DSG Drill: Emergency Evacuation
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| Wed, 01-25-2006 - 2:59pm |
Haven't had a drill in a while. I hope littlesbigs won't mind if I step in and do one.
Okay, you've just been evacuated from your home (fire, flood, other emergency situation--localized to your neighborhood). You had less than five minutes to gather your family, pets, and anything else you could grab. Your purse is not near the door, and you can't take the time to look for it.
Question #1: What did you take with you?
Question #2: Where will you spend the night, and how will you pay for it? How will you buy food? How will you contact your insurance company to make a claim? Who will you call for help?
Your home may be gone by the time the crisis is over. How will you pay your bills? Do you have records of all your credit cards and account numbers and due dates? Where are those records? How will you access them?
This is on my mind because dh sent me the article I've posted below, and I've been working on following its advice. For others interested in being prepared, this article also makes it easy for heirs should you die suddenly (heaven forbid).
From the NY Times:
How to Prepare for One Really Quick Getaway
By DAMON DARLIN
What is the first thing you will grab from your home if your house floods, catches on fire or comes tumbling down in an earthquake? Family photos? The pets? The Hummel figurines?
It probably will not be your financial and medical records, the very things you will need to rebuild your life after a disaster. If you are like most people, you have documents stashed in various places throughout your home, perhaps some under lock and key. And with your mind racing as danger hits, you are not going to have the time or wherewithal to figure out which ones you need.
In any case, your financial and medical records would be such a large and unwieldy pile that you would just say forget about it, grab Fluffy and scramble out of there. Indeed, that is probably your reaction any time someone suggests you get your records organized.
But wait. Do not run away yet. New technology is making this tedious task less odious, and surprisingly, it is not that expensive.
All told, you can secure your records in a weekend afternoon. Even better, doing all this has a wonderful side effect: it can put you in better financial shape to survive a disaster because you will end up a lot smarter about how you spend and save money. For instance, one of the first things to do is compile a list of where everything is - account numbers and the locations of important documents. The list will help you or anyone in your family locate things you need for the insurance adjuster or relief worker. (Download a template for this information that you can place right on your computer.)
This is really the "if hit by a bus" list that financial planners have been recommending you compile for your heirs. If you think of the list that way, you will be reminded of your mortality and you will not want to write it. But think of the families displaced by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita or by California wildfires, and the psychological barrier collapses. The list becomes a much easier sell now, said Brent Neiser, a director for the National Endowment for Financial Education. "It forces you to think," he said.
Here is what else you have to do to protect your records and yourself:
RECORD: Once you have made your basic list, save it on a U.S.B. flash drive. A 256-megabyte drive, which you can buy for $20 or even less if you catch a store promotion, gives you enough space for that file and all the other suggestions mentioned below.
Several of the big flash drive makers, like SanDisk and Lexar Media, are now selling more advanced drives that allow you to encrypt the data so others cannot read it without knowing the alphanumeric key that unlocks the code. Some are even shock proofed with heavier rubber and plastic coatings. Those will cost about $10 to $20 more, but are certainly worth it when you consider the sensitivity of the data on them.
It is also a good idea to copy the contents onto additional drives for backup and for other members of the family.
BONUS: When you are listing the credit cards, also note the credit limits so you will know how much you could spend in an emergency. If your credit cards are at their limits now, you are not going to have any cushion to fall back on. So start paying off balances, beginning with the card carrying the highest interest rate.
SCAN: Some important documents are on paper and you will want copies of them with you: tax returns for the last three years (Form 1040 is all you will need in an emergency), a recent pay stub, birth certificates, marriage license, the deed to your home and insurance policy pages that list your coverage. If you do not have a scanner or a printer with a flat scanner, take the pile of documents down to a copy center like Kinko's to scan. Record the image files on the U.S.B. drive.
BONUS: Take the opportunity to check your insurance coverage for potential disasters like flooding. With homes appreciating in value, you may also find you need to increase coverage.
SHOOT: Some personal finance advisers suggest that you make a spreadsheet listing everything you own and enter the date and price paid and then file all the receipts and ... yeah, yeah. You will never do it. But creating a detailed inventory of everything you own need not be a major chore when technology comes to the rescue. Many households now have a camcorder or digital camera. Walk around each room and take a picture of each item. Then, either store all the photos on a memory card (unless you live in the Biltmore mansion, you can load all the photos on a 256- or 512-megabyte card). Or you can transfer them to the same U.S.B. drive with your other documents.
Describe each object on the camcorder soundtrack or in the file name of the digital photo. Make an extra copy on another card or drive. "If you give one to your insurance adjuster, you go to the front of the line," Mr. Neiser said.
For additional protection, you could upload the photos - as well as all your beloved family photos - to one of the free online photo services like Flickr.com, Picasa.com, Snapfish.com, or Kodakgallery.com. Anybody you choose can then have access to them from any computer anywhere. (Make sure to set the privacy options, though.)
BONUS: You are going to discover a lot of stuff you no longer want or need. Sell it or donate it and take a tax deduction. Intuit, maker of Quicken and TurboTax, sells a $20 program called ItsDeductible that estimates the value of donated items, but Bankrate.com and Salvationarmyusa.org have free valuation guides.
SECURE: Now it is time for your medical records. You can place your health history as well as digitized copies of X-rays, scans and electrocardiograms on the same encrypted flash drive.
