Disaster Prep Wednesday: "Preparedness and Disaster" Videos

Nice videos from the Kansas City area:

Disaster Prep Wednesday: I Got Your Gun Control Right Here

Nice piece on slowing down would be mass killers, which contains this truth:

Gun Free Zones are hunting preserves for innocent people.

If you decide you aren't interested in being part of that preserve, then what kind of weapon do you need to stop a bad guy? Not much, really. You could use a cross bow, but the damn things are hard to conceal.

There are all sorts of lists of nice concealed pistols out there. My suggestion is that you get something that will fire a shot filled round in addition to regular ammo. Why? Makes it harder to miss the bad guy and makes it harder for a stray round to take out a fellow innocent.

Interesting discussion of self-defense shot rounds suitable for use in a pistol at NRA/American Rifleman:

The most efficient handgun for shooting .410 shells would have a smooth-bore barrel sized to fit that shell only. However, sawed-off shotguns and smooth-bore pistols have been restricted in this country for some time due to NFA regulations established in 1934. In order for a handgun to qualify for over-the-counter sale without additional Federal tax stamps and paperwork, it must have a rifled barrel and be chambered for a center-fire cartridge intended for handguns or rifles.

See the handy info from 410Handguns.com here, which serves to point out that shot shells are a mostly a close up and personal thing. Then again, personal defense is all about up close.

Info on the Smith & Wesson Governor, one of those .410/.45 combos here:

The Smith & Wesson Governor revolver puts six rounds of customizable response under your control. Load with .410 2 1/2" shotshells, .45 ACP or .45 Colt - alone or in combination - and hit your target in every situation.

Training also helps.

That's where you learn the kind of gun control that matters.

UPDATE: See Top Cops Warm to Idea of Armed Citizenry to Confront Terrorists:

Oakland University criminal justice professor Daniel Kennedy couldn't agree more. He told the Detroit News that terrorists would be reluctant to attack armed citizens.

“We don’t have laboratories where we can test these theories, but there is something to the argument that terrorists want a high body count — and if they can only shoot a few people before they’re taken out themselves, it wouldn’t have the kind of impact they want.”

Which is a cowed population willing to accept anything to stop the terrorists, including meekly surrendering.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: You Are On Your Own

That's it.

You are on your own.

Plan accordingly.

Sort out the urgent and important items.

I suggest you use something like the "Eisenhower Matrix":

The Difference Between Urgent and Important

Urgent means that a task requires immediate attention. These are the to-do’s that shout “Now!” Urgent tasks put us in a reactive mode, one marked by a defensive, negative, hurried, and narrowly-focused mindset.

Important tasks are things that contribute to our long-term mission, values, and goals. Sometimes important tasks are also urgent, but typically they’re not. When we focus on important activities we operate in a responsive mode, which helps us remain calm, rational, and open to new opportunities.

You might note that President Eisenhower said, “What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.”

 Where would you put preparing for likely disasters in the matrix?

Good luck.

Oh, and there is this other useful quote from General Eisenhower:

In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Don't Let the Turkey Burn Your House Down (Reposted)

Here's a re-posting of a 2014 post on how to avoid making a wreck of your Thanksgiving:


Okay, try not to burn your house down while cooking your turkey.

Especially true if you decide to deep fat fry the thing.

Some words of advice from Joseph Lindberg at the Twin Cities Pioneer Press
Exploding turkeys: How to avoid them:

On average, five Americans die each year from fires caused by deep fryers, according to the National Fire Protection Association.

The most common mistake is overfilling the deep-frying vat, which causes oil to spill over the edge and ignite, engulfing the entire unit in flames that are difficult to extinguish.

And placing a frozen -- or even partially frozen -- turkey into the vat can cause an explosion of hot oil, according to the fire marshal.

In fact, UL, an independent and global safety science company, considers turkey fryers so hazardous that it will not certify them for safe use.

U.S. fire departments respond to about 1,000 home fires each year that are started by deep fryers. In addition to deaths, those fires cause some 60 injuries and $15 million in direct property damage on average per year.

