Earthquake Preparedness

Well the Fireside on March 19th was well attended. It was nice to hear Earthquake facts rather than hype or rumors. I hope you'll take some time to look through the publication at BeReady Utah.com that was recommened by our Speaker Dr Gerber: Putting Down Roots in Earthquake Country

If you missed the Fireside, here are just a few things to remember:
Duck Cover and Hold
- DUCK or DROP down on the floor.
- Take COVER under a sturdy desk, table, or other furniture. If that is not possible, seek cover against an interior wall and protect your head and neck with your arms. Avoid danger spots near windows, hanging objects, mirrors or tall furniture.
- If you take cover under a sturdy piece of furniture, HOLD on to it and be prepared to move it. Hold the position until the ground stops shaking and it is safe to move.

Practice turning off your electricity and water. Know how to turn off the gas, but do not practice this step. In the event of an earthquake, once you turn off your gas, only your utility company should turn it back on for safety reasons.

OTHER THINGS TO KNOW:
HIGH-RISE BUILDING, move against an interior wall if you are not near a desk or table. Protect your head and neck with your arms. Do not use the elevators.

OUTDOORS, move to a clear area away from trees, signs, buildings, or downed electrical wires and poles.

on a SIDEWALK NEAR BUILDINGS, duck into a doorway to protect yourself from falling bricks, glass, plaster and other debris.

DRIVING, pull over to the side of the road and stop. Avoid overpasses and power lines. Stay inside your vehicle until the shaking stops.

CROWDED STORE OR OTHER PUBLIC PLACE, move away from display shelves containing objects that could fall. Do not rush for the exit.

in a STADIUM OR THEATER, stay in your seat, get below the level of the back of the seat and cover your head and neck with your arms.

Earthquake Month

Since we're talking about earthquakes right now, I thought it would be approrpriate to take a look at what a 6.3 Quake did to New Zealand on Tuesday (still Monday for us in my neighborhood!). When the forecasted "big one" hits the Utah fault line it could be 7.0 or greater!!!

You can read about it here!

We can be ready friends. Let's not live in fear. Lets live in peace by knowing that we have prepared!

Info on the Web

"Preparation through education is less costly than learning through tragedy"
- Max Mayfield, Director National Hurricane Center

Over the past couple of years I've tried to use this blog to help others find worthwhile information about Emergency Preparedness. There's a lot out there and not all of it is trustworthy!!!! OUCH! Actually, some of it is meant specifically to make a buck through "scare tactics" and that's just not where we need to be putting our money nor our focus. There's work to do and we need to be taking care of business!

I have found that some sources are consistently reliable while others aren't even worth a bookmark and on my computer...that's pretty bad. This morning I decided to begin a series of links that I think have very useful information and the first one that I turn to is Emergency Essentials. (My opinion: If you shop their sales this company is a great source of preparedness items - get on their mailing list and see what's going on with them for the month. With stores on 106th South in SLC and one next to the Distribution Center in Orem, it's easy to just swing by once a month to pick up their specials.) When you go to their website they have file tabs at the top of the page - One is called Insight Articles and will take you to their archive of article categories. Each family is at their own level of Preparedness - we need to budget our time, money and focus into one thing a month to make great strides - so I felt that this would be especially helpful for my readers to click on the category that is your focus for this month. Here ya go....enjoy!
Emergency Essentials Articles

CERT Training for the Prepared Volunteer

Excellent Article! Hope you'll take the time to read it!

CERT Training for the Prepared Volunteer

Can It Happen Here?

Here's some after thoughts to Friday's story about the San Bruno CA explosion. Definitely worth being informed about: 
Aging Gas Pipes at Risk of Explosion Nationwide

This Can Happen in ANY Neigborhood - even OURS!

Something as simple as a gas line break can change numbers of lives in just seconds. Last night it happened in this San Francisco Neighborhood - right at suppertime.

It took a while to figure out what had happened but while Emergency Officials were working on that part of it - trained people were helping to evacuate the families. My question is: Where does a family go to when this kind of thing happens? If their house is on fire then everything else that they own, including their car, is also on fire! This is the reason we need to have an emergency plan and guess what.....WE DO! 

Over the next few weeks you will be learning about what our area will do in this kind of a situation, whatever the disaster might be. When you get the notice that gatherings are being held, Please Attend! We need EVERYONE to be on board.
It's for the common good of the neighborhood but it's also for the safety of your own family!

You can read the article by clicking here.

Flooding in Lehi

We never know when our skills will be needed and in what way. That's why it makes such a difference to get trained ahead of time and be ready.

This article shows us how the CERT teams were called into action for our own community this week. If you'll read closely you'll see how the CERT Emergency Plan fell right into place for this situation eliminating confusion and wasted time.

