a variation on this one.

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team

P.S. We have held similar events in the past. At one meeting some years ago, The Home Depot and Costco both came and took orders that they delivered a week later.

P.P.S. Fire extinguishers were the hot item at that earlier meeting, too!

British Columbia recently completed a poll to gauge the extent of personal preparedness throughout the province.

Now you may not live in BC, or even in Canada. But Canada’s history of developing a culture of preparedness pretty much mirrors ours in the U.S., with some of the same ups and downs.

And Canada has experienced many of the same kinds of disasters: floods, fires and terrorist attacks.

So, their surveys are worth looking at.

Unfortunately, this survey led me to this “April Fools Day” theme.

Pretend these are answers YOU are giving to survey questions.

“Sure, I know the threats we face.”

The British Columbians identified their top hazards as earthquakes, wildfires, extended power outages and severe weather. And they distinguished between these based on where they lived: residents living in Vancouver and on Vancouver Island (on the coast) listed tsunamis and earthquakes as hazards; people living in the interior and the north cited wildfires and floods.

So far, so good. But let’s take a closer look in the mirror.

Take me as an example. Here in Southern California even I think first about the risk of earthquake. But as we have reported repeatedly, the most LIKELY emergency is power outage. (Already 3 this year.) Second could be a railroad car accident, since tracks run right behind our neighborhood. Third, a gas line break since there is major construction planned right across the street!

Drive just 2 miles east, and you’ll be in a wildfire area and you’ll face the possibility of flash flooding – even though we get less than 15 inches of rain a year!

Turn around and head 5 miles west, and the list of hazards changes again. First, you’ll be in a liquefaction zone, so if the earthquake hits, damage will be different, and greater. Second, you’d be within the reach of a tsunami.

The point of all this? A simple answer may be TOO simple. You may be fooling yourself if you think your first fast answers are sufficient.

“I know who will be there to help out.”

Most people make some poor assumptions, here, because they are used to one-off emergencies, where police and fire respond, often within minutes.

In a major emergency, First Responders will NOT be able to come by to give you a hand! They will be stretched out serving the entire community – often, with fewer than a half dozen First Responders per 1,000 residents!

In a real disaster, it will take hours, maybe days, for the first wave of organized assistance to arrive. Then, it will take days and maybe weeks for real support — food, water, utility repair crews, etc. – to show up. Yes, Puerto Rico breaks all records for non-response in the U.S. But some people in Texas and Florida are still in short-term housing. . .

The correct answer to the question of assistance is actually two-fold. First YOU are responsible for helping yourself. Second, you and your neighbors may be able to help each other.

And that takes planning in advance!

“Of course I’ve got a personal emergency plan.”

In the Canadian survey, 54% of respondents said they had an emergency plan. . . but only 13% said it was complete. Most households had emergency supplies for up to 3 days, but often with some important items still missing. As for emergency kits in the car, at work, or for evacuation, only about 30% had them.

When it came to insurance for the likely hazards (flood, earthquake) only about half the Canadian respondents had any.

How well do you compare?

“I admit I’m not fully prepared. You wanna know why not?”

The Canadians said they weren’t prepared because of “personal laziness” and “apathy.” And before we point derisively at the Canadians, let’s look at the reasons Americans give for not being prepared. (Thanks to Lucas Gregson for some of these.) Do any apply to you?

• There’s no real threat of the world ending. Maybe not, but what about “minor” disasters, like being laid off your job? Construction that tears up your street? A wreck that takes down the power grid? It doesn’t take total annihilation to mess up your plans for life.
• Too complicated — I can’t prepare for everything. I’ll just deal with it when it comes. Hm. Well, a 72-hour survival kit will address the majority of issues that you’ll encounter. Kits will give family members a chance, too.
• I have faith in the government. Talk about April Fool!
• My sister is prepared; we’ll just go there. What if the disaster hits her, too? How will you get there if roads are impassible? And how welcome will you really be?
• I was a boy scout (alternative: I was in the military). I know how to survive. Starting from scratch, with no tool or supplies? And what about your family if something happens to take you out of the picture?
• I don’t want to be one of those weirdo preppers. Well, you probably buy insurance. Does that make you a weirdo home or car owner? Same concept . . .!

“I’d find it easier to build a survival kit if . . .”

These answers come from the Canadians and from my neighbors, over the years.

• If I knew how to get started.. That’s why we publish so many lists! Survival kit items, step-by-step preparation for a hurricane, etc. If you haven’t yet found a list that works for you, I think that may lead back to the first excuse above, that is, “personal laziness.”
• If I had money to spare. No one has all the cash available for an instant, complete survival set-up. But everyone can add one or two survival items to the stash every month. Start slow – just start!