To avoid explosions and fire, follow these tips from the fire marshal:

-- Place the fryer outdoors on a flat surface, and never on a wooden deck or in a garage.

-- Fill a cold fryer with water and place your turkey into the vat to determine the amount of oil needed. Mark the water level well below the rim of the vat, and make sure the fryer dries thoroughly before filling with oil.


-- Oil and water do not mix. Avoid injury, and explosions, by thoroughly thawing and drying the bird before frying it.

Be smarter than the turkey. Don't be in the running for a Darwin Award.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Increasing Your Situational Awareness

All of us are concerned about terrorist activity - though the risks of such an act affecting you or anyone you know are remarkably slim.

Probably, instead of worrying about such a remote possibility, you really ought to be getting ready for those life events that are far more likely - floods, fires, earthquakes, and car wrecks to name a few.

On the other hand, there are few really good suggestions that can help you in almost any situation - one of which is to work to improve your "situational awareness" skill set.

You might recall that in Sherlock Holmes books, Holmes has the seemingly uncanny ability to see things that others don't. Holmes has increased his situational awareness.

In fact, in most detective and thriller literature, the hero or heroine of the work very often uses that ability to solve/prevent/resolve whatever crisis is confronting them because they observe more things that you and I might.

In old Western movies, someone would often offer up a warning because things were "too quiet." Or, in other words, the situation was anomalous because the normal, expected pattern of noise (bugs, birds and whatever) was absent.

In real life, aircraft pilots and those who drive our navy ships work hard to acquire the ability to "know" what is happening with a glance or quick brief - to gain a sense of the situation quickly.

The U.S. Coast Guard offers up this definition:

Situational Awareness is the ability to identify, process, and comprehend the critical elements of information about what is happening to the team with regards to the mission. More simply, it’s knowing what is going on around you.

As is pointed out here, there are some events ("first wave" events) that you can do nothing about. However,

But if you are fortunate enough not to be a victim of the first wave, then you can survive. And often, before the first wave occurs, there are minute details that can tell you something is wrong.

Buried in this Psychology Today piece is a kernel of what is involved in developing situational awareness - "pattern finding" -

Pattern-finding is so central to survival and success that we see patterns everywhere, even in random data—a phenomenon called apophenia. We spot faces in clouds and hear messages in records played backward. And while we expect some level of order in the world, on occasion our pattern-spotting gets away from us and makes a connection we wouldn't expect. When that happens, we demand, at least subconsciously, an explanation.

It turns out that our favorite kinds of explanations involve "agents"—beings capable of intentional action. The agent could be a person, a god, or a superintelligent robot. We're biased to blame even simple events on agents—spotting them or their footprints allows us to manage them if they are dangerous: It is better to mistake a twig for a snake than to mistake a snake for a twig.

Unconscious pattern recognition underlies a variety of automatic processes, including those we associate with accurate intuitions or a sixth sense ... Sensing danger in a combat zone or suddenly "knowing" that a partner is cheating or a friend is pregnant are instances in which we've pieced a pattern together wholly unconsciously. The suddenness with which it bursts into our consciousness can feel as if the hunch is born of clairvoyance.

Let's get more practical. If you drive the same car every day for weeks, months or years, you will - if you are mostly sentient - learn to appreciate the cars "normal" feel. As a result, when something changes from that "normal," you may take the car to a mechanic offer up a "it just doesn't feel right" suggestion.  That's your sense of pattern recognition kicking in. The mechanic will (and if you ever listened to Car Talk, you've heard this) ask questions designed to focus the problem into a diagnosis of probable issues.

Okay, let's say that you go to a busy shopping mall. If you spend a few minutes watching shoppers, you will see that there are patterns to their mall behavior and that it is easy to spot people who don't fall into those patterns. These "odd folks" are outliers. Now, it may be that these outliers are simply people who vary from the norm due to inexperience or indifference to mall shopping. Or - it may be that they are up to something unusual - and they fall outside the pattern.

So, it's a July day in a mall. Everyone is dressed in summer clothing except for a few individuals wearing long back raincoats. Would you notice this? If you do notice this, what should you do? This constitutes a "thing outside the pattern." Your situational awareness level ought to jump up a bit. What else are these folks up to? Are they gathered in one spot or spread out? Are they looking at each other or ignoring each other?

