In Week 1 of National Preparedness Month my wife and I discussed our plans, inspired by the Make a Plan page on the DHS website.

Communications

Staying up to date with the latest official notifications sounded like a good idea. We have iPhones on the Verizon network so we made sure that our emergency notifications are turned on. Local police radio can also be informative at times. If you don’t have a radio for receiving those channels directly there are several smartphone apps that can play streaming police scanner audio over the internet.

Our personal communication plan is to use our cell phones if possible. In an event like the Seattle earthquake of 2001 or the I-5 Skagit River bridge collapse telephone networks can be unusable due to the increased usage as people try to reach friends and family in the area. Text messaging can be an alternative way to get word through. If your cell phone offers a feature like WiFi calling, be sure to turn that on. If your phone has internet connectivity through wifi the phone call will be sent over the internet if possible, bypassing the local telephone network.

As a backup communication plan we also have Baofeng handheld radios that are reliable within a couple of miles. These are also great for when you’re basically on the same site, but need spontaneous communication without resorting to yelling or making a phone call.

Voxer is also a great voice messaging app. It combines the “push to talk” functionality of a walkie-talkie and the persistent long distance capabilities of text messaging.

Special Family Needs

We don’t have a lot in the way of special needs, but we do have a German Shepherd in the family. The ready.gov site has a good page on things to consider for your pets. We have a backpack for him with vacuum sealed bags of dog food, a metal run, leash, and some treats. In an emergency we can grab his Go Bag and be on our way.

Emergency Plan

We have our family emergency plan stored in a document. When it is updated I print out a new copy and make sure that we both have a copy of it in our Go Bags and Get Home Bags.

In the Week 2 summary I’ll be writing about our emergency kits. Stay safe out there and contact me if you’d like help working on your own preparedness plans.