mid 70s and saturated, I’m sure. [74F and 99%RH]
This is the one year anniversary of the death of Dave Hardy. Frequent commmentor, keen observer, friend of the blog. Pray for the repose of his soul, and his wife and daughter. Raise a glass to absent friends.
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From a website aimed at cops, comes this article:
“As police and firefighter numbers fall, officials urge disaster prep”
A few pull quotes, but you should read the whole thing-
“”So even if you were the slickest agency in the world, and you dealt with disasters all the time … if you train every day, a disaster is still called a disaster for a reason,” said Amy Donahue, a professor in the department of public policy at the University of Connecticut. “Even if you devoted all of your resources to these rare events, you still would find yourself struggling to manage them.””
“We’ve learned through some of our exercises, through Cascadia, which was a national exercise, that maybe it’s more realistic to expect that help in a week and maybe two weeks,” Barrington said. “With those kinds of time frames, it’s very important that the citizens be able to have the resources available that they can survive and live for multiple days without help.”
“‘EVERYBODY IS A FIRST RESPONDER’
Last year, FEMA released its 2018-22 Strategic Plan for disaster response, which emphasized “shared responsibility across all layers of government down to the individual.” In other words, residents of the affected communities are their own first responders.
“If you’re talking about a sudden large-scale disaster, there will never, ever, ever be enough professional first responders right when they’re needed, right when a disaster strikes,” Simpson said. “Everybody is a first responder.””
…
“During a disaster, it may be up to family, neighbors and even strangers to save themselves and others.
“They’re saved by bystanders,” Simpson said. “That’s actually the frontline of first response in a large-scale disaster.””
“People, just individual, regular people like us,” Donahue said, “don’t tend to put too much, if any, energy into being ready in the most simple and basic ways for a disaster. If a whole lot of people were just a little bit more prepared, it would make a very big difference.”
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I got a few things done this week (and last).
I got wheels for my 40 gallon water tank.
I sprayed the grapevines for caterpillars, again.
Pruned the citrus.
Added food to the pile, moved several buckets of bulk to my offsite site.
Ate some of my stored food, tried some new recipes.
Bought a bunch of stuff- Build parts for gubs. Propane heaters. Water filter. Some other defensive items. Some medical stuff. All on the secondary market. No itemized receipts. Sometimes no receipts at all.
Put a case of Mountain House in the truck. Getting stuck at school with the kids was not on the radar. Looking more seriously for a boat. If I had to go get the kids in a high water emergency, I could walk in, but it would be better to have a boat of some kind.
Got another pair of wellies (big boots).
Working on installing a roof rack on the Expedition. Would work well for a jonboat or open kayak, or inflatable.
Reading through “Bushcraft First Aid- A Field Guide to Wilderness Emergency Care.” Can’t recommend it unless you are starting from absolute zero. His info on tourniquets is out of date and wrong. Makes you wonder what else is OOD and wrong…
Feels like there was some other stuff in there too, but that’s all I can think of at the moment.
It feels like time is really short. Lots of bad things hanging by a thread, literally just a heartbeat away. Get some training. CERT, a PD CPA class, EMT, or self defense. Get your ham license, it’s easy and can be a lot of fun. Plus, you’ll meet people, many of whom are like minded. Meet some people. Go to your local county, city, or neighborhood meetings. Find a ham club. Go to the Show and Shine car show Sunday morning… get out of the house. Heck, just go yard sale-ing and chat with folks. Take the tenor of the tribes.
Don’t put it off. .Gov is late to every party, and even they are saying you need to do more to get ready!
n