What are your plans at this point?

There's a nice discussion of "situational awareness" at The Organic Prepper's blog post How to Survive a Terrorist Attack. One point he makes is that you gain by having an improved sense of situational awareness:

A higher level of situational awareness can help you in many ways, should you be unfortunate enough to be present during an active of terror.

It can help by:

Allowing you to identify a threat before it becomes active
Allowing you to locate exits and routes to the exits
Allowing you to determine sources of cover

If you can identify a potential threat before it exists, you can sometimes prevent an attack or at the very least, you can protect yourself and your family more effectively. . . .

The Organic Prepper also points to "Kim's Game" as a learning tool for increasing your situational awareness - well described in Graywolf Survival's Using Kim’s Game to increase your observational skills. A hat tip to both those blogs.

The point of all this is to encourage you to learn to really look at the world in which you operate and use the recognition of the patterns you observe to assist you in being able to rapidly identify anomalies that may require further, rapid examinations for potential threats.

Or maybe even the need for a car repair.

Remember, Holmes once solved a case because of a dog that didn't bark - an event outside the expected pattern - and a fine example of Holmes applying his sense of "situational awareness."

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Preparing for Winter

As the calendar rolls over to November, and with The Old Farmer's Almanac predicting colder weather than usual in some areas (see also here), it seems like a good idea to think about getting ready for bad winter weather. Of course, like any old sailor, I am in favor of having a good checklist to help me get ready, and also like other old sailors, I like to steal borrow a checklist from someone else to save me having to work too hard.

So, here's a checklist from the Center for Disease Control found here

Preparedness Checklists for Winter Weather

Sure, some of things may not apply in your area of the country, but that's the nice thing about a checklist, you can modify it to meet your circumstances. On the other hand, some of the items are universal to any disaster - like having a family communications plan, adequate water and food, and planning for ways to keep warm.

Start now and avoid the rush.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Asteroids and Tsunamis

Yes, there are real world disasters aplenty, but sometimes it is good to take a step back and look at the more remote events. One of these, popular in movies from the late 1990's was the threat from asteroids smacking us and causing the "end of the world as we know it" (see here).

Behind these movies there is some truth. Things from outer space have collided with the earth. Under current theories, the fact that dinosaurs no long roam the earth is perhaps the result of one such collision or perhaps not.

WHat about the question "If an asteroid hits the earth could man survive?"

According to this article, from the NYTimes,"Did an Asteroid Impact Cause an Ancient Tsunami?", the answer might be - "Yes, under the right circumstances. In fact our ancestors may have already survived at least one such incident."

A large asteroid or comet, the kind that could kill a quarter of the world’s population, smashed into the Indian Ocean 4,800 years ago, producing a tsunami at least 600 feet high, about 13 times as big as the one that inundated Indonesia nearly two years ago. The wave carried the huge deposits of sediment to land.

Most astronomers doubt that any large comets or asteroids have crashed into the Earth in the last 10,000 years. But the self-described “band of misfits” that make up the two-year-old Holocene Impact Working Group say that astronomers simply have not known how or where to look for evidence of such impacts along the world’s shorelines and in the deep ocean.

Scientists in the working group say the evidence for such impacts during the last 10,000 years, known as the Holocene epoch, is strong enough to overturn current estimates of how often the Earth suffers a violent impact on the order of a 10-megaton explosion. Instead of once in 500,000 to one million years, as astronomers now calculate, catastrophic impacts could happen every 1,000 years.

So, 4800 years ago? Humankind certainly around (see here) and is still around, so it should be clear that humans can survive asteroid strikes and the tsunamis they can cause, if in fact the theory of the event described in the NYTimes piece proves to be correct.

On the other hand, big tsunamis ("megatsunamis") - whatever their cause- suggests that one good form of disaster prep is to move away from that lovely beach front property.

