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Get ready now to avoid chaos after hurricane

Amber Glades mobile home park in Safety Harbor has taken to heart the lesson of Hurricane Katrina: People must be prepared to take care of themselves and their neighbors if a hurricane hits. More than 20 park residents are undergoing special training so they can help themselves and their neighbors in a natural disaster.

The training to create a Community Emergency Response Team, or CERT, has been around since the mid 1980s. It began in California after officials there realized that citizens trying to rescue others following an earthquake could lose their lives because they react through instinct rather than training.

States or local governments sponsor CERT training, given by emergency officials. Residents volunteer to attend nine weeks of training to learn how to organize their neighbors following a disaster, how to conduct light search and rescue operations until emergency workers arrive, and how to deliver emergency first aid. Team members also receive basic equipment that identifies them as CERT members and helps them do their jobs, such as hard hats, goggles, flashlights and vests.

CERT training has spread to every state in the nation in the last 20 years, but is getting much more attention since Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. The entire nation saw the chaos when people depended on the government to tell them what to do and where to go. This year, governments are doing a better job of speaking the blunt truth: It may take days for government help to arrive after a major disaster, so be prepared to help yourself.

With hurricane season less than a month away, local governments in Pinellas County also are emphasizing that message to residents. City and county governments are urging all residents to gather everything they need to be self-sufficient in their neighborhoods, without power or water available to them, for three to five days. That includes medical supplies like prescriptions and oxygen, nourishing food that does not have to be cooked, gasoline for cars or generators, tools for debris removal, etc.

This is a difficult message for Americans to hear. They are accustomed to dialing 911, saying what they need, and getting an immediate response. As Katrina and other hurricanes in the past two years have taught us, that won't happen in a major emergency. The needs are too great, the calls too numerous, and emergency agencies will be dealing with damage and trauma to their own employees and equipment.

With hurricane season starting June 1, local governments throughout Pinellas are gearing up their information campaigns. To find out how they can help you prepare for a storm, go to your local government Web site or call county or city offices. If you have a neighborhood association or belong to a civic group, ask for a speaker to address your group about ways to prepare.

There is no time to tarry. The first named storm of the 2005 hurricane season had entered the Gulf of Mexico within days of June 1.

[Last modified May 4, 2006, 00:59:16]