What's your areas most likely disaster and how are you prepared?

[enjoy the ride]

In my area, earthquakes, high winds and wild fires are most likely.
All you can do for earthquakes is have resistance built into your home, fasten everything down that can tumble over and have a basic supply of water and edibles around the home. I also keep a barbeques and charcol stored for heating food if needed.
Although no hurricanes here, microbursts from the ocean are really damaging, flattening trees and taking down power. So like earthquakes being prepared to have neccessaries at home at all times is good.
Wild fires are totally different- you need to be able to leave fast- that one I am not really prepared for. I can't think how I would ge my animals out fast. I really need some work in that area.

So what's your situation?

 

[patandchickens]

Likeliest natural disaster here would probably be major ice storm or blizzard-with-ice, like the one in the late nineties. Honestly, if we were without power for more than a day or so in the really seriously freezing part of winter, at least part of the family would probably have to find someone to stay with. I expect DH would take the kids to his mum's place across the city (cities usually tending to get their power back early), and I would find someone around here on whose floor I could sleep so I could check on the animals daily. Or maybe I wouldn't, I don't know, it depends on the exact situation and how passable the roads were/weren't.

Our big problem in that circumstance would be heating the house (oil-fired furnace needs electricity to make the fan go) -- we do technically have a fireplace but it is very ill-designed for actual heating so we've never bothered to have the chimney cleaned/inspected and I wouldn't feel comfortable using it.

At some point in the next few/five years, I really want to get a fireplace insert, probably woodburning, because if we had that, we could stay here just fine through any outage. "Fortunately" our basement sump produces all too much water during the winter months so that would work for flushing/washing/animals, and we have jugs o' drinking water stored. We could eat dry/uncooked foods, or heat stuff on the propane bbq grill (in moderation - we usually only have 1 spare tank).

I guess the other likeliest big problem would be a Hurricane Hazel type hurricane -- we are in a very low spot, and if we got more than about 3" at a time, or even less if the ground was already totally saturated to the gills as it is right now, I honestly do not know how much likelihood there'd be of basement flooding. We have a battery backup on the sump pump, and car batteries could be swapped in to prolong it past a couple days, but if surface water were actually pouring thru the basement windows the sump pump would be irrelevant. But, you know what? If that happened, so the basement would flood. It would cost us a buncha money we could ill-afford. It would suck. But it would not be a *serious* problem.

So that's our story. Southern Ontario is not exactly the natural disaster capital of the universe, fortunately


Pat

 

[Dodgegal79]

Here mine would be forestfire and heavy snow. They had heavy snow here years ago and people were without power for almost a week. I have only wood heat so its ok for me, I would just have to worry about my waterlines freezing. As for forestfire, I don;t havv many trees by the house but I think I might not be doing to good if that happens. Cross my fingers!

 

[Acre of Blessings]

I guess I would have to say, Straight Line winds (very damaging) - hail - possible tornados - and as dry as it is... fires from individuals burning trash unattended, ice storms.

I took a class for 16 weeks called C.E.R.T (community emergency responce team) we were all trained to know what to do in any disaster. From bandaging a wound to marking a door on a house that we had just searched for survivors or fatalities. Mainly we were trained to keep our thinking straight in a disaster.

We were trained on what to store and how to properly store it and how long we could keep it stored.

It is a really neat program and anyone can take the class. You also get CPR Certified and Advanced First Aid Certified.

 

[FarmerChick]

Worst here is ice storms and horrifying T-storms with possible tornado and big hail, high wind type thing.

Lost power for a week once in an ice storm. (stupid trees on the lines..LOL)

For me, I fill the bathtub to flush, have drinking water, have pool water for backup if needed for flushing or anything else.

Just bought a propane stove (very pretty) and installing it in about 2 weeks. Buying 250 gallon propane tank and total cost is $1,200 for all.....so to supplement heat and for emergencies it comes in cheaper than a monster monster generator for heat..LOL...I couldn't afford a generator big enough to run my heat pump......so the propane is an emergency source of heat vs. my nasty kerosene heaters I used to use....will sell my 2 and make a buck or 2 on them.

 

[Beekissed]

Ice storms, floods and tornadoes. For loss of power, I would be up a creek for water, no pun intended! I plan to get a handpump and install it on the spare well here on the property. Heat with wood, so no problem with heat or cooking. Have an outhouse, so no problem with the necessaries. Have a cellar with food stocked up, so could go for awhile. Always keep a good supply of toilet paper and the essential staple foods.

We are high and dry for floods but the tornadoes are a distinct possibility. We have the cellar in an emergency like that. Keep flashlights by all the beds and the exits. Kerosene lamps filled and ready. Water in jugs in the cabinets.

That's about it.

 

[miss_thenorth]

We were told when we moved here that there is a possiblity of tornadoes around here.

We truck in our water, and our holding tank holds 3300 gallons which would on general daily use last us 3 weeks to a month. Conserving would allow that to last longer. We have a generator to power the pump and a basement. My pantry is stocked (i shop the sales and stock up).

that being said, tornadoes are still very uncommon here.

 

[sweetproserpina]

Our disasters would be about the same as patandchickens, as we're in Ontario (southern) too. I'm amazed at how well the power stays on here. We've had heaps of storms this past year and haven't lost power once. At our old place in BC we lost power constantly

Blizzard/ice storms or heavy storm/hurricanes, although hurricanes would be extremely rare.

Our wood-fired furnace wouldn't work (no elec. for the fan) but we have a wood stove too that we could use to cook/heat with quite nicely. We get our water trucked in, so we'd just lower buckets down into the cistern under the garage to get our daily water too. I plan on filling up the pantry and root cellar for the winter, and I always have loads of flour on hand, and with the chickens for eggs we'd do all right if we were snowed in for a few days or weeks.

 

[Hiedi]

Our water company is not very reliable so quite frequently we lose water. That is why we try to store a lot of water. We have ice storms in the winter, but our winters our not that harsh. My biggest concern, we live near a major interstate and a truck stop so I am concerned about chemical spills where we might have to evacuate. I keep a survival pack in my car for that type of situation. I am also concerned about criminals that travel the highway and happen to get off at our exit because we are out in the country. We have already had someone leave a stolen car in front of our house after setting it on fire.

 

[Colored Egg Farmer]

Our areas most likely disaster probably would be fires.
That reminds me we aren't even prepared for anything.