Now you have been warned. Or, as the U.K. Express put it Scientists predict MEGA-TSUNAMI twice the size of Big Ben to wipe out entire CITIES: A MEGA-TSUNAMI of biblical proportions presents a real threat to humanity today, scientists have warned.


UPDATE: On the other hand, a mega tsunami might just solve the issues involving the artificial islands in the South China Sea.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Getting Ready for El Nino 2015

El Niño Strengthening

The latest analyses from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and from NASA confirm that El Niño is strengthening and it looks a lot like the strong event that occurred in 1997–98. Observations of sea surface heights and temperatures, as well as wind patterns, show surface waters cooling off in the Western Pacific and warming significantly in the tropical Eastern Pacific.

“Whether El Niño gets slightly stronger or a little weaker is not statistically significant now. This baby is too big to fail,” said Bill Patzert, a climatologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. October sea level height anomalies show that 2015 is as big or bigger in heat content than 1997. “Over North America, this winter will definitely not be normal. However, the climatic events of the past decade make ‘normal’ difficult to define.”
***
Both Patzert and NOAA forecasters believe the southern tier of North America, particularly southern California, is likely to see a cooler and wetter than normal winter, while the northern tier could be warmer and drier. But the sample of El Niños in the meteorological record are still too few and other elements of our changing climate are too new to say with certainty what the winter will bring.

Well, so? The potential impacts for North America are set out here:

The impacts of El Niño upon climate in temperate latitudes show up most clearly during wintertime. For example, most El Niño winters are mild over western Canada and parts of the northern United States, and wet over the southern United States from Texas to Florida. El Niño affects temperate climates in other seasons as well. But even during wintertime, El Niño is only one of a number of factors that influence temperate climates. El Niño years, therefore, are not always marked by "typical" El Niño conditions the way they are in parts of the tropics.

More here:

Yes, this is not yet an exact science, but forewarned is forearmed.

Get ready. Have a kit.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: "Home Preparedness in Earthquake Country" by UCSF

A good reminder for all kinds of disasters, including those that involve the earth trembles that affect much more than California:



And if you don't think you are in a danger area, you might want to look here and these maps provided there:

Damaging earthquakes in the U.S., including Alaska and Hawaii 1750 to 1996 (USGS says they are going to update this map one of these days).

And here's one day's worth (14 Oct 15) of earthquakes magnitude 2.5 or more:

So, be ready. Have a kit.

Disaster Prep Wednesday (Late Version): Have an Emergency Kit!

This a short post - but there is a need to repeat the advice often given here - "Have a plan and an Emergency Kit." That kit should include at least 3 days food and water for every family member (yes, and for your pets, too). Really, what you are planning for doesn't make all that much difference, so long as you focus on the essentials like food and water. Especially adequate amounts of clean drinking water.

Why?

We have just seen the enormous damage wrought by incredible rain fall in parts of North Carolina and especially in South Carolina and there are Health concerns abound in aftermath of flooding:

People served by the City of Columbia's water system - 375,000 in all - have been advised for several days to boil all water before drinking or cooking with it due to pipeline ruptures throughout the system. This process can kill most disease-causing microorganisms that may be present in the water. Using regular, unscented bleach can also decontaminate the water if boiling isn't an option.

Drinking infected water can cause illness similar to food poisoning, with symptoms like nausea, diarrhea, cramps and mild fever, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As with any illness, health officials advise that staying hydrated - by drinking clean, disinfected water - is the best remedy.

Your earliest, very best source for that clean water is from the supply you've kept on hand for just such an emergency. But there is more -see Disaster Prep Wednesday: Water, Water, Water which contains these ideas:

3. Make sure you have some chlorine bleach in your disaster kit for water purification. It only takes a few drops per gallon, so you can keep several small containers around.
4. You might want to invest in a simple (but not cheap) camping water treatment kit. REI has a good guide on How to Choose a Water Filter.

Now, the point is that many of the affected people in South Carolina had no expectation that things might go totally FUBAR as the result of a rain storm. They might have expected something from the hurricane that drifted by, but most of that would have whacked the coast. Whereas much of the flooding bad news is in the center of the state - on rivers and places where dams have failed. All of which makes the point - one the Boys Scout have long made - "Be Prepared"

You never know what might happen exactly, but you can be assured something will happen. AND real help won't be there for a few days. You can count on that.

