Having what you need on hand before a disaster strikes can be easier than you think—but why do so many of us mess it up? (The answer is a level of surprising worthy of a clickbait title…)
Bottled water? One of those hand-crank radio-flashlight combinations? Six months’ worth of military surplus MREs? A flamethrower?
Picking out a home disaster preparedness kit can be…challenging. Or it can feel downright overwhelming. It can also start to look very expensive very quickly. Not even counting the truly “over-the-top” (what I’ve been told to politely call things I think are primarily for paranoiacs so we don’t get sued) underground doomsday bunkers that some equate with preparedness.
So, what do we, as general people—often on a fixed budget—do to prepare? How do we select supplies that are appropriate, cost-effective, and realistically useful for us individually?
Let’s take a look at how the experts choose what supplies to stockpile for major responses and look at some techniques we can apply to gauge our own preparedness needs. Together, we can outline a mindset you can apply to minimize cost while maximizing your own personal resiliency to disasters and emergencies. Hooray!
So, how do the professionals prepare?
Most anyone that knows something about disaster planning and preparedness has heard of FEMA. FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and they are actually a part of the Department of Homeland Security. FEMA not only creates response plans and sends folks out to assist municipal and state resources during a disaster, but they also provide training, education, and written materials to help people at all levels and at all stages in the disaster cycle.
FEMA, contrary to many impressions, is not a single-handed disaster response organization. They consult, educate, and assist with planning, finance, and high-level logistics. States, cities, counties, other federal agencies, and individuals are the ones who work on the ground distributing supplies and doing all that “in-the-field” response work.
But none of that work would be possible without adequate preparedness. And to help professionals (and you) get prepared, FEMA has a lot of good resources.
In short, however, the pros take a look at what types of disasters are possible in their area. They do their best to predict the effects. “If X disaster occurs, the biggest impacts to my community will be A, B, and C.” Then, they look at what actions can be taken and what supplies will be needed to lower the impact of those effects. “If A happens, we will need this many hospital beds per 1000 residents in my community.” Or, “We can reduce the chances of B happening if we have better drainage on our main roads and reinforce our two oldest bridges.”
One of the biggest challenges of planning for future disasters is gauging how likely something is, and balancing that with how high its impact could be. For example, a break in the fence of a local ranch during a snowstorm could be a pretty high-frequency event in some areas, but besides some cattle clogging up a road, and a little overtime work for the cowboys, it probably isn’t a high-impact event from a disaster planning standpoint. Probably the most intensive response would be making sure law enforcement can enact road closures or alert nearby residents if needed. Not that big a deal.
An attack by a giant space squid, on the other hand, would probably have an enormous impact. Anyone who has seen the movies in the Cloverfield franchise knows the kind of damage a rampaging space monster (or John Goodman) can do to a city. But, giant space squid attacks are wildly unlikely events, so despite being high-impact, they don’t generally warrant aggressive planning. At most, some basic guidelines for response and an occasional re-evaluation of the likelihood of the threat. And maybe genetically engineering a giant space sperm whale to eat the giant space squid—but that would be more of a federal level thing.
Something like a tornado, that’s where disaster response finds its forte, and where planning becomes very necessary and very challenging. A tornado is a medium-frequency event in many places, and a medium- to high-impact one, depending on where it hits. What supplies are needed to respond? What actions can be taken to reduce the likelihood lives will be lost or property damaged? Are these actions viable and are those supplies able to be stocked in sufficient quantities and rotated to avoid expiration?
Then what about less frequent, but still somewhat likely, and very high-impact events? Things like chemical plant disasters, train derailments, terrorist acts, extreme natural disasters, or epidemics/pandemics are lower frequency than tornadoes or wildfires or floods, but they can have hugely devastating impacts.
These rare but massive impact events are some of the hardest to properly prepare for. Their rarity means we have less experience dealing with them, and therefore have a harder time predicting how they will play out and exactly what actions can mitigate their effects. Keeping adequate stockpiles updated and ready to disperse is expensive and logistically challenging.
These rare, high-impact events are often beyond the preparedness abilities of any individual municipality or even state. These events are best prepared for by sharing the resource and stockpiling burdens. Mutual aid agreements help with getting trained personnel into place to respond in a time of massive need. And the federal government’s ability to pool vast resources becomes vitally important.
You may have heard of the Strategic National Stockpiles (SNS). These are caches of emergency response supplies (generally medical supplies) for overwhelming disasters. The SNS was deployed most recently in response to the COVID-19 pandemic to bolster local and state protective equipment and ventilator stockpiles (if they had any stockpiles at all; some did not, but that’s a topic for another time).
The SNS, like a larger version of any good emergency supply cache, has had some thought put into it. A lot of research goes into what items are most versatile, have the best shelf lives, and are likely to be of greatest need and in shortest supply during different disasters. Experts also look at what has been used in the past and what quantities might be needed at different time frames in the disaster.