“What would really get me started on disaster preparedness would be . . .”

• If I had experienced a disaster myself.

Do you detect the problem here?!?  (We do regularly start our meetings by hoping for just a small earthquake!)

OK, back to April Fools’ Day.

Wikipedia defines it this way: “ . . . an annual celebration commemorated on April 1 by playing practical jokes and spreading hoaxes. The jokes and their victims are called April fools.”

This Advisory shares some long-standing hoaxes — not to mention some delusions — about the topic of preparedness. Most aren’t really jokes, although I tried to give them a touch of humor. The problem? You could be a victim of any of them!

I hope you’ll treat this seriously so you don’t become one of those April fools.

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide Team

P.S. We regularly involve members of our HOA in discussions like this one. Here’s a true story about emergency supplies from about 6 months ago:

“Raise your hand if you have emergency water supplies at home.”  (Just about everyone raises their hand.)

“Raise your hand if you would be willing to share your water with a neighbor who runs out.” (Every hand goes down.)

Makes you think, eh?

 

All ready for the holidays?

Here are 3 security mistakes people tend to make at this time of year. Take 2 minutes to check them out. It would be wonderful if you and your family could avoid them all.

1. Packages are SOOOO tempting!

Sure, you know better than to allow packages to be delivered to an empty house.

Just a week ago I was stopped on the street by a patrolman who showed me a picture of a kid taking a package from a front porch. (The picture had been taken by a home security camera. More on those later.)

And when you’re shopping, take the time to put gift purchases into the trunk of your car. If they won’t FIT in the trunk, at least cover the back seat pile with a dark and preferably dingy looking blanket. Better yet, make an extra trip rather than let packages sit unattended in a parking lot in full view.

And at home, don’t position your tree and all the lovely presents right in front of a window as in the picture above. Someone could break the window, grab the presents and run.

Packages are so tempting — to thieves!

2. “We’re so proud of our emergency preparations.”

The holiday season often means more visitors to your house. The guy to string the lights on the roof. UPS and Amazon delivery people. All the invitees to your Christmas party!

Every person who comes onto your premises has the chance to take a good look at what you have – and that includes some of your emergency preparedness items.

Your gardener sees the locks, the security cameras and lights you’ve installed. The delivery guy walking past your open garage door sees your tools and the cupboards and shelves packed with food and water. The computer guy you bring in to troubleshoot your new network sees your ham radio set-up, not to mention your laptop and printers.

It’s natural for a visitor to tuck this sort of information away. And in a big emergency, your house might become a target for one of those visitors, now turned desperate.

What can you do to cover or camouflage emergency supplies? Yes, be proud of the sensible steps you’ve taken. But with a bit of creativity you’ll get more of them out of sight. You can be just as satisfied and maybe a whole lot safer.

3. Take out the trash!

We’ve all read the novels where the criminal is identified because of stuff he puts in the trash. (Harrison Ford left orange peels and fake ID photos in the wastebasket in The Fugitive, remember?)

If you’re making a lot of purchases and getting a lot of gifts, you are going to have more trash than usual. And it may attract the wrong kind of attention.

Save and/or shred receipts or statements that have account numbers. Some receipts for online purchases may show up in your email. Protect them from casual view. Don’t stuff empty cardboard boxes (with pictures of TVs and electronic games and security cameras and drones!) into the trash; break them down and recycle anonymously at the recycling place.

And if you’re traveling during the holidays, make sure newspapers, leaves or other trash doesn’t build up outside while you are gone. That trash, plus a dark and empty house, is a real invitation to trouble. (Ask a neighbor for help, and invest in some timers for lights and/or radios.)

Oh, and for heaven’s sake, don’t you or your kids announce via social media or on a phone message that “We’re away skiing for a week!” Ouch!

We wish you the pleasure of giving, and the excitement of receiving. But we sure hope it’s not spoiled because you overlooked taking these sensible precautions.

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide Team

P.S. We’re writing an Advisory about “Hiding valuables in plain sight.” Sign up for all our Advisories to be sure you get it.

 

 

Radios — The Most Popular Piece of Emergency Gear

More of our readers “invest” in emergency radios than in any other one piece of emergency equipment. (Makes sense, of course. Without a reliable emergency radio, when disaster hits you could be completely cut off. Without a good emergency radio, you may not even know that a disaster is COMING!)

Because of this interest, we continually comment on what to look for when you’re shopping for a radio. And we regularly update our Best Emergency Radios review page to be sure the radios listed there are still available.

So it’s time for yet another radio update.

