No, I'm not in the path of Sandy but I was thinking about what I would need should we ever have to prepare for a storm or emergency. We never have those kind of storms here and I can't remember anytime in my lifetime other than some minor floods that I'd have needed emergency preparation supplies.
Even in winter the schools have never once needed to shut down. We have the equipment to deal with whatever the winter hands us. Plus living in a small town you learn to rely on yourself and family. For example in our car we have a winter emergency kit. It has flares, candles, matches, blanket, crank flashlight, extra gloves, scarf and hat. I added a few energy bars. I can't put water in the car or it would freeze and explode in winter. I bring water during summer trips.
We don't have an emergency kit for the house. I'm not sure how these kits would be useful if your house is flooded or in another disaster where your house is destroyed. Plus if you aren't at home during a disaster and can't get home your kit is useless. We have camping gear and lots of food and water at home. If the power goes out we have a gas fireplace that has a manual ignition so we can use that. We can cook on our camp stove or our gas barbecue.
I don't think I can remember a time that the power has gone out for more than a couple of hours and even that would be a very long time. Usually if the power goes out it only goes out for a couple of minutes. The closest we get to a power outage is when we do Earth Hour and turn off all our electrical gadgets and lights.
If I had the room I'd store a couple of those big things of water. I don't like buying water and have avoided it. I'd rather buy a water purification kit than buy bottled water. I know how to make drinkable water through evaporation. Plus we could boil water to drink. So I figure we are good for water.
Now if there was a disaster and we didn't have electricity or water for over a week we'd struggle but not die. We'd boil water. We'd eat the food we had and share with neighbours until our freezer was empty then we'd start on the canned foods. I think we'd survive. But then I've never experienced a big storm or disaster so I don't know what it's like. Maybe I'm overestimating our ability to stay safe and fed. All I know is it's unlikely that we will ever be in the path of a hurricane, tornado or major earthquake. Flooding yes, snow storm yes but so far we haven't had any major ones. I guess we just live in a pretty safe part of the Earth (touch wood!).
I'm sending out my thoughts and prayers that everyone in the path of Sandy stays safe and she isn't as bad as they are predicting.
Even in winter the schools have never once needed to shut down. We have the equipment to deal with whatever the winter hands us. Plus living in a small town you learn to rely on yourself and family. For example in our car we have a winter emergency kit. It has flares, candles, matches, blanket, crank flashlight, extra gloves, scarf and hat. I added a few energy bars. I can't put water in the car or it would freeze and explode in winter. I bring water during summer trips.
We don't have an emergency kit for the house. I'm not sure how these kits would be useful if your house is flooded or in another disaster where your house is destroyed. Plus if you aren't at home during a disaster and can't get home your kit is useless. We have camping gear and lots of food and water at home. If the power goes out we have a gas fireplace that has a manual ignition so we can use that. We can cook on our camp stove or our gas barbecue.
I don't think I can remember a time that the power has gone out for more than a couple of hours and even that would be a very long time. Usually if the power goes out it only goes out for a couple of minutes. The closest we get to a power outage is when we do Earth Hour and turn off all our electrical gadgets and lights.
If I had the room I'd store a couple of those big things of water. I don't like buying water and have avoided it. I'd rather buy a water purification kit than buy bottled water. I know how to make drinkable water through evaporation. Plus we could boil water to drink. So I figure we are good for water.
Now if there was a disaster and we didn't have electricity or water for over a week we'd struggle but not die. We'd boil water. We'd eat the food we had and share with neighbours until our freezer was empty then we'd start on the canned foods. I think we'd survive. But then I've never experienced a big storm or disaster so I don't know what it's like. Maybe I'm overestimating our ability to stay safe and fed. All I know is it's unlikely that we will ever be in the path of a hurricane, tornado or major earthquake. Flooding yes, snow storm yes but so far we haven't had any major ones. I guess we just live in a pretty safe part of the Earth (touch wood!).
I'm sending out my thoughts and prayers that everyone in the path of Sandy stays safe and she isn't as bad as they are predicting.
Comments
If only everyone would be more concerned (and reclaim self-responsibility!) about relearning how to take care of themselves, our world would be a much better place.
End of mini-sermon/rant. Have a great week!
I guess we could get our hands on a hunting rifle should we need to keep the zombies at bay. LOL!
New Years Day 2000 our water tank died and it was a long weekend so we couldn't get anyone to come fix it for 3 days! I had two little kids in diapers and no hot water. That's my big Y2K disaster story.