Numbers for these stockpiled supplies are based on models and estimates for population affected, how long those effects will last, and how long before those supplies can be produced again. If it can readily and quickly be supplied without being stockpiled, it may not be worth storing as much. Just relying on a good supply chain can save a lot of time and money, but obviously that supply chain has to be resilient as well. For example, if you can quickly have a company manufacture new masks, you don’t need to stockpile as many. But if something happens to that company, or the product can’t be delivered during a disaster, you’re in major trouble.
You may not put quite as much scientific research into your own emergency stash, but it is absolutely critical to give it some good, solid thought.
Now that we have an idea of how experts approach disaster preparedness and supply selection, we are better able to think about our own disaster kits and how to select our own supplies based on need and appropriateness. Remember, your own personal preparedness is as much about mindset as it is specific items. Staying calm, and getting as much good, scientific information as possible is the most important thing you can do. But, beyond that, having some stuff on hand to get you through a few days without help can turn you from a disaster victim to a disaster champion.
First bits first: What disasters are highly likely, or somewhat likely in your area? Don’t forget to think about human-made issues, like industrial chemical plants, landfills, power plants, railways that transport hazardous materials, etc.
**Important Interjection: If you live near industrial facilities, chemical pipelines, and hazardous material storage/disposal sites, your community has a legal Right to Know about these hazards for preparedness and planning.
Think about these potential disasters and their likely effects. You may have already been through some of these; use that experience to inform your planning. What did you experience? What went well? What would have made things easier/better? What information were you lacking/do you wish you had? And finally, are these disasters and effects reasonably likely? They don’t need to be frequent, but planning for a zombie apocalypse (while fun), isn’t really useful. Planning for a few days to a week of power outages during a natural disaster is useful. Be balanced and as realistic as you can when thinking about effects.
Now, list out those effects for each potential high- and medium-frequency disaster. Do any effects overlap? Quite a few probably do—power outages, for example—and that makes preparedness a little easier.
Think out those effects.
What impact will each one have on you? Do you have a way to prepare food in a power outage? Do you have enough water or a filter to last three to five days in the event of a boil water warning? If stores close for a week, do you have enough of your personal medications on hand (like insulin, blood pressure meds, or anything else you may need to stay healthy)?
If you’re ordered to evacuate, do you have a way to leave town? Do you have a place to go?
Do you have a simple first aid kit in your home? A fire extinguisher? Do you know how to use them? Having a ton of supplies does you little good if you can’t use them properly/safely. And similarly, don’t hoard a bunch of random items. If you wouldn’t eat it normally, canned spinach may not be the best choice to keep in your pantry as an emergency food.
Try writing a list of items you would like to have on hand during a disaster, and items you could grab quickly and bring with you if you were ordered to evacuate. Break down this emergency kit list by things you know you’ll need, things you have needed/used in the past, and things you think you might need.
What do you already have on hand? What don’t you have? If the list is long and possibly expensive, what can you pare down? Instead of cases of individual water bottles, a few one-gallon jugs of water will be way cheaper. A couple of flashlights and batteries cost way less than a whole generator.
There may also be resources your community offers that you don’t have or can’t afford. If you or someone you know has special medical needs, most counties have the ability to open special shelters during disasters to provide skilled care for people on oxygen or with other healthcare requirements. Usually, your local health department will have information on how to be listed and contacted for special needs disaster sheltering.
Just like they do for professionals, FEMA also offers disaster preparation guides for citizens. And Ready.gov has good suggestions for basic items to have on hand in your disaster kit, as well as other information for preparedness.
Finally, make sure you rotate your supplies. You may want to set a date (I use the first official day of Hurricane Season) each year to go through your supplies and cycle out things close to expiring and replace them with new stuff. Try to use items from your kit (like batteries, medicines, or shelf-stable foods), and replace them right away to keep everything up to date. Just make sure you already have the replacement on hand, so you don’t empty your kit of important items and then need them later. Also, put some paper and a pen with your kit. When a disaster does strike, you can keep a list of things you use, as well as things you wish you had or wish you had more of to make your kit even better for next time.
Ultimately, what you stock for an emergency is up to you. Generally, a few days worth of basic supplies is all you need. Underground doomsday bunkers are some people’s hobby, but they aren’t realistic preparedness. With some research, a cool head, and a little critical thinking, you can be very prepared with little money and time wasted on things like 18-inch concrete walls. Which leaves you a lot more time and resources to do one of the best disaster preparedness activities ever: help your friends and neighbors.
Volunteering, sharing good information, and helping out those that may not have the time or money to adequately prepare makes any community stronger, which makes us all more resilient, and you far better prepared to turn a bad disaster into just an inconvenience. So thank you in advance for making your community—and therefore our whole world—a little bit stronger.