Have a plan, have a kit.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Preparing for Floods

As this is being written, a hurricane is approaching the Southeast U.S. and there is also the possibility of heavy rains preceding the hurricane impact. In short, lots of water is in the forecast. So, no better time to look at flood and hurricane preparation. Here a couple of videos with some good ideas:





Get a plan, get a kit.

Remember that heavy rains over a long period of will cause the ground to become soft and may allow strong winds to knock over trees onto your home or onto power lines feeding your neighborhood. It may take some time before power can be restored - plan accordingly.

Oh, and if you have a portable generator for emergencies:

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Humor

We all know that it's no fun in being with people who take everything way too seriously. So, if you are tired of being preached to without any wit behind the "lessons" here a couple of things to lighten things up"

First, the short FEMA ad:


Then a series of comments on some illustrations from Ready.gov from about.com, samples of which appear below:

Oh, and I know nothing of this book or its author (which means this is not an endorsement), except this is a pretty humorous video:



As the Good Book tells us:

A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.

- King James Bible

Disaster Prep Wednesday: "Neighborhoods Responding in Disasters: Turning Connection into a Powerful Resource to Catastrophe "

Another excellent U of California disaster prep video:

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Disaster Preparedness:" Influenza and Emerging Infections"

University of California video in its "Disaster Preparedness" series

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Red Cross Courses that Help in Disasters

The Red Cross come under a good deal of criticism, but it's hard to beat their courses that may help in disasters such as First Aid, CPR, and AED:

...[T]he American Red Cross has world-class instructors and award-winning online courses to ensure you get training that sticks. With over 550 locations across the United States and the option to take some of the learning online through our best-in-class Simulation Learning, we offer you the flexibility and convenience to provide you training when and where you need it. Certification classes include a free digital certificate, valid for 2 years, plus free access to digital learning materials and online refresher courses.

Yes, you might have to pay to take a course, but think of the cost of not have the basic training needed in an emergency.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: FEMA asks "Are You Ready?"

FEMA has a way too long guide asking "Are You Ready?"

The guide has been designed to help the citizens of this nation learn how to protect themselves and their families against all types of hazards. It can be used as a reference source or as a step-by-step manual. The focus of the content is on how to develop, practice, and maintain emergency plans that reflect what must be done before, during, and after a disaster to protect people and their property. Also included is information on how to assemble a disaster supplies kit that contains the food, water, and other supplies in suffi cient quantity for individuals and their families to survive following a disaster in the event they must rely on their own resources.

Use the info most applicable to you and your situation. I doubt people in Omaha have much need for earthquake or hurricane info. And, as the the guide is from 2004, so you know that there have been some changes in the past 11 years, so think about those changes.

The fundamental thought, though, is still valid: You need to rely on your own resources - perhaps for 3 days or perhaps much longer. And it is better to do some planning now, in anticipation of a disaster, rather than trying to catch up after your world has changed.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Pet Preparedness

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Weapons of Survival

Unless your are like the survivors of the "Emberverse", well schooled in the art of sword play and/or the use of bows/crossbows, there is always the possibility that you might need some sort of weapon - perhaps not to protect you from your fellow living humans or even the living dead, but to put meat in the stew pot or to fend off wild animals.

In the past, I have consistently suggested that the best self-defense weapon is some sort of shotgun. Why? Because with a shotgun accuracy is not critical and if you miss, it is less likely that your pellets will travel along and injure that nice Mrs. Jones who lives just down the street.

But . . . what about a weapon to kill game?

Field and Stream, one of may favorite magazines, has suggestions in this article by Keith McCafferty "What's the Best Survival Weapon?" Mr. McCafferty, who surely know more than I about such things, suggest a couple of rifles:

The Henry U.S. Survival firearm ... is an updated version of the ArmaLite AR-7 designed for the Air Force. Weighing a scant 21⁄2 pounds, it is the ultimate breakdown .22, with the action and barrel unscrewing to fit inside the ABS synthetic buttstock, which floats in case your canoe capsizes.
***
The second gun I tested was a longtime friend—my .350 Remington Magnum. The best survival weapon is the one you have in your hand when you face a survival situation. For most hunters, that’s a centerfire rifle.