Status of our long-time favorite emergency radio

The Ambient Weather Adventurer, original cost around $30, has been our favorite for a while. We own more than one, and many of our readers have them, too. It’s a great radio to tuck into your pack or simply have on the kitchen counter.

Bad news! This model seems to have been discontinued. Here and there online you can find one for sale, but their prices make no sense! I saw one yesterday at $281!

So we aren’t recommending this model anymore. (Maybe you want to try to sell yours for a profit???)

New favorite, the Eton FRX5

Eton makes several different radios, and the brand carries a number of labels including one from the American Red Cross.

The FRX3 costs about $10 more than the original Ambient Weather, and has most of the very same features.

The one we’re recommending today, though, is the Model FRX5.  It costs nearly twice as much, but for that you get double the power, more lighting options, the ability to charge a smart phone, capture localized emergency alerts, etc.

Here’s a link to the radio: Eton FRX5 Hand Crank Emergency Weather Radio with SAME Alerts

And here’s what it looks like:

This is a very compact radio, just over 7 inches tall and a couple of inches wide. It operates on battery, AC, solar and crank. In fact, this radio earned the best score in a recent test measuring how much listen time was created by 2 minutes of cranking. (In this case, something like 10-12 minutes.)

What I like is the SAME Alert feature — stands for Specific Area Message Encoding. You enter in your county and the radio will automatically send alerts for that area.  (Seems to me this would be essential in Tornado Alley of the U.S.!)

When you click the link above, you’ll go directly to Amazon. Scroll down to the bottom of the Amazon page for a full description of this radio, with several more photos.

First time radio purchaser? Get answers to 7 important questions.

If you haven’t yet added a radio to your survival supplies, check out the Eton model above. Just click on the blue link to get started.

If you have NEVER shopped for an emergency radio before, go first to our Best Emergency Radio Reviews page because you’ll find there the 7 questions you need to consider before adding a radio to your pack, or to the survival kit of any of your family members. And you’ll see a number of other radios that we have reviewed and recommend.

The radio we would upgrade to if we were flush

I’ve mentioned before that we have an old Panasonic shortwave radio. (Joe’s had it ever since we’ve been together, and that’s over 33 years now, so its age is something older than that!) That’s the radio in the picture at the top of this page. Joe was changing the batteries, which explains the red ribbons at the bottom.

We have hauled this radio from coast to coast and back again, and Joe loves it.

Yesterday Joe handed me a spec sheet for the radio he would LIKE to have. It’s also available at Amazon, and also made by Eton. As far as I am concerned, it certainly looks a lot like the old Panasonic (!), but . . .Joe assures me that it’s “the ultimate” in radio receivers. It gets AM, FM, Aircraft, Longwave and Shortwave bands, has a rotating antenna plus you can tune-in stations by keying them in or searching for them. You can actually store 1000 stations!

If you’re really serious about emergency radios, check this one out.

Alert – Prices for the SAME RADIO vary considerably. Shop carefully to get the best deal!

Eton Grundig Satellit 750 Ultimate AM/FM Stereo also Receives Shortwave, Longwave and Aircraft Bands – Black (NGSAT750B)

And doesn’t it look a LOT like the Panasonic collector item above?

You need at least one emergency radio, and probably several. The good thing about radios is you can select the features you need (for each use or each person) and not have to buy features you don’t want, and you’ll save by choosing carefully.

Do you already have an emergency radio? Would you recommend it?  Let us know in the comments!

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide Team

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. . . Goes Against Current Fashion

Every week survivalists and preppers spend millions of dollars on “survival gear” — including tents, flashlights, generators, radios, firearms and more. Do you ever think you should be doing this, too?

But take a moment to consider this. If your efforts are all to prepare your family to “pull up the drawbridge” and “defend the castle,” you will be ignoring, if not actively alienating, the very group that will be in the best position to save you!

Who is that? It’s your immediate neighbors!

Remember Katrina, Superstorm Sandy, the earthquake and tsunami in Japan? It was hours or even days before official help got to many neighborhoods!

Lives were saved by neighbors helping neighbors.

Most lives are lost in the first 15-30 minutes.

Regardless of how prepared you are with emergency supplies, the first 15 to 30 minutes following a disaster are the most critical if you are trapped in a burning house, under fallen debris or in a mud flow.

And the only people on the scene capable of helping will be your immediate neighbors.

The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) trainings that are available in many communities around the Country teach citizens how to best protect themselves and help their neighbors.

But in most cases – especially in more highly populated areas – the CERT training falls short of organizing trained members into functioning neighborhood units.

It’s up to you to organize your own neighborhood groups!

What about the aftermath?

Yes, you can store water, food and medicine to tide you over for the days or weeks it takes for the government and support organizations to recover.

