Blog Post by J. Patrick Moore, CMCA
Administrator, King City Civic Association

When I was young, I had the opportunity to live through a local disaster – the Columbus Day Storm of October 12, 1962. Many people (including my parents, I’m sure) wouldn’t have called it an “opportunity,” but rather a “misfortune,” “annoyance,” or, for some kids at that time, “excitement” or “adventure.” For those of you who weren’t living in Oregon at the time, here’s a brief synopsis: the remnants of a tropical cyclone were caught up in the jet stream and followed the jet stream eastward across the Pacific Ocean. The storm grew in intensity as it neared the Oregon Coast, and came onshore along the south coast, and then turned north and came up the Willamette Valley. Millions of board feet of timber were blown down, and power and telephone service were lost throughout much of western Oregon.

My family lived in the heart of the Lake Grove area at that time. The storm came in late on a Friday afternoon, so we had all weekend to work on cleaning up tree limbs from the sixteen or so Douglas Fir trees on our quarter-acre lot. To give you a perspective of the damage, we walked straight off our porch the next morning, and the two steps were each twelve inches high! Our backyard burning pile was going all weekend long. We had some minor damage to our roof, but overall, the greatest inconvenience was the loss of telephone and electrical service; the power was off for two weeks straight! Luckily, my Dad had an old, white-gas camp stove that my mom used for cooking and for heating up water for baths; otherwise, we would have been eating out of cans or what we could buy and prepare without cooking, and bath time would have been very cold – knowing my Mom, not bathing would not have been an option.

Why do I relate this story? I believe it’s instructive of how we need to live in Western Oregon: prepared for disaster. I doubt my Dad really kept that camp stove with the idea that we’d be using it for a couple of weeks in the house; it was probably more for either sentimental value, or perhaps a misguided notion that my Mom would actually like to go camping some day (that day has never come, Dad!).

I recently attended a workshop, co-sponsored by the Red Cross and Horizon Restoration, concerning preparation for “the Big One,” a Subduction zone earthquake off the Oregon Coast. Current science points towards a regular period of time between those earthquakes of about 250 – 300 years. The last one was 311 years ago. One geologist I talked with a few years ago, said that when the Cascadia Subduction zone slips, the 8.5 – 9.0 earthquake off the coast will feel roughly like a 7.0 earthquake in the Portland area, but for anywhere from two to five or more minutes. Coincidentally, geologists estimate that the faults in the Portland area are capable of an earthquake around 7.0 in magnitude. So, whether it’s a quake off the coast or in the area, we all need to be prepared! The Red Cross speaker suggested that, when the “Big One” hits, we should think of the scenario in terms of “living in a log cabin in the Portland area.” It’s likely that much of our infrastructure – roads, bridges, utilities (power, water, communications, etc.) will be severely damaged in such a quake, and it will take a fair amount of time before they are restored to working order.

What would you need in order to survive for a month – or longer – on your own?

The speaker from the Red Cross showed us a 72-hour kit that he owns. He also acknowledged that a 72-hour kit isn’t enough to survive long-term; but he said that asking people to put together a 14 day kit doesn’t work. It would be seen as insurmountable for many. Even getting people to put together a 72-hour kit is difficult; the government estimates that only 13% of households in the United States have reached that level of preparedness.

Stop and think for a few minutes about how all that will affect you:

• How many bridges do you typically cross in your daily or weekly routine? (For me, it’s crossing 11 bridges to work and 10 home, under 6 to work and 8 to home. There are some alternative routes, but most of them, sooner or later, cross a bridge as well, and my route straddles the Willamette River, so if the bridges go down, there will be a long line for the Canby Ferry (if it is still running). However, it only has capacity for six cars, and it runs on electricity – so it might not be operating). If you aren’t at home when disaster strikes, will you be able to get there – and if not, do you have some supplies in your car?
• Do you take medications? If so, will your pharmacy be able to get you refills? If not, you will need to have some extra medicine at home (always consume the oldest so it doesn’t get out of date).
• How much food do you have? If having two weeks’ worth stored up all at once, how about purchasing a few extra cans every time you shop? Again, a system to “rotate your stock,” so that you use the oldest first, works best.
• Do you have drinking water? Again, start by picking up a bit at a time. Date them and use them periodically; jugs of water have varying shelf lives, check the date on the jug.
• Do you have some extra blankets? Flashlights with some spare batteries? A battery-powered radio (preferably with the NOAA weather-radio feature built in, or a separate NOAA radio). Consider purchasing an LED flashlight (or several) since your batteries will last a lot longer than with a conventional flashlight.
• Do you have a first-aid kit?

These are some ideas to get started with your 72-hour kit. More information can be found at http://www.ready.gov/ or http://www.redcross.org/, or by calling or stopping by a local Red Cross office.

As I wrote at the start of this article, I consider the Columbus Day Storm to have been an “opportunity,” to reflect on what it takes to survive a disaster and know that both preparedness and improvisation are important. Remember Apollo 13? Disaster struck on their way to the moon. Improvisation and some smart guys with slide rules got them back safely.