What turns an elk thumper into a small-game provider is the cartridge. Instead of using full-power loads, I fired handgun rounds using a cartridge conversion sleeve (KJ Knives: $25; 406-​669‑3382). A conversion sleeve is a housing that encloses a handgun cartridge so it fits the diameter of a rifle bore. (For the .350, it’s the .38 auto.) You can drop 30 or more pistol rounds into a pocket and forget they are there. Reserve your big-game loads to signal for help or rebuff teeth-gnashing creatures of the night.

You might note the caveats he has with the Henry.

More info on the Henry here:

Like the original Henry U.S. Survival Rifle, this innovative, semi-automatic model is lightweight (3.5 lbs.) and highly portable. At just 16.5″ long, when all the components are stowed, it easily fits into the cargo area of a plane, boat or in a backpack. It’s chambered in .22 LR so you can carry a large quantity of ammunition without adding much weight to your gear.

In short, an emergency rifle for trip to remote areas or as part of your "bug out" gear.



As for the Remington, perhaps Remington still makes a rifle chambered for the .350 magnum, but I couldn't find it on their website. You can buy them used, however, or find an equivalent. A quick glance at the Ruger website seemed to indicate the .350 has fallen out of their favor, too.

Me, I still like my old Savage Model 99 .300 lever action. As noted here:

For hunting North American game the Savage 99 is still one of the finest hunting rifles of all time.

Well, it doesn't have that "conversion sleeve" thing, but then again, I use my very old J.C. Higgins (Sears) bolt action, clip fed .22 for such things. Been shooting with it for 50+ years. A comfortable old friend, and reliable as the day is long.

And perhaps that is the key - choose a gun or guns that you feel comfortable with and then take the time to practice. When the need is great is the worst time to be figuring out how to use such a vital tool.

Disaster Prep Wednesday: Odd Stuff

There are people out there who think hard about survival and sometimes have -um- interesting ideas:

Urban Survival Site Unusual Survival Gear

Aluminum Foil – The best thing about foil is you can wrap meat and veggies in it, throw it in a fire, and a few minutes later have a hot meal. It can also be molded into a bowl, cup, funnel, or a pot for boiling water. In addition, it can be used to enhance an antenna, to sharpen scissors, to make sun boxes for small plants, to collect dew from trees, and in the summer it can be put in windows to keep the heat out. But the most important usage: Tin foil hats!

Happy Preppers Weird Survival Tools:

Weird Survival Tool #14. Panty hose.
An old military trick is to wear pantyhose underneath the socks to help avoid friction
and blisters for long hikes. Worn underneath the socks will minimize the friction and
keep chiggars and ticks from reaching your legs. There are many reasons pany hose
can help you:
- prevent blisters and keep you warmer than ordinary socks
- filter water;
- keep your soap clean and dry;
- act as a dust mask;
- improvise a fishing net or other cordage;
- collect berries or otherwise a vessel to help you forage in the wild (generally,
- it's a great carryall, such as for gathering tinder);
- keep chiggers and ticks from reaching your leg (keep away leeches too);
- use also to improvise a mosquito net;
- make a tourniquet or secure a bandage

Outdoor Life Survival Gear: The Weirdest Stuff That Should Be In Your Survival Kits And Bug Out Bag:

Vodka: You’ll get more bang for your buck carrying around a little bottle of hard liquor than a bottle of beer. This can serve as a wee nip you swallow for courage, or as a disinfectant as part of your medical gear.

Emergency Preparedness Tips 7 Unusual and Weird Survival Tools:

2. Dental Floss

We use dental floss for hygienic purpose, but did you know that you can use it for survival? Dental Floss has a lot of uses; here are some different uses of dental floss:
- Fishing Gear
- Tinder
- Making a Snare
- Cutting Food
- Lashing a Knife

There are lots of good ideas out there.

