Are You Ready For An Emergency?

Are you ready for an emergency? It may be a minor disaster or an unforeseen emergency in your neighborhood. You may have to be evacuated. Are you prepared to leave your home and go to a shelter if you get news or online alerts or a knock on your door from local authorities telling you that you MUST leave your house?

We must think about what to grab and take on short notice. My top priority would be the necessary important documents I have stored in a binder in a very secure place. You may know I designed a binder with FREE printable pages.

I have also included instructions detailing what you may want to add to your binder. One would be pictures of our family members and pets to be enclosed in the binder if we get separated from our loved ones. If you can get fingerprints of your loved ones, that would be great, too!

We’ll keep one picture and post the other on a wall to hopefully be reunited ASAP.  Here is the download: Food Storage Moms FREE Printable Emergency Binder Download

I prefer printing it on cardstock, and it’s actually in color if you want to print with a color printer.

Some Items To Grab If You Have To Evacuate

• Emergency Binder
• Grab and Take Items
• 72-Hour Kits
• Pet 72-Hour Kit
• Water
• Food
• Prescriptions
• Extra Glasses/Sunglasses
• Cash
• Sentimental Items
• Valuables

You can print this on cardstock and tape it to your door where you would leave to evacuate. Grab and Take Items Checklist Be sure to include insurance policies, copies of property deeds, passports, birth certificates, and other items mentioned.

10% Of The People In Utah Are Prepared

Here’s the deal: I have heard that only 10% of the people in Utah are prepared for a disaster or unforeseen emergency. This bothers me because I can’t provide for my entire street or neighborhood. I have this percentage based on actual numbers from churches, emergency and disaster preparedness centers, and communities where I have taught classes about this topic in Utah.

I’ll bet the percentage of unprepared families is even lower in many other locations, particularly the highly concentrated urban centers. I hear comments like, “I don’t know where to start.” Or “I don’t have the money to buy groceries, let alone emergency food and supplies.”

Each family has different resources to support their preparedness efforts. You should prepare based on the type of disasters that are the most common in your area. Hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, winter storms, and other hazards tend to be more common in various regions. Even earthquakes seem to happen in places like California than in other areas. Do your research and start putting together your family disaster plan that considers location, the number of household members, if any have disabilities, and other critical variables.

No Power For Five Days

I have also heard people ask, “What’s the big deal? We’ve heard we need to be prepared for the last thirty-plus years, and few emergencies have occurred from what I see.” Well, this may be true in some areas of the country, but I always get emails from readers asking me what to do. They include comments like this: “Our neighborhood has been without power for five days. What would you suggest for cooking, etc.?”

These are real people, and the emails show me the fear felt by the families concerned about what’s happening around them. My heart aches for them because maybe they have never had a minor or major power outage, EVER.

But they do now! My point is this: we need to be prepared BEFORE we need to be ready. It’s a fact. If you turn on the TV and listen to the news, hear it on the radio, or look on Facebook, there are emerging issues in numerous places in the USA and worldwide. Look at the millions of people affected by the recent winter storms. Who would have thought there would be wildfires that destroyed whole communities, not just neighborhoods.!

Ready For An Emergency

I’m sure you have seen my articles/posts on many emergency preparedness topics. Sometimes, we have to see the comments about the stuff I have listed below again and again before it sinks in enough to take action.

If even one family gets prepared in the next week, I will have accomplished what I have tried to do: inform the world one family at a time. Let’s hope at least 15% of your neighborhood is prepared. That would beat the 10% in Utah who are prepared for disasters, whoever they may be.

Are You Ready

Make An Evacuation Plan

Talk with your family and plan to meet up at a safe place after an evacuation or disaster if that should occur. Please have more than one or two options for meeting places to gather in case the roads are damaged and you are driving a carpool or taking the kids to dance lessons. You need to have various evacuation routes in case roads are washed out or full of traffic jams.

