September 14, 2018 T he C olumbia P ress 5 Emergency: Clatsop County shouldn’t count on quick help after a major disaster Continued from Page 1 There are so many ways to answer that. One of the things that affects us in Clatsop County and poses a particu- lar challenge for Warrenton is the thing that helps create our culture, who we are and what we are: the ocean. We’re on the coast. We identify with it. Yet so many emergencies are generated from the ocean. One of the biggest risks is a Cascadia earthquake and subsequent tsunami and yet our most frequent danger is from strong winter storms. … We forget that there’s a much higher risk of their occur- rence. While we prepare for real- ly large events, we can forget that an event like the 2007 Great Coastal Gale has a 10- year recurrence pattern. Q. So how do we prepare for both? It’s a challenge to strike a balance. We should work dil- igently on the Cascadia event while making progress on the smaller events that happen more frequently. We have an enormous haz- ard profile here. It’s part of living on the coast. It’s a big challenge for the CERT team to educate the public. Q. What will happen here after a major event? We expect the coast will be completely cut off. Clatsop County will physically look different. … There could be bridges down. The major routes could be impassable. There could be tsunami in- undation islands that people can’t escape from. Emergency management of- ficials used to advocate house- holds prepare for 72 hours before help arrives. That changed as people saw that a Katrina event or a Hurricane Sandy could occur here. So we began saying people should prepare themselves for two weeks. That’s a big ask. But since the two weeks have become the standard, every- body is talking now about two weeks not even being enough. We understand if we push too hard people will stop lis- tening. But how will people and communities sustain them- selves until roads and a more direct presence can be estab- lished? It’s going to be difficult to get food, water, shelter, med- icine and medical care to af- fected areas at the time of a disaster. The No. 1 thing that we, as a nation, can do is for all the individuals who live in the affected areas to prepare themselves. It will reduce the response coming from the rest of the nation. That’s why two weeks is now thought of as a minimum. Q. What’s something most people don’t realize? The difficulty is in getting people to prepare themselves. It’s difficult to imagine the im- pacts of a disaster and those who take it seriously can be the object of mocking, that whole ‘doomsday prepper’ thing. It’s hard to get the bal- ance right. Nobody is suggesting that people dig a hole and fill it with guns and food and wait for the bad day to happen. But we need to get people to take small actions to prepare. While Cascadia Subduction Zone is like a four-letter word, it really does dominate our work. We can start to prepare for the large event by getting ready for the next coastal gale. Q. What’s one thing peo- ple can do to get ready? The one I always lead with costs no money to do and yet is the most important: make a plan with your family. Write some things out. There are on- line resources; just search for ‘FEMA preparedness plan.’ The Red Cross also has products that can help. Take 20 minutes on a weekend and talk with your family about ‘what would we do if a bad earthquake struck?’ Talk about how you will find each other after a disaster. My wife and I spend just a few minutes every month talking about our plan. Now that we have a child in school, we discuss what we will do if it happens when he’s in school. Who will get our other child in preschool and where will we meet? Next important thing is to have a kit. Don’t try to do it all in one day. But start the process. If you have an old backpack at home, get it out … Start filling it with supplies. Each time you go to the grocery store, make small purchases for it, such as a can opener, flashlight, a couple cans of soup. Anything you’d use for camping. Long underwear. A sleeping bag. It’s about getting by until help arrives. When people prepare them- selves and their families, auto- matically they reduce the bur- den on everybody else and on the first responders. Q. Why spend an entire day at an emergency pre- paredness event? The Warrenton CERT team has lined up a remarkable se- ries of speakers, all of whom have vast experience to share. It’s an ambitious schedule. Even those who don’t make it for the entire day can get literature and items that are useful for their preparedness kits like space blankets and whistles. Q. Is the county better prepared than it was in 2007? A lot has been done to pre- pare the county and spread information about the kinds of risks we face. But when it comes to some- thing like the largest hazards, it’s hard but essential to main- tain equipment, supplies and personnel for an event that could happen this year or in 50 years. We’ve learned a lot and there are always new lessons to learn. Sick? Injured? Get diagnosed and treated by a doctor or nurse practitioner over the phone or by video chat. See if you qualify (no insurance needed)... cmhvirtualcare.anytime.org OR 1-888-972-8022 2111 Exchange St., Astoria, Oregon • 503-325-4321 www.columbiamemorial.org • A Planetree-Designated Hospital