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0 pointsdalke10y ago0 comments

I double-checked, and I still see nothing about the process of how to identify the risk level.

For example, it says 'For example, do you live in a 100-year flood zone?' but does not describe how to find that out. It doesn't mention the term 'flood map', or where one finds a flood map. Do you go to the library? Is it easy to find online?

I tried now for Santa Fe, NM. http://www.newfloodmap.com/mountain/ doesn't list Santa Fe county, and in any case I can't tell if it's a legit site or a value added site trying to scam money out of me by looking official and packing together resources that are freely available. I gave up trying to find it online - I think I can get it from City Hall.

Regarding chemical risks, as I pointed out, it doesn't mention the Local Emergency Planning Committee. Quoting Wikipedia:

> Under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA), Local Emergency Planning Committees (LEPCs) must develop an emergency response plan, review the plan at least annually, and provide information about chemicals in the community to citizens.

Someone who is looking for a guide to help with preparation, and doesn't know to keep extra water around, is likely also someone who needs help to map out plausible risks, and could use a pointer to legally mandated resources that are supposed to be available to help with those risks.

Then again, if I don't believe the government is going to bail me out of problems, why should I believe that those government maps and government information is worthwhile for my planning? Are they reliable? What is the experience of others with that information?

As a case in point, regarding 'relevant risks', the text says "Although we are entering the realm of very unlikely events, if you worry about encountering an overturned chemical tanker.."

This would be an excellent example of how to do a cost-benefit analysis. A first approximation is easy - how many people have been killed or injured by a chemical tanker where a mask would have helped? What's the probability of that happening to the reader? What does a mask cost, including the need to recharge or replace it? If it's a 1:1 billion chance per year, and it costs $10/year, then that's saying that your life is worth about $200 million to you.

But if that's so, then perhaps other things, like storing important documents, or copies of important documents, in a safety deposit box is much more worthwhile. Or driving at a more sedate speed (the first paragraph of safety tip #2 is very true!) Or remembering to not drive into flowing water, which kills many more people every year than gas from an overturned chemical tanker.

> board up windows in locations prone to severe weather ... I'm sort of struggling to pinpoint the nature of the complaint :-(

My complaint is that the document tries to take on a lot, and yet does too little.

There are a lot of resources for many of these disasters. There's no way your document can cover all of the things to worry about with a hurricane. You have to point to more complete resources elsewhere. It's not a simple matter of "boarding up windows", since that's only one of several options. I mentioned hurricane shutters; my parents had corrugated metal shutters for the window, stored under the house because when a storm is coming, everyone is trying to get boards for their windows. While on the other hand, a hurricane is more predictable. It's okay to wait until the last 24 hours to fill up the tub with water to use for flushing the toilet, which is not an option in earthquake country.

Accept that your document will be incomplete, and point people to where to go for more information.

The most common major threats (tornado, blizzard, hurricane, flooding, wildfire, sinkhole (yes, I'm from Florida), earthquake, avalanche, volcano/lahar flow, tsunami, etc.) all have official guidelines for how to prepare for them. Use them, and add to them. Don't try to be an all-in-one solution.

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f-10y ago· 1 in thread

The guide doesn't go into specific instructions on how to find flood maps and doesn't do a risk analysis on everything (although it provides numbers for many of the more common risks) chiefly because (a) it's difficult to provide answers that are universally applicable no matter where you are; and (b) I sort of trust the reader to be able to search / ask around; (c) it's already 60 pages of text.

The other thing I sort of learned is that when you spam people with links to hundreds of external resources, you actually lower the odds that they will stay focused and read any of them.

But yeah, maybe a catalog of links to ready.gov and the like may be useful at some point. I actually had several, but I think I lost them in subsequent edits.

For the chemical tanker bit, see section 3.7, which talks about doing a risk analysis before wasting time on such stuff; and in general, most of part I, which tries over and over again to drive across the point that there are some things you really need to worry about, and that they don't involve gas masks and night vision goggles.

dalkeOP10y ago

Who is your target audience?

These are people who you remind - quite well, I'll add - that commonplace things are more deadly than apocalypse planning.

And you remind them that they need water.

And you humorously recommend they download an XML dump of Wikipedia.

You recommend a Garmin Foretrex 401 Waterproof Hiking GPS, but while you recommend 'both a country road atlas and a more detailed map of your county or state' it's in a context where you likely mean road map, and not something where a hiking GPS would be that useful.

And you bring up gas masks in the context of local factories as well, with recommendations of masks to buy; why do you have the text unless you think it's useful?

Sure, the reader can search / ask around ... but then why have this essay in the first place?

Another thing that's missing is to train for emergency situations. The only times I found "train" or "practice" was in the context of weapons and fighting. But you also need to practice using the GPS in hiking situations, if only to learn what basic terms like "datum" mean and what the modes do, and practice making a fire (else why have the matches?), and replacing the tubes on your bike. It mentions 'dig out a latrine' using a shovel and a pickax .. now where do they go for learning how deep to dig, or even that there is such a thing as good latrine practices? (Me? I learned it from the Boy Scout manual.) It's better to practice setting up a tent instead of doing so the first time in a dark.

Sure, you can assume the reader just knows to do this .. but why don't those same people know they should 'sign up for a basic course or have someone truly competent take you to the range' to practice with a gun?

Go to back to an earlier theme of mine, one of the points is "Biking on public roads? Wear a helmet and bright-colored clothing, stay well clear of the doors of parked vehicles, move in a straight line instead of weaning in and out of the traffic, and watch for cars trying to make right turns."

Like most of the rest of the document, this is a very individualistic response. A community response would be to join cycle advocacy groups and fight for usable dedicated bike paths. These are even safer. Yes, helmets, etc. can be a short-term solution, but the long term solution should be to minimize the need for these expensive, personal solutions and reduce overall risk.

"Prepper culture", on the other hand, seems to avoid these sorts of community solutions to the same problem. This document also ignores them.

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