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Old 01-08-2014, 16:42   #32
vorticity
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Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Fort Collins, CO
Posts: 15
When flooding hit Colorado this September, I had almost this exact scenario play out - we weren't sure if our location would be heavily flooded/lose power/etc. but it was a possibility, and while there was a heightened sense of potential damage (within the 24-hour time limit), the actual emergency (flooding, water loss, etc.) would hit with only a few hours' notice (time for a flash flood to work its way down the canyon.) Basically, we ended up half-implementing our plan - getting the pieces in place, to finish everything up once we knew we needed to.

It was a very useful experience, and I definitely picked up some things that I missed:

1.) Food: we have a one-month supply of dry goods that we rotate in-out on a six-to-nine week basis (dry beans and rice, plus some canned goods and candy/chocolate for variety.) I did end up moving that supply to higher shelves in case of floodwaters - it would suck to have your food supply ruined, and more flood-resistant storage is definitely part of the 'new' plan.

2.) Water: I had three 6-gallon carboys already filled with clean tap water, and had our two 100-gallon WaterBoBs out, ready to be filled in the tub as needed. Would keeping a few clean, empty 1-gallon jugs, to be filled from a spare WaterBoB and/or from a filtration system, be useful as barter material for people without clean water?

3.) Sanitation: it's me, my wife, and our two toddler girls, so we have a *large* supply of TP on hand at all times. Sanitation was a potential issue, though - in case of sewer outages (as happened in nearby cities) my plan was to build a latrine in the far corner of our backyard, but that made me wonder about how that would work in a flooded situation - when the backyard is under water, where does the waste go? I thought about using a few Homer buckets and garbage bags to store waste, but was genuinely unprepared for a 'toilet's out, can't dig a crapper' situation.

4.) Medical and 5.) Cooking: We're good on meds (no prescriptions), and have a large first-aid kit and resupply set for basic bumps and bruises - not sure what I'd want in addition for a 30-day emergency, though. With 2x-propane tanks and a firepit, I thought I'd be good for a couple of weeks of food/water prep at least, unless the backyard was underwater - have since gone out to get a supply of sandbags to fill up since then, but will still have to learn how to properly use them.

Things that didn't make my 5-point list, but do now:

Money - never even thought about getting a cash supply. Oops. I'd probably hope to barter useful things (gallons of clean water, food, etc.) for things I forgot, but not sure that's a viable solution. In an inflation-run environment, and with the knowledge that banks often limit withdrawals to avoid runs, you're kind of left with keeping a large pile of cash in the house. What's the balance between too-much-that-should-be-earning-interest-somewhere and that's-enough-to-buy-a-$600-chicken to keep around, do you think? Can a month's salary reserve be made of a combination of cash and barter items?

We also found it 'interesting' that all our 'safe' document storage was in our safe...in the basement. Not a great place during a flood, and we ended up moving documents, titles, medical records, etc. to a new fire/flood-proof safe upstairs. Easy to overlook stuff like this.

We were fortunate not to have to implement the rest of our plan, but it was a good exercise nevertheless. Things like sanitation, money, and document security were not things I'd thought about, and getting to think through the plan, but not suffer from things we overlooked, was a really useful exercise.

Last edited by vorticity; 01-08-2014 at 16:59. Reason: edits to fit 5-point format as specified in first post
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