The CERT Motto: Do the most amount of good For the greatest number of people In the shortest amount of time!


Lehi's Dry Creek Flooding: 300 Volunteers help with Sandbags

New Site for AVERT

AVERT (non profit group that sponsors the CERT training) has a new site with lots of useful information. Check it out: AVERT

Emergency Preparedness In Our Valley

Provo, Orem residents learning emergency management just in case

Daily Herald

I Recommend AVERT for CERT Training

Ken Moravec is one of the CERT teachers for AVERT. He is an excellent teacher - probably because of his extensive personal experience with emergency rescue.

Ken has a lifetime of personal experience with every kind of imaginable GLOBAL emergency. His personal understanding of emergency preparedness needs is truly impressive. If you have ever considered the need to be more prepared for emergencies, I highly recommend that you take advantage of Ken's accelerated classes - it's a long day and a half but at the end of the training you have a wide variety of skills and practical experience. It is truly "empowering".

CERT Training Offered by The Lehi Fire Dept

Sing up for CERT training! Call the Fire Department at 801- 768-7130 to register. Classes begin February 24, 2010

Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) is an organization of volunteer emergency workers who have received specific training in basic disaster response skills, and who agree to supplement existing emergency responders in the event of a major disaster. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), recognizing the importance of the program, has adapted and expanded CERT materials to cover all hazards. Some of the materials that CERT trains on include: disaster preparedness, fire suppression, medical operations, search and rescue, team organization, and as a final test, a disaster simulation is conducted. In the short term, CERT personnel can perform in situations requiring simple fire- fighting tasks (e.g. small fires, turning off gas), light search and rescue, damage evaluation of structures, triage and basic first aid skills. In the long term, CERT personnel may assist in the evacuation of residents, or work in conjunction with emergency crews on major incidents or disasters.

The next CERT training class will begin on February 24. Class rosters will be limited to a 25 person maximum and the class lasts seven weeks with classes held one night per week. The cost of this program is $30 for Lehi residents and $35 for non- residents and fees are used to outfit each member with equipment and the use of fire extinguishers. Each person will receive the following: helmet, vest, gloves, mask, eye protection, and a textbook. If you have any questions please contact the Fire Department at 801-768-7130, or refer to the website at www.lehi-ut.gov/fire/index.php or www.facebook.com/lehicert for more information.

Practice Practice Practice

Wouldn't it be nice if right here in our own little neighborhood we could pull ourselves together to practice what we would do during any given situation............hmmmmmmm

800 responders stage ground zero emergency drill

NEW YORK – The largest disaster drill since Sept. 11 at the World Trade Center site is under way.
New York City officials are staging a mock explosion on a PATH commuter rail train Sunday morning in the tunnel linking the site to northern New Jersey. Over 800 police officers, firefighters and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey officials are taking part.
Officials bought TV ads and plastered train stations with posters to warn downtown residents of the drill. A Defense Department-arranged flyover of a jet over downtown Manhattan last month panicked thousands of Wall Street workers and residents.
Officials say there haven't been as many responders at ground zero since the Sept. 11 attacks.
PATH rail service is suspended Sunday morning during the drill.

WE DID IT!!!!!

KUDOS......
to our newly Certified Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) We finally have enough certified people in our neighborhood to qualify as an official CERT team. This makes us the FIRST CERT TEAM in LEHI!!! This really is a BIG DEAL because everyone in our neighborhood will receive benefits from their efforts.

Our starter team consists of:

Mari Shanta

Elaine and Kent Bartschi

Dave and Charla Buchanan

Rita Rawlins

Nikki Welton

Katie Davis

A CERT team is trained to do light search and rescue following a neighborhood emergency situation. This can be anything from a gas line breaking to a fire to an earthquake or more. In the event of a community disaster, it could take from 72 hours up to several weeks before community safety crews are available to help out our neighborhood. This team is now trained to assess the situation and apply basic rescue efforts. On occasion, supplies that would be needed for a community cache become available for free and are distributed among certified teams - We now have a certified team so that we will be included in the distributions!!!!!

Thank you's go out to each one of these people who have so willingly and selflessly given their time to become trained for the benefit of our neighborhood.
If you will take a close look at the names on the list of CERT members you may notice that all but one live on the same street in our neighborhood! It would be so great if we could have at least 2 people who live on 2325 North and 2 who live on 2280 North who are willing to become trained CERT members. At the bottom of this blog you will find a list of upcoming classes. There won't be another one held in our area until Oct but if anyone is willing to travel into SLC or Provo areas training seminars are being held every month. So take a look at your calendars and see when you can schedue to attend. You will be so glad that you've done this! You really will!

Do You Know?

