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What is Emergency Preparedness?

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The term refers to the steps you take to make sure you are safe before, during and after an emergency or natural disaster. These plans are important for your safety in both natural disasters and man-made disasters. Examples of natural disasters are floods, blizzards, tornadoes and earthquakes. Man-made disasters can include explosions, fires, chemical and biological attacks.

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How and Where to Replace Your Important Documents

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davidlat (sxc.hu)
davidlat (sxc.hu)

DENVER – Not only were Colorado homes damaged by the recent severe storms, flooding, landslides or mudslides, but many survivors also lost valuable personal documents.  The documents include everything from Social Security cards to driver licenses to credit cards.

The following is a partial list of ways to get duplicates of destroyed or missing documents: Continue reading →

Sinkhole Danger!

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How to tell if there could be one in your yard

After a Florida man was killed in February when a 20-foot-wide sinkhole opened under his bedroom, many people wondered, Could that happen to me?

Thousands of sinkholes appear in the US each year—but sinkhole deaths are very rare. Only two other people are known to have been killed by sinkholes in the past 40 years in the US. Both were in Florida, and both people were operating heavy well-drilling equipment at the time. Serious injuries are rare, too, though minor injuries such as twisted ankles from small, overlooked holes do occur. In March, a man playing golf suffered a dislocated shoulder after he fell into an 18-foot-deep sinkhole on a golf course near Waterloo, Illinois.

While the risk to life is low, the risk to property can be considerable. What you need to know… Continue reading →

Tsunami Facts

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  • A tsunami is not just one wave but a series of waves or a “wave train.”
  • Many witnesses say a tsunami sounds like a freight train.
  • When the ocean is deep, tsunamis may be less than a foot high on the ocean’s surface, can travel at speeds up to 500 mph without being noticed and cross the entire ocean in less than a day.
  • Once a tsunami reaches the shallow water near the coast, it slows down. The top of the wave moves faster than the bottom, causing the sea to rise dramatically, as much as 100 feet at times.
  • Tsunami waves can be as long as 60 miles and be as far as an hour apart. These waves can cross entire oceans without losing much energy.
  • Flooding can reach land 1000 feet (300 meters) from the coastline and the dangerous waves have enough force to lift giant boulders, flip vehicles, and demolish houses.
  • Scientists can accurately estimate the time when a tsunami will arrive almost anywhere around the world based on calculations using the depth of the water, distances from one place to another, and the time that the earthquake or other event occurred.
  • Hawaii is the U.S. state at greatest risk for a tsunami – they get about one per year and a damaging one every seven years. The biggest tsunami that occurred Hawaii happened on April 1, 1946, where the coast of Hilo Island was hit with 30 foot waves coming in at 500 miles per hour. 170 people died as a result.
  • In 2004, the Indian Ocean tsunami was caused by an earthquake that is thought to have had the energy of 23,000 atomic bombs. Within hours of the earthquake in 2004, killer waves radiating from the epicenter slammed into the coastline of 11 countries, damaging countries from east Africa to Thailand. By the end of the day, the tsunami had already killed 150,000 people. The final death toll was 283,000.
  • Not counting the 2011 tsunami in Japan, there were 26 tsunamis that killed at least 200 people or more in the last century.

 Source: dosomething.org