fema

According to FEMA, at their emergency preparedness website, the very first step is to Be Informed.

For this step in our Prep-Along, you will need a binder, tabs, and patience with tedious websites as we explore the following three questions:

  1. What hazards are most likely?
  2. How will I get alerts and warnings?
  3. Does my municipality have emergency plans (shelters, evacuation routes)?

risk

Question #1  What hazards are most likely?

Depending on your geographic area, you are more or less likely to experience certain natural disasters. The difficulty is determining which ones apply to you. If you are lucky like me, your county has a preparedness website that tells you all of the disasters common to our region.  If you don’t have access to a site tailored to your area, you have a few choices:

  • Pop through the pages FEMA wrote for kids and check each in the “Am I at Risk?” remarks under the cartoon kid at the bottom left.
  • Read ALL of the descriptions for each disaster here (and not all of them even tell you, BTW)
  • I hear tell that you can find out through the Red Cross site, but I can’t figure out how.

redcross shot

Once you have established your list, you need to print out the “what to do before, during, and after details” for your notebook.  You have several options:

Once you have all the sheets ready, put them in your notebook….and read over them.

alerts

Question #2  How Will I Get Alerts and Warnings?

You have several ways to be alerted to disaster warnings if you don’t have the TV on when it happens.  Your next assignment is to browse the following links and shop around for the warning apps or alerts that fit your family best.

Go ahead and set up the ones you like.  You don’t need to buy a radio yet, though.  That’s a later week.

redcrossapps

 

Question #3  Does my municipality have emergency plans (shelter, evacuation)?

Actually, FEMA has a pile of questions you are supposed to ask about community plans.  I don’t see anything on our town website or the county one, so I’m going to call up the Fire Department tomorrow and see if they know where I can get that information.  I know back in the day there were designated fall-out shelters, but it’s been a while since the 1960’s.

If you can find out this information, write it on the applicable pages for each disaster in your notebook.

Share what you found!

Come back here and post something in the comments that you didn’t know before.  On Friday, our usual linky will be shots of everyone’s progress.  Some blogs know how to let people (without blogs) put in their own photos at the end of the post.  Anyone know how to do that?