Disaster Economics: Risk Taking and Risk Aversion

We've all heard the pleas from people who have lost everything in a disaster. Most of these cries come from those who went into the disaster unprepared, uninsured and, often, very poor. I mean, when was the last news report you saw about some family whose expensive but insured beach house was washed away and who had to pay a deductible in order to rebuild? No, as the late Houston "consumer reported" Marvin Zindler used to say, "It's hell to be poor!"

Well, it's with a little nod to "the poor" that I refer you to these lessons from the Foundation for Teaching Economics on the Economics of Disasters :

This set of lessons looks at a variety of natural disasters – from the Black Death of the Middle Ages to Hurricane Katrina in our too-recent memory, to fears of avian flu pandemics that haunt the future – through the lens of economic analysis. The contexts were chosen to facilitate the teaching of economic reasoning principles not only in economics courses, but also in history and the other social studies disciplines. Each lesson addresses a question that reflects people’s compassionate reaction to news of disaster and develops one or two key tools of economic analysis in answering that question. Case studies of past disasters provide real-world illustrations.

While all the lessons are good starting points for thinking upon such matters, Lesson 3: When Disaster Strikes, What Can Government Do? is particularly interesting:

Costs of government policies sometimes exceed benefits. This may occur because of incentives facing voters, government officials, and government employees, because of actions by special interest groups that can impose costs on the general public, or because social goals other than economic efficiency are being pursued.
***
1. The challenge for government in disaster response and relief is determining when it should take a “hands-on” role and become actively involved, and when the goal of recovery is best-served by stepping back in favor of other institutions better suited to the task.

- The rule of rational choice directs decision-makers to choose the alternative with the greatest excess of benefits over costs. This rule applies not only to private decision-makers but also to government decision-makers: Governments should undertake those activities for which the expected benefits outweigh the expected costs.
***
Government ineptitude during natural disasters may be good fodder for comedians and radio talk-show hosts, but the pertinent lesson is more about the need to adjust our expectations than the need for “better” government. Throughout the 20th century, we demanded that government take on more and more responsibility for citizens’ well-being with relatively little consideration of whether or not political institutions are inherently capable of meeting the lengthening list of expectations. The tendency to think that big problems – like natural catastrophes – can best be dealt with by big institutions, like government, is understandable. Persisting in that belief in the face of continuing evidence to the contrary is not. If we expect governments to perform functions for which they do not have the necessary knowledge, incentives, and mechanisms, we not only invite disappointment, but risk undermining their ability to perform the vital tasks for which they were created: restoring civil order, maintaining the rule of law, and providing those few public goods necessary for other economic and social institutions to operate.

If you download the "EOD Lesson 3 Outline" from the page, you'll find a nice discussion of the concept of "Other People's Money" in the disaster context in one of the Appendix 1:

All such programs put some people in a position to decide what is good for other people. The effect is to instill in the one group a feeling of almost God-like power; in the other, a feeling of childlike dependence. The capacity of the beneficiaries for independence, for making their own decision, atrophies through disuse. In addition to the waste of money, in addition to the failure to achieve the intended objectives, the end result is to rot the moral fabric that holds a decent society together.

One of the questions we all should be asking is, "Does government intervention make people less risk averse or more?"

For example, we all know that there are government programs that decrease the insurance costs of people who build big beach house on barrier islands. Would these houses get built if the owners had to bear the true cost of paying for their own insurance - if that insurance were even available? North Carolina, for example, has the Coastal Property Insurance Pool:

The Coastal Property Insurance Pool offers commercial, homeowner and dwelling windstorm coverage and homeowner coverage to any person having an insurable interest in property located in the 18 eligible coastal counties of North Carolina. The Coastal Property Insurance Pool also offers commercial fire and dwelling fire in a more limited area defined as the beach area (comprised of North Carolina south and east of the inland waterway, including the area known as the Outer Banks).

The Coastal Property Insurance Pool is defined by the North Carolina General Statutes as the "Market of Last Resort"; therefore, it is highly recommended that property owners attempt to obtain insurance in the standard market. Your Insurance Agent may assist you in placing coverage either in the standard market or in the Coastal Property Insurance Pool.

