Creating Your Own Disaster Plan
OutdoorHub Reporters 11.16.18
Every home should have a disaster response plan. It doesn’t have to be a novel, but it should be available to all members of the household and you should practice the plans inside. Now this may sound silly to some of you but consider this: OSHA requires that all workplaces with a certain number of employees have an Emergency Response Plan and that they are trained on it and its available to the employees.
If its of such importance in the workplace, why wouldn’t hold the same value in your own home? This article will walk you through how to create your own emergency response plan.
Regional Disaster
No matter where you are from there is the threat of regional disaster. Just think about those disasters that you face each and every year. For the east coast an example would be the hurricane threat. We all have our unique challenges each year. Start your emergency response plan by addressing those regional disasters.
FIRE
Every emergency response plan should contain your response to a house fire. Create an evacuation map and a list of items to grab, if you so desire it. There should be no guess work. The map can be simply a hand drawing.
Most importantly you are going to want to practice this fire escape plan at least a couple times per year. Another great addition to your preps is a Kidde brand ladder for window escapes
SHTF DISASTER
Once you have established a process for regional disasters and fire you can bite off more. SHTF disasters are such that you are going to need to survive without the help of normal services for extended periods of time.
PANDEMIC RESPONSE
One of the most terrifying disasters to prepare for is the invisible killer that is a pandemic. While many people look at a pandemic as a standalone disaster, its more likely to be a teammate of any other serious collapse.
Hygiene and sanitation will disappear quickly in a collapse. Without trashmen and running water, waste will pile up and pests will move in. Disease will spread like wildfire and people will trade that disease with ease.
You need to have a pandemic response plan for the coming collapse. In that plan you need to address your plan to bug in and isolate yourself. You need a plan to deal with waste in a collapse and you need a plan for setting up a quarantine. These are all critical if you want to survive a pandemic.
Bugout Plans
The bugout is by far one of the most ambitious and complicated things you are going to take on. It’s bizarre to hear people throw around the word like its comparable to taking a walk down the street with your pack on your back. If you are careful and thoughtful about the bugout you may invest in an entire binder just for this operation. That is the right word for the bugout, operation.
If a company of solider were going to move from one location to another through a hostile environment with people on their team who were vulnerable, it would be an operation and there would be a serious game plan. The bugout is just that, except you are likely not a seasoned warfighter.
Mapping
Mapping your bugout should offer up a number of BOLs or bugout locations. Don’t settle for one location in one direction. If the threat is in that area, then you are out of luck. Map resources along the way and be sure you have multiple routes as well.
Packing
Of course the tings that you pack are of the utmost of importance. Be sure that you have everything you need to survive if you don’t make it to your location. Place an inventory sheet in your binder. Also be sure everyone in your family has a bag.
Caching
How about not carrying as much on your back? Well, you can achieve this by burying some survival caches.
Practicing
Above all, be sure that you walk the walk. Don’t create a bunch of bugout locations that you might not even be able to get to physically. Take the walk and then take it with your family. Not the struggles in your binder.
Nuclear Disaster
Where do you go and what do you bring in a nuclear emergency?
The most important thing to consider is insulation in a room at the center of your home. Similar to a tornado drill really. Isolate that location and be sure that you bring everything you need to stay there for hours. If the fallout is near your home, you should consider at least 7 hours. That will give time for the radiation to decrease.
Running Drills
In the business world you often here: “If its not written down than it didn’t happen.”
That is the importance of the emergency response plan. Just print a simple sheet that features all of the emergency drills you want to run in a year. If the end of the year rolls around and you have not filled out that sheet with some completed drills, well, you failed. It’s a very easy thing to measure.
Order your drills the same way that you create your binder. Focus on regional disasters first before worrying about SHTF.
Your drills must include your family. They are an integral part of your success. Surviving a disaster is not the responsibility of one but the responsibility of everyone to know their part and act. Its not a joke and its not an option. Be sure everyone understands the severity.
Conclusion
Creating a useful emergency response plan that is stored in a physical binder will suddenly add accountability to your disaster preparedness. If you are looking to level up you need only have documents, like these, that measure where you are achieving, where you are ready and where you are falling short.
The emergency binder is just as important as a flashlight or ammunition. I often hear people talk about how its so hard to prepare for emergencies because they have no money. The other important thing about creating an emergency response plan is that it can be absolutely free! You don’t need a binder. You can just paper clip your plan together and store it somewhere safe.
Every household in American should have an emergency binder. At the very least, you owe it to your loved ones. If you are the big “prepper” of the family, what happens if you are hurt or killed 5 minutes into a disaster? In most cases your family is left to figure it all out on their own. Don’t make that mistake.