Those with serious medical conditions may want to consider a product sold by the nonprofit organization that developed the MedicAlert bracelet 50 years ago. It sells a special USB flash drive on its Web site, www.medicalert.org, called the E-HealthKey for $85. SanDisk originally developed the product for the Army. Pop the flash drive into any computer and a screen flashes with your medical condition to alert emergency room personnel, for instance, to an allergy or your use of a pacemaker. But beyond that screen, medical information you enter with the help of a user-friendly program right on the drive is encrypted.
For an additional $20-a-year fee, MedicAlert uploads your data to its server so you have a backup.
The E-HealthKey is only available for PC's running Windows XP or Windows 2000. You may want to wait until November when the organization issues an improved version.
BONUS: The E-HealthKey software, created by a division of Bio-Imaging Technologies, also plots your weight, cholesterol or anything you regularly record, onto a graph. "It's a great wellness tool," said Ramesh Srinivasan, MedicAlert's vice president for marketing. If you are going to run for your life, clutching your flash drive and the Hummels, you had better be healthy.

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The pets - 1 cat (put into her carrier near back door) & 1 dog (leash is in garage near car).
mslvp@sbcglobal.net
Cruise and Group Specialist
HAVE A GREAT DAY! (OR EVENING!)
Question #1: What did you take with you?
I grab my cell phone and drivers license and debt card and cc, and get the cats in their carriers, then if I have time grab the computer and load it down to the car. That would take the full five minutes most likily.
That all being said, I have a special place by my door for anything that I would need in an emergency including my purse. I live in an area that has tornado's in the spring all the time so I have to have emergency items where I can get to them. My purse, the cat carriers, and coat would all be there ready to go. It would just be catching the cats and grabbing the computer that would take time. And quite frankly if they tried to make me leave without my cats, knock me out or something cause I'd fight them on that. Actually I wouldn't have to take the full computer even just the external hard drive which houses all my quicken records. Chances are I'd be gone long before they evacuated the area though, I don't mess with Mother Nature too much. I know she can kick my booty.
Oh and I also have snack items, a blanket and a bottle of water in my car at all times just in case. Better to be prepared than not. And I get antsy if I have less than a half a tank of gas in my car so I'd at least have that much gas which should get me where I need to go.
I also have gas lanterns, and candles and a stock pile of food that would get me through a couple of weeks if I was somehow stranded at home for a long period of time. I get iced in occassionally, the longest it's lasted is a couple of days but I like having the security of having things on hand. The trick would be making the water last as long as it would need to.
Question #2: Where will you spend the night, and how will you pay for it? How will you buy food? How will you contact your insurance company to make a claim? Who will you call for help?
First stop would be my parents they live within a ten minutes and that would cost me a dime. If I couldn't stay there, I'd drive down to the trailer/country place my parents have and stay there. No need to buy food and I have clothes and health and beauty items at both places. I have both my car insurance and renter's insurance through the same company so I'd give them a call at the number on the back of my car insurance card. I'd call my parent's first for help, then some extended family members.
Your home may be gone by the time the crisis is over. How will you pay your bills? Do you have records of all your credit cards and account numbers and due dates? Where are those records? How will you access them?
I pay all of my bills through my bank's site and set up payments the day the bill comes in and have several of my bills that are just bill directly to the bank's site so I wouldn't have to worry about those. The big concern would be if I was evacuated so would my place of employment what would happen if they couldn't deposit my pay check? That gives me nightmares hense me building up my emergency fund.
Honestly, it amazes me that so few people have an emergency plan especially those that live in an area that has regular issues with weather. I know people around me that couldn't make it through a single day without going out. And don't know where they'd stay or have an evacuation plan at all that live near me. Heck I even have a plan if zombies attack. : - D
I think I'll jump in and join on this thread. BTW, I am Dotchi.
Question #1: What did you take with you?
Besides yelling for the kids to get to the van, I grabbed my Mom's Desk. It's a folder that I keep everything in, the keys are near the door to grab as I am running out the door and I would have grabbed the medicine from the fridge door and the urgent must have medicine bag hanging on a hook (which I can grab on the way out, has needles, extra glucometer, extra pills for 1 week, etc) and my cell phone will be on the top shelf next to the keys.
Question #2: Where will you spend the night, and how will you pay for it?
Depends. If it is from the nuclear plant, we'd head north (fastest route out) and hit Knoxville. Probably stay in a KOA sleeping in the van with the sleeping bag, extra blankets and pillows in the back. Pay for it with cash from the ATM machine since my ATM card is in the Mom's Desk.
If it is for some other reason, like the house falls over or a fire, then I'd stay at my mother in laws or friends house.
How will you buy food?
With cash. We do have snacks in the back, so if it is a 1 or 2 day thing I could get by with what we have in back of the van already.
How will you contact your insurance company to make a claim?
It's in Mom's Desk and I'd have my cell phone.
Who will you call for help?
My husband, my mother in law, Leslie, my friends, Military One Source (all in Mom's Desk, which btw is zipped shut so nothing falls out!)
Your home may be gone by the time the crisis is over. How will you pay your bills?
By check or pay over the phone. We would be staying with MIL until insurance paid and we have a van we can live out of (and did for two months) if necessary.
Do you have records of all your credit cards and account numbers and due dates?
Yep, in Mom's Desk complete with contact info, acct numbers, who to talk to, how it is paid and amount due each month.
Where are those records?
In Mom's Desk. I have a copy of them on computer but after a few computer crashes I started working with everything on paper.
How will you access them?
Unzip Mom's Desk, flip to Expenses or Insurance.
Wow. I feel so prepared. Better double check everything now. Including the camping box inside the van.
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