DO YOU KNOW:

HOW to determine if an injured person can be moved without causing a more serious (even paralyzing) injury to them?

HOW to lift a heavy object (like a wall) off of your loved one who is trapped underneath?

HOW to use a fire extinguisher or turn off the main valves to your utilities so that your house doesn’t catch fire or something even worse?

HOW AND WHEN to apply the principles of triage for broken bones or identify and treat someone in shock?

If you said no to any of the above questions…PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE read on:

These are just some of the things that I learned during a 21 hour workshop that I attended this past October. I walked away from this training feeling “empowered” having replaced fear with knowledge and having an assurance that I am better prepared to take care of my family in the event of a disaster. I now know that I have skills that will allow me to offer a valuable service to my family and my neighbors in our moment of need.

We never know when a disaster is going to happen HOWEVER – living 2 mi from an earthquake fault we can be sure that something will happen at some point! As individuals we can prepare our homes and families to cope during that critical period. But can you imagine how many lives might be saved if our neighborhood would come together and have a plan and become trained to deal with the immediate situation at hand? Proper training would help reduce injuries, the loss of lives and minimize property damage!!! We’re not talking about generalizations – we’re talking about the people and homes ON OUR STREET!

I spoke with the emergency preparedness director for the City of Lehi who told me that outside of the 3 step program that they have adopted (http://www.lehi-ut.gov/emergency.php) there really will be no emergency services available to our community for several days or maybe even weeks. They simply don’t exist to make them available plus, there is a specific order to who gets what services first and individual homes are WAAAAAAY down on the list! We have to consider that places like the hospitals will be overwhelmed and so there will be a “picking” order that says most severe ones first. So I asked him what we as citizens of this community should do. His answer: Prepare as neighborhood groups.

Studies of behavior following disasters have shown that groups working together in the disaster period perform more effectively if there has been prior planning for disaster response.

The Lehi City plan says: When disaster strikes, you should not rely on the government to help you. Here are some reasons why YOU must prepare:

1. You may be on your own.

2. Government may not help – Local officials and relief workers…cannot reach everyone immediately.

3. Services may be down – such as electricity, gas, water, sewage treatment and phones.

4. You may have to evacuate.

5. You’ll find Peace of mind.

6. You may save a life.

Being prepared is as easy as 1-2-3

1. Make a Kit

2. Make a plan

3. Be informed

Well I could go on and on but won’t. I hope you’ll click on that City link and see for yourself what they have outlined for us. Then I hope you’ll consider taking the training that I took. Right now we have 5 people on 2375 N who have gone through the training. Can you imagine how much better it would be to have that many on each of our 3 streets in our neighborhood? What a difference it would make. The $45 registration fee buys you equipment / Hard hat, goggles, vest, gloves, dust mask and instruction booklets. The best part of all is that it’s presented by a well informed, interesting instructor.

If you are interested in attending a training, check the bottom of this blog for a list of upcoming seminars or call me (neighborhood phone list) or drop me a note at ritarawlins@yahoo.com and I will submit your name.

Thank you so much - Let's not be a Henny Penny group where no one wants to do the work (training) but everyone wants to eat the bread (recieve the benefits!).

Take CERT Training to be Truly Prepared

The house down the street is on fire. Would you know what to do?
The earthquake has passed — the ground has stopped shaking. Do you know how to search for your friends and neighbors?
The hurricane has passed. Do you know how to tend to your family's injuries?

Now is the time to get some training and prepare yourself with lifesaving skills. There are many community classes to learn CPR and basic first aid. There are classes to teach organizational skills. Local colleges often have classes teaching survival skills. But if you want really comprehensive training to give you the skills and self confidence to face an emergency, it's time to check out CERT training.

The purpose of the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) Program is to educate members of the community about disaster preparedness for natural disasters and other emergencies which may affect their area. The program trains individuals in basic disaster response skills, such as fire safety, light search and rescue, team organization, and disaster medical response. Trained CERT members are prepared to assist in their neighborhoods or workplaces following an emergency before professional responders are available to help.

Click Here to read the entire article from Meridian Magazine.

We have 3 people in our neighborhood who are CERT trained. To be truly prepared we need at least 2 trained people in each block. We have already begun a cache of supplies for dealing with a neighborhood disaster. Lots more is needed and we will begin a focus on collection in January. If we can get 5 more people trained/certified, we will qualify to receive FREE items for our neighborhood cache. If you are interested in helping our neighborhood, please scroll to the bottom of this page and you will find a list of the next 3 training classes in our area. If we can get a group of 30 to train then the instructors will come to us to teach a class - until then, we are encouraging as many as possible to enroll in the Jan 3rd class. Training is an important part of being prepared and WE CAN BE PREPARED!