If disaster struck tonight would you have the three days’ supply of food and water as well as a torch and portable radio with fresh batteries which we’re all supposed to have in case we need them?
If you do you’re in the minority.
Data from the New Zealand General Social Survey 2008 shows most New Zealand households have food for three days, less than half have a three-day supply of water, and one-quarter have a household emergency plan.
I’d be with that unprepared majority.
We have enough food to last more than a week without going to town but don’t usually have much water stored. However, we have an irrigation dam not far from the house If the water supply failed we could always use that. We’d usually have enough gas in at least one tank to fuel a barbeque to boil it first and if the gas ran out we could light a fire.
We have several torches and a couple of elderly transistors which still go and always have spare batteries but we’ve never discussed an emergency plan.
Civil Defence Minister John Carter says every household ought to get together and formulate a plan:
“This includes knowing where to shelter in an earthquake, flood or storm; knowing where you will all meet up during and after a disaster; and knowing where you have emergency survival items stored.
”Every household also needs to be prepared for evacuation with a basic getaway kit.
“Perhaps also get the household together and research what happens when a major earthquake occurs and what a tsunami is. On Sunday people were quoted as saying they would run if a tsunami hit but of course, you cannot run as fast as a tsunami surge.”
The big snow of 2006 showed a lot of country people it was necessary to be prepared for a lot more than three days without electricity, water or supplies.
Friends were without power for a couple of weeks and found they not only had to feed themselves but their staff too. One ended up with two extra families for meals and others had neighbours staying with them because theirs were the only homes with fires for cooking and heating.
One of the major problems was lack of water.
There was lots of snow which they were able to melt but they found it took a lot of snow to produce a little water so anytime they weren’t cooking they had their biggest pots on the stove top trying to keep up with requirements for drinking, washing and flushing loos.
Certainly while on the farm we were prepared
But in town having enough water for more than drinking is a big ask, especially as it may need to be kept fresh
As for a plan, what a waste of time. It is worth thinking and discussing ways of dealing with obvious disasters but one definition of a civil disaster is expect unexpected
Ele I am quite sure between you and your farmer you would cover your needs and the needs of many others. rayinz is right it would not be rural folk at risk here although you and your farmer would get very sore forearms keeping the cows comfortable if you don’t have backup power available.
I mentally review our preparedness occasionally and with all the toys and knowing the store is not available 24/7 it does not worry me for our selves but the biggest gap in our civil defence planning is not “self sufficiency” but the time delay for infrastructure to recover to be able to help the “public demand”. All the exercises in this area only test if those with a task can do it and tend to ignore how a response will be managed when only 10/20 % of the planned responders attend their station.
As I have commented before The ChCh C D head quarters is in down town City and with a 8 + quake it is likely the swamp will liquify and C D HQ will sink into oblivion,it would be much more suitable to have it at Harewood on the riverbed of the Waimak as if flooding is the emergency then time will be an option unlike the short or nil warning of a “terra mote”.
Things such as victim recovery, machinery inventory and utilisation, in the face of just finding qualified operators for example, fire, ambulance and law enforcement will all fall foul of sod’s and murphy’s laws and with due respect the Hon John Carter should stop worrying about those who choose to test Darwin’s theories at the beach during a tsunami alert and concentrate on the macro planning that will be the significant failure in any emergency. I understand our local C D response was compromised by a shortage of person power and good communications rather than a lack of a plan last Sunday.
I will just go and run the generator up and check the fuel, the gas for the BBQ and the candles and matches and and and – perhaps a lie down first.
We sort of have a contingency plan.
We have 2-3 days of water in plastic containers and at least that amount of food as well. As it happens we have a months worth of wine but that is another story.
For shelter while we don’t have a tent or anything like that, we have ground sheets and tarpaulins which would be used and depending on the state of our house a wooden villa built 1910, we would improvise around it’s ruins or live in it if still standing.
For cooking we have a barbeque and gas supplies in gas bottles.
I suspect because we live in a reasonably freindly neighbourhood that there would be communal efforts to provide food and shelter to those in serious need and to provide some security from the scum who would inevtiably appear to make others lives a misery.