Store Water and Food

Plan to have a sufficient water supply and enough non-perishable foods for at least two to three weeks in case you are homebound due to a major epidemic or disaster.

Decide on one or two choices of cooking devices that you could use to boil water or cook a hot meal. Be sure to store the appropriate fuel for the stoves you plan to use. This is one of my favorites: Butane Stove and Butane Fuel

Get Supplies Now

Order some N-95 masks to add to your first aid kit as part of your family and/or car emergency kit. If you don’t have a first aid kit, think about what will happen if the pharmacies are closed due to power outages. Do you have cough syrups, Tylenol, or whatever OTC products you would like if you were unable to get them anywhere due to all stores being closed or inventory being sold out? It will happen, trust me. It has happened in many cities and states this year, just like in past years. Here’s my first aid kit that I recommend at the very least to have on hand: First Aid Kit For Survival

For those on prescription medications, you need a way to transport and protect them in an emergency.

Keep Up On Laundry

Keep up on your laundry and store extra laundry detergent so you can wash your clothes by hand when needed. If we lose power, we don’t want to wash a week’s worth of dirty clothes in an emergency washer. You’ve probably seen my emergency washing machine with 6-gallon buckets and a Gamma lid as a mobile washer: Mobile Washer.

Have you been looking for an emergency washer that can do blue jeans and bed sheets? This one can. I have been washing my clothes for a week with this gem, which rocks! It’s very sturdy and affordable. It’s about time someone made an excellent portable washing machine that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg.

Lavario Washing Unit

I had considered buying a wringer, but that’s on hold, so I looked at other options like an emergency hand washer—Lavario Emergency Washer (currently unavailable). We purchased two Lavario’s when you could get them, one for washing and one for rinsing clothes. I sure hope they start making them again. Check garage sales, thrift stores, or eBay if they have one.

Lavario Washing Unit Parts

Emergency Portable Toilet

The emergency toilet on the left has a 5-gallon bucket, and the one on the right has a 6-gallon bucket.

I would ensure you have a portable toilet because if the power goes out, the sewer lines may not work. I prefer six-gallon buckets so you don’t have to squat down as far. Six-gallon buckets or an  Emergency Toilet

Flashlights and HeadLamps

Please get some good flashlights and store extra batteries unless you plan to use solar flashlights. Headlamps are fantastic as well.

Consider What You’ll Do if the Emergency Takes Place While You’re at Work

We not only need to consider proper emergency prep steps for use at home, but emergencies happen when we are at our work places, at school, the gym, or elsewhere. Our preparations need to include a family communications plan so we can make contact with all family members.

We may face additional challenges if the cell towers are affected and the cell phones don’t work. There are few landlines used these days, especially in homes. Look into walkie-talkies for local contact and make sure you practice their use with close family and neighbors tuned into the proper channels.

Consider buying a NOAA functioning radio so you can get alerts and evacuation directives. You don’t want first responders to show up without you knowing what’s going on around you.

Other Handy Items

Some other items to be sure you have available are:

• Diapers, formula, or baby food for the little ones. You’ll also want lots of baby wipes.
• At least one manual can opener so you can access the food in those canned goods and freeze-dried foods.
• Utensils for eating the food, along with needed paper products.
• Toilet paper and paper towels.
• For the ladies in the house, have extra feminine products available since you don’t know when you’ll need them.
• Changes of clothing for all family members, especially if wet weather is anticipated.

Final Word

Remember that this list has just the bare necessities we need should a disaster hit. But we need to encourage our neighbors to prepare for the unexpected, too. If your neighbors are approachable, have some get-togethers and talk about what you would do as a team of neighbors working together.

Then, discuss what each could bring to the table if it takes the government or other emergency agencies a week or a month to arrive with help. We must take care of ourselves because we are responsible for OUR family to survive disasters. May God Bless this world, Linda

Copyright Images: First Aid Kit Bag AdobeStock_179882754 By Showcake