Welcome to Disaster Preparedness Month 2018

September 1, 2018

One of the reasons I started JCP Technical was to assist in disaster preparedness for the average people separate from Government programs, and to empower people to take care of themselves, their communities, and families. Each year we have a series of posts detailing what YOU can do to prepare yourself for disasters.

What can you do?

The government says that you should be preparing for disasters and have disaster supplies available for up to 96 hours after a disaster. I divide it into three categories.

From short-term to long-term. Fortunately most of us will only deal with short term emergencies from a fire, medical emergency, or weather event. These disasters, seem to resolve themselves quickly and have significantly different requirements than a long term disaster situation.

It is important to differentiate the category you are in if you are in charge of making emergency preparations for yourself, your family, or your business. I’ll discuss all three, all three are fluid, there are gray areas between all three.

Category 1: Emergency Response, Short Term Emergencies, and Short Term Military Operations. 0 to 96 hours

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has repeatedly stated that we should all be prepared for up to 96 hours without outside sources of food, fuel, and electricity. If you are in areas with specific disasters like tornadoes, earthquakes, or wildfires, then you should absolutely be prepared for those instances. How do you prepare? Simply have enough “stuff” for each person to last four days. Do an Assessment, Analyze and Act. These types of disasters could also be called emergencies (emergent situations) and could range from knowing the location of fire exits and what to do if you are stranded at work or school for 4 days. 

Category 2: The Transition from Emergency Response, to Short Term Disruption. Weeks to Months

This time period lasts from the time of the original response, to about 3 months. During Superstorm Sandy, most people in the impact area were out of electricity and drinkable water for 10 or more days. 

This type of disaster is the most you can reasonably prepare yourself for. Unless you have a major facility for storage you probably will not be able to store enough food, water, and other supplies for anything longer than 3 months. Remember for a family of four this uses 1 gallon of water per day per person. For 90 days that means you need 360 gallons just for drinking, and it may last that long if you are extremely disciplined in using it, and do not live in a hot environment.

Category 3: Primitive Living.

This is one step beyond “Living Off the Grid”. Primitive Living is exactly that, you do not have food, water, or other supplies on hand and need to generate it in the field. Basically pre-industrial revolution. This would be a huge societal disruption to say the least. 

Some estimates by official government sources list the death toll in the 10’s to hundreds of millions within 12 months if we need to transition back to primitive living. What would cause this? Regional to National Emergencies including nuclear attack, massive volcanic eruptions, Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP) events, famine, massive public health emergencies like a pandemic flu, massive crop failure, drought, government disruptions, civil war, social upheavals, and any other emergency that may cause widespread problems.



Preparations for this type of situation for Americans and Western Europeans would mean society re-learning how to live off the land, collect water, hunt, fish, grow your food, and yes, defend your family with force if necessary. NBC’s cancelled series Revolution is probably the best example of this type of TV show, however it is a work of fiction (or is the government trying to disclose something?).