Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Preparedness: It's Not That Hard!

Preparedness can be a scary word; it's true, it can be daunting. Many people I have talked to during preparedness presentations across the state are overwhelmed by what the word entails. Here in Utah, people have entire rooms in their homes dedicated to preparedness. Shelves full of canned foods and gallons of water! But if you think about the basics of being prepared, you shouldn't be daunted. It really can be easy if you start with the essentials.

My advice, start with a 72-hour kit! Either purchase one already made on our online store or gather the supplies and put them in an old backpack. Make sure your kit is readily available for use. This could mean near your bed, in your car, or by the front door.

Once you feel comfortable with your kit, start gathering other items that may be useful. These include, extra flashlights and batteries in case of a power outage, a few extra cans of food and some water containers after a trip to Costco and beefing up your first aid kit. Then check your fire alarms and make sure everyone in your house knows what to do and where to go in case of an emergency.

As soon as you have the basics down, you can rest assured that while you may not have everything but the kitchen sink in your earthquake, tornado, and atomic bomb proof chamber, you have essential items that will help in case of any type of emergency.

If this simple post doesn't do it for you, I suggest saving your money for this instead. 



Shout out to Jana Sweeny for bringing up the "preparedness is simple" topic and to the Oregon Trail Chapter for this awesome video.

2 comments:

Faye said...

Faye @ Buffalo Red Cross, Great post! I do think people find the task of developing a kit daunting, but this article definitely breaks it down and makes the topic more approachable! Our blog covers similar topics! http://bit.ly/gk7ay3

Mary said...

Thanks for sharing your blog with us and our readers! We'll be sure to check out your posts!!