Before this CPIP plan, there was a potentially huge state liability (see here), which was addressed in part. See here. The new plan still leaves inland property owners subsidizing beach front property insurance - but to a much lesser extent:

Before the new law, North Carolina's plan required property insurers to help play claims in the event that the plan's coffers couldn't cover the costs of a huge storm. But there was no mechanism to allow insurers to pass the costs to customers. The unlimited liability drove one major insurer out in 2008, and officials feared others would follow.

Now, if the plan's coffers are emptied by a big storm, the plan would first call on the insurance industry to contribute as much as $1 billion. If that still isn't enough, policyholders from across the state would face surcharges on their property-coverage bills of as much as 10%.

As you might gather, not everyone is happy with this level of unknown risk. On the other hand, tourism, especially people renting beach houses for vacations on the coast is a big part of the NC economy - which is why the law encourages beach house building. It might seem fair, however, to add a tax to each beach rentals that would go into a fund helping to cover disaster costs before tagging the other homeowners in the state.

If you are poor and have little? Does that make you more likely to take on more risk to protect what you have? Is there an explanation in this question for people who refuse to evacuate from the potential impact area of a hurricane so that they can defend their few possessions from pre or post storm looters? One paper discusses this briefly here at p 5:

As to the impact of natural disasters on risk attitudes, Cameron and Shah (2012) conduct incentivized risk game experiments in Indonesia and find that people who recently lived though natural disasters such as floods or earthquakes exhibit higher risk aversion than living in otherwise like villages. They also interestingly show that the impact persists for many years, particularly if the disaster was severe. However, part of the documented effect is driven by income losses.

The Cameron and Shah paper can be found here. An interesting effect on Katrina evacuees shows that initially they may be more willing to take risks. See abstract of Risk loving after the storm: A Bayesian-Network study of Hurricane Katrina evacuees:

We investigate risk preferences of a sample of hurricane Katrina evacuees shortly after they were evacuated and transported to Houston, and another sample from the same population taken a year later. We also consider a third sample of resident Houstonians with demographics similar to the Katrina evacuees. Conventional statistical methods fail to explain a strong risk-loving bias in the first Katrina-evacuees sample. We utilize Bayesian Networks to investigate all relevant conditional distributions for gamble choices, demographic variables, and responses to psychometric questionnaires. We uncover surprising results: Contrary to prior experimental evidence, we find that women in our sample were significantly more risk loving in the first Katrina sample and only mildly more risk averse in the other two samples. We find that gamble choices are best predicted by positive-emotion variables. We therefore explain the risk-loving choices of the first Katrina-evacuees sample by the detected primacy of negative-emotion variables in that sample and explain the latter by traumatic and heightened-stress experiences shortly after the hurricane.

Of course, part of the problem lies in defining what "risk aversion" is.

Can sheltering in place in the face of storm representing x% chance of harm actually be more risk averse than leaving knowing that there is much higher possibility that all your possessions will be stolen in your absence? What is the impact of having insurance in such a case? Do those insured find it easier to evacuate?

My hypothesis is that it that these "risk taking" decisions are highly economic in nature and that if governments are wondering why there is resistance in some areas to "mandatory" evacuations, much more thinking and research needs to be done along these lines.

I think Maslow's hierarchy of needs" comes into play - a disaster drops us all into the lower levels dealing with physiological needs and those safety needs:

Safety and Security needs include:

- Personal security
- Financial security
- Health and well-being
- Safety net against accidents/illness and their adverse impacts

There's a reason why Red Cross shelters offer security, lots of snacks and food, health providers and people on watch throughout the night.

But that "financial security" part? Not so much.

I remember, after one tornado,  meeting a woman whose rented house had a tree fallen right down its middle, rendering it unfit for human occupancy. She was staying, however, because she had just bought a big screen television which she knew would disappear if she removed to a shelter. Given her evident poverty level, that television represented a substantial financial asset to her - one she was unwilling to put at risk.

Economics.

In making up your disaster plan, it is important you know what you might assume greater risks to avoid losing and figure out a way to deal with that ahead of time.