But what good is it if your neighbors don’t do the same?

Are you prepared to fend off neighbors at gun point to protect your own supplies? Or are you going to stand by and watch them starve or die?

This is a terrible situation that you need to think long and hard about, because it could easily happen.

Once again, it’s up to you to remind your neighbors to build emergency supplies.

How to get your neighbors involved?  You can start by asking yourself, and then sharing with them, these important survival questions.

In an emergency, wouldn’t it be better if you knew . . .

• The neighbors on either side of you, across the hall or across the street?
• Are they families or individuals?
• How many children do they have?
• Where are family members normally during the day?
• Are there any disabled members of the family?
• What part of the house do people sleep in?
• If people are missing at night, where would you look for them?
• Do your neighbors know what part of your house you sleep in?
• Would they know where to look for you in the middle of the night following an earthquake or tornado?
• How long would it take them to find you?
• Would you still be alive when they do find you?

In an emergency, you are your neighbors’ keeper – and they are yours.

Our current American emphasis on rugged individualism, our concerns for privacy, our worries about interfering – these views must be re-examined in the face of preparing for a neighborhood disaster.

 

Joseph Krueger
Your Emergency Plan Guide Team

P.S. Share this post with your Neighborhood Emergency Response Team, to get their reaction.  And let us know how it is received!

We are currently exploring a “shock” method to get our preparedness message across to our neighbors. We wrap a letter around a one-liter bottle of water. It explains that . . .

“We cannot store enough food and water to be of help to you in an emergency, but here is a bottle of water to show our good faith. We hope you will recognize the need to be prepared and – using the list on the back of this letter – make sure your entire household is protected.”

Why go to this trouble for your neighbor?

Even here in our neighborhood, after all our meetings and trainings and articles, the reality is that as many as 35% of our neighbors simply don’t take responsibility for their own safety and security.

Yes, this is better than nationwide averages, which put the unprepared at closer to 50%.

But because these people haven’t personally experienced an earthquake or serious storm, or had to survive for any longer than a few hours in a post-emergency situation,

. . .either the risk doesn’t seem real to them or

. . .they mistakenly believe that the government will provide for them.

So the Message in a Bottle is just the next step.

Our Emergency Response Team will be meeting next week to roll the letters and fasten them to the water bottles with rubber bands. Then they’ll set out and deliver a bottle to the doorstep, if not directly into the hands, of every person in their assigned area.

When the emergency hits, we don’t want neighborhood slackers coming to us for help, and forcing us to either share our precious supplies or turn them away. The letter makes that clear — in a nice way.

We want everyone to be prepared and working together!

I’ll report in on what kind of response or reaction we get to this campaign!

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide team

P.S. Sign up here so you don’t miss any neighborhood training ideas!

P.P.S. If you’d like a copy of our letter with the checklist on the back, just let me know.

At a recent CERT update meeting here in our town, a police officer was asking questions about our neighborhood preparedness. Not our individual preparedness, but what we have done for the neighborhood.

The question about supplies from the police.

“I assume you guys have pulled together supplies, like food, for everyone?”

As it turns out, we’ve been working hard to get our neighborhood aware and organized, so we were proud to be able to describe what we’ve accomplished.

The answer about supplies from our group.

“We have NOT taken on gathering and storing supplies for the whole neighborhood!”

Our motto is “Shelter in Place with your OWN supplies.”

Here’s why.

1. Human nature. If people think someone else is doing the work for them, they stop doing it themselves.

2. Incentive. If not everyone participates, then the “good citizens” who store food and water will be penalized when their unprepared neighbors start knocking on their door for help. We remind people that if they are unprepared, they are not likely to be welcomed when the disaster actually hits.

3. Money. Buying and storing food supplies for hundreds of people takes a big financial investment, not to mention specialized knowledge.

4. Space. Storing food supplies for hundreds of people also takes a big and ongoing investment in storage space, maintenance, security, etc.

We are a volunteer organization. Our membership waxes and wanes as people move away or move in. Fortunately our members can get good local CERT training, but some of the best neighbors don’t have it yet.

Now, we’re also fortunate to have a small monthly budget thanks to our Homeowners’ Association – and that allows us to purchase carefully-selected pieces of equipment that we will have ready for an emergency. (You can read more about our equipment purchases here.) But our budget doesn’t extend to the thousands of dollars that would be necessary for purchasing and storing food.

So we’ve decided to continue to stress “Make sure you have your own supplies of food you like and the medicines you need. And don’t expect your neighbor to welcome you with open arms when you run out.”

What decisions are you making in your neighborhood?

Virginia
Your Emergency Plan Guide Team

I’d really like to hear! Please send comments!