When we think about disaster preparation, the first step is to decide whether to stay or evacuate. This may sound odd, but we need to make that decision now, before the disaster strikes. Most people wait too long to decide and risk getting caught in massive traffic jams or trapped by rising water, fire or damaged roads. As an F-18 instructor, I told my students to decide when to eject before they ever set foot in the jet. Sixty percent of tactical jet fatalities are pilots who waited too long to pull the ejection handle. Although your survival may not depend on a split-second decision, it’s hard to think clearly with adrenaline. Adrenaline reduces reaction time and increases your strength and pain threshold. What it doesn’t do is facilitate rational thought. When faced with serious inflight emergencies, I found that even simple arithmetic, like calculating remaining fuel, became more challenging. Choosing in advance under what circumstances you’ll stay or evacuate is critical.
If your home is at risk of being damaged, the answer’s obvious, but even if your home is expected to come through untouched, here are some additional things to consider.
> Could your neighborhood or the surrounding area become dangerous or impassable?
> Do you or your family have a medical condition that requires fast access to emergency services?
> Worst case, how long could your area be without municipal water, power and emergency services?
> Do you have enough water, food and power to get by in that worst case scenario?
On the Bolivar Peninsula, we can only evacuate by ferry or highway 87. The ferry can’t operate during extreme weather and highway 87 is only a few feet above sea level. Eighteen years ago, a friend of mine had a beachfront home in Gilchrist, Texas. A hurricane was predicted to come ashore as a category 1 or 2. My friend’s home was built to the latest building codes, and he decided to ride it out. The morning before landfall, there was no wind or waves, but he got a bad feeling and decided to leave with his wife. As they headed out, he watched the water slowly crawling across highway 87 in his rearview mirror. That hurricane was Ike. It did come ashore as a category 2 … but with a category 5 storm surge. Ike didn’t read the building codes and when he was finally able to return, there was no sign his house had ever existed. Not even the pilings or the concrete they were embedded in remained.
More recently, in 2023 hurricane Otis formed off the west coast of Mexico. It was predicted to be a tropical storm or category 1 hurricane, however, shortly before landfall it surprised meteorologists with explosive intensification. It made landfall as a category 5, killing 58 people and becoming Mexico’s most costly hurricane. I believe in having a positive attitude, but we don’t want your elevator designed by an optimist. With disasters, assume the worst and decide NOW under what circumstances you will evacuate, make your evacuation plan so you can execute it quickly, and then follow it. We’ll cover some evacuation How, Where, with What ideas in future installments.
