Emergency Kit

[happymomma]

Hi,

After last night's huge thunderstorm I realized that we are so unprepared for any emergency. We literally would not know what to do. So now I am looking to start us on a emergency kit of some sort to prepare us. I was curious to know if others have it and what they have as part of their emergency kit.

Thanks!

[hannah]

We have a first aid kit (from Costco). The kit has medical stuff but also emergency blankets, packets of water, and rain ponchos. We also have bottled water and food (peanut butter, jelly, soups, juices) in the basement near our camping supplies. We have always thought that we could just grab the box of food and water bottles along with the camping supplies (which include a stove, kitchen stuff, tent, sleeping bags, lanterns, flash lights) and load everything into the car quick if we need to leave. We also have some cash in the event that the ATMs don't work. I have been planning on making copies of important documents too but I haven't gotten that far yet. I would love to see what others have that I might have not thought about. Great post!

[Sugar Magnolia]

Very timely post! We are supposed to get HIT with storms today. Tornadoes, hail, 45 mph winds, you name it. We have a lantern and storm radio. And that is it. I will be making a Target run soon for batteries, so I would love to see what others suggest.

[Puddy73]

The Red Cross site has some good information on this subject:
http://www.redcross.org/services/disaster/0,1082,0_3_,00.html

[ThreeofUs]

ITA about having a camping set-up ready to go - but you also might consider what you might want to rescue from the house before you go (papers, as noted by PP, as well as clothing or child care items).

It's really best to run drills, figure out what you'd need from these and from sites like RC, and then follow up to ensure you can get what you need quickly. Also think about what you'd need in the way of first aid if someone is really hurt.

For example, we just realized we have outgrown our little "safe box" for important papers, etc. I guess we'll be running to Costco for a bigger box that we can just dump in the car.

Good luck!

[mamaoftwins]

We just looked through the Weather Channel's website after our recent t-storms/tornado watches and found this:

http://www.weather.com/ready/supplykit.html

It's pretty detailed! Anyway, we have a Rubbermaid container in our basement for our supplies, and we just added a duffel bag to it, in case we would ever need to take the supplies and go. Just a thought we had since those Rubbermaid containers aren't the most portable in the world, and there is no way I could take that container and two babies at the same time if I were home without DH. As far as the food and water, our "Sam's Club storage area" is in the basement as well, so we have all that there if need be.

We bought a lot of our stuff from a camping store and Home Depot. The crow bar was my fav purchase. :)

I need to get on the copying important documents, too!