Preparing for Disasters

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Dgflorida
Posts: 4381
Joined: Wed Oct 07, 2015 8:10 pm

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by Dgflorida »

Yes, I plan to prepare for the hurricane season here on the west coast of Florida. I don't know if we will stay or go. The biggest problem with going will be the traffic. I went through that evacuation misery with Rita and Ike in Houston. And the road system is much worse here due to poorly managed population growth. So we may be stuck here regardless of intentions. We are high enough to survive a storm surge and hub has assembled a variety of solar chargers, water "pool", etc. Here we will lose both water and electricity. Until the disruption of the flooring is finished, I am not going to pack in a bunch of stuff. Everything will be moved to the kitchen area and it will be a couple of weeks of a mess. Although a tropical storm is predicted early next week, it will have to take a number. I got the trees around the house trimmed back last month, reducing the chances of roof damage. All you can do is reduce chances and stock pile as you can. The intensity of hurricanes generally increases as the season goes on, so the dangerous ones have not yet formed.

Once things settle down, I will pack in lots of juices and water. Food will be canned goods of course. I have a manual can opener.
colonialgirl
Posts: 1835
Joined: Sat Aug 29, 2015 2:01 am
Location: Central Illinois

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by colonialgirl »

Maggie -
Don't let being in walking distance of things be a consideration. During our five day power outage from the tornado for 3 days there were no gas stations. Only three had power the first day and they ran out of gas within hours. Restaurants had no power hence no refrigeration, lights within, cash register, etc. Same with grocery store - two in the area had power and they were close to stripped by the end of the first day.

Though I am always stocked up on food because that is how I shop, I was never into any kind of weather preparedness. But after those 2 five day power outages in 6 months, it got my attention.

And I agree with hurricane advice - just leave. But you need to be prepared - i.e. what you need to take with you. You of course can replace clothes and toiletries - your mother's locket or your grandparent's wedding pictures - not so much.
BeckyO
Posts: 926
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 11:32 am

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by BeckyO »

Colonialgirl, you are so right. After Katrina we had several weeks of 'no place to shop' for gas , groceries or anything else, including cash or credit. So you either had it or you didn't have it, whatever that was.

A friend two states over brought me some eggs. When the stores eventually got electricity, nothing that needed refrigeration could be bought or sold, because of the previous electricity/refrigeration problems.

People took pickup trucks loaded with every container they could find and drove hundreds of miles roundtrip to purchase gasoline for themselves and family and friends to use in vehicles, power tools and generators. If those people had cash. Banks were closed, ATMs didn't work, credit card were refused. Gotta have cash.

I keep cash, more than half a tank of gas in my car, I have a fully charged portable generator, a sterno 'stove' and sterno, candles, matches, a butane lighter, a crank radio/flashlight, extra meds all the meds in a suite case, manual can opener, containers of water, lots of canned goods.flash lights and batteries, even have one solar light.
colonialgirl
Posts: 1835
Joined: Sat Aug 29, 2015 2:01 am
Location: Central Illinois

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by colonialgirl »

What we went through was mild I know - but once you have experienced it, you learn quickly you won't be unprepared again. And we were unprepared. We only had a little propane heater and the smell using that was awful. We ran out of firewood and I begged a guy to brink me a load of slab wood which I paid a premium for and would have paid more.

We still have things we want to get. Our water comes from large municipal wells but the pumping station is subject to flooding. We can always use the water in our sump if we can treat it - so we need to get a water treatment kit for example. We have bottled water but it goes amazing quickly. Of course we cannot do everything that we want to do all at once, it is too cost prohibitive.

I do not say this to start a debate with anyone who doesn't believe in global warming, but we feel it is pretty self evident that the climate here on earth is becoming more extreme and I think we have to prepare for it.
Dgflorida
Posts: 4381
Joined: Wed Oct 07, 2015 8:10 pm

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by Dgflorida »

Well, this morning, Sunday, they are still predicting a lot of rain here on the West coast of Florida, Tampa area. Rain is common in this section of Florida in the summer. However, I am sure that the shelves are empty of water this morning. This is a fast moving system, so it will be gone by midweek they predict. Rain soaks in quickly here and our detention pond has 2-4 ft of capacity. This will be a non event, but will likely cause newbies to the area to over-react. Meaning, when a future storm is serious, they will likely not react enough. Human nature.

The wind risk is worth noting. A disruption of power is a big deal. Well, this will be a good test.
mbrudnic
Posts: 4497
Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 7:57 am

Re: Preparing for Disasters

Post by mbrudnic »

colonialgirl wrote:Maggie -
Don't let being in walking distance of things be a consideration. During our five day power outage from the tornado for 3 days there were no gas stations. Only three had power the first day and they ran out of gas within hours. Restaurants had no power hence no refrigeration, lights within, cash register, etc. Same with grocery store - two in the area had power and they were close to stripped by the end of the first day.
Yes, I realize that. I think more of prep than Hubby does. after the remnants of Hurricane Ike met another storm right over the Ohio Valley, The area was a bit of a mess. We only lost power twice for about 8 hours each. Nearby stores were out, had to drive 5 miles or so to find some things.
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