Operation Preparedness

[Trevorum]

A couple of us SMs have been tossing around the idea of some hands-on training in Emergency Preparedness. One of the more "outside-the-box" ideas is to have each family - led by their Scout - agree to go completely off the grid for an entire weekend. This would be to simulate a natural disaster. The family would agree to trip the breaker and go cold turkey for 48 hours, Friday dusk to Sunday dusk.

 

With some advance planning (and springtime weather!) we think this shouldn't be too great a trial for most families. Candles and flashlights, propane fuel & stove for cooking, etc. (No TV would be a big plus!) It could actually be a fun learning experience for the entire family.

 

However, we see the biggest impediment to getting families to opt into this experiment would be their refrigerator (and possibly freezer). No one would want their food to spoil needlessly of course and we think they wouldn't want to "trip the breaker"

 

I'd appreciate your thoughts on this idea. Do you think families would want to do this or is it just too totally crazy?

 

-trevorum

[FireKat]

I had a friend whos dad had a place in the country that was close to what you describe. Just bare minium things. Did have elect & water (and indoor plumbing ) Maybe your bunch can find someplace with just bare bones and stay there for the weekend. That way nothing gets spoiled at home.

[Stosh]

If it's a natural "disaster" why would assume there would be a house to trip the breaker on? Take what would be needed and walk away with what they could carry.

 

When the Y2K thing ran around, everyone was in a major panic. They wanted the gas generators, stockpiled food, etc. When they asked me what I was going to do, I said when the power grid went down, I would take my supper out of the freezer (not a problem for winter in Wisconsin), go out in the back yard, start a fire and make supper, toss a couple of blankets on the bed, and turn in for the night.

 

Have the families travel to a set point, on foot, and establish a refugee camp with what they could carry. Wagons, travois, whatever they wanted to tote the stuff, but nothing but human power to get it there. It would be very interesting to take inventory of each family to see what they thought was important and what was not.

 

Stosh

 

 

 

[Eamonn]

Over the past few months we have been working on a pandemic influenza preparedness and response plan.

We have been told to expect 30 40% employee absences.

If that number proves to be right?

Imagine the problems we are going to have.

Some stores will not be able to open?

Gas stations?

Truck Drivers?

Power workers?

The list goes on!!

If this really does happen, crisis conditions will become a reality.

Eamonn.

[FireKat]

Eamonn, influenza A is on the rise in our area. It is attacking even those who were vaccinated against it.

[Gold Winger]

Why not just trip every breaker but the fridge? You could tie or chain the handles together if needed.

 

I notice that you didn't say anything about firearms. What if the zombies rise?

[Trevorum]

FireKat & Stosh - that would just be another campout, eh? Our idea is to have whole familes participate in this, even if they are not normally "camping families". Give everyone a taste of what would happen if the power supply was disrupted at home. Give them some things to think about what worked and what didn't.

 

GW - that's a good idea! Just leave the fridge breaker on (doh!) And I like that idea of a tie around the handles. We could give each Scout a colored plastic zip-tie to use as a "seal".

 

I imagine we'd get a lot of up-front resistance by moms and dads ("What does this have to do with Boy Scouts?"). Any ideas on how to pitch the idea to families?

[Lisabob]

Interesting idea, Trev. A couple of questions for you: How large is your troop? (I could see this working better in a small troop than a large one.) How active are most of your parents? (probably easier where most are already serving as ASMs, Committee members, or at least occasional drivers, as opposed to a lot of drop-and-run types.) What preparations and safety precautions would you ask (especially non-scout) family members to make for this? What kind of community are you in? (maybe easier in a rural area than a suburban or urban community)

 

Most important: What, exactly, do you hope the boys to get from this experience?

 

Thinking about my son's troop, I think it would be a tough sell to be honest. We'd probably have better luck "staging" such an event at a cabin or in some remote place, than asking ~40 families to cooperate on this, especially since many live in places where they do not have the luxury of backyard fire building for cooking. But if you can pull it off, more power to you and I'd love to hear about it!

[Trevorum]

Lisa, Our troop is pretty large and has great parent participation but I don't see how that would make a difference. Our idea is to create an opportunity for individual families to prepare for an unexpected disaster, experience some of the hardships in a safe and non-threatening manner, and then learn from the experience and become more prepared for a real event. This would be an experience on the family level, not as a troop.

 

Our goal is to get the boys to take the lead in planning for the weekend shut-down ("Mom, do we have enough candles?"), helping out under the 'primitive' conditions ("Let me show you how we use the 3-bucket method for washing dishes!") and then learning from the weekend ("Let's make sure we have enough batteries next time!")

 

I am hoping tht if we pitch this right, we can get "buy in" from a lot of the families. it would be completely voluntary of course and non-participation would have no adverse effect on the Scout.

 

 

[Lisabob]

I was thinking that it might be easier with a smaller troop because a) small troops are often more tight-knit socially and culturally so getting parental buy-in might be easier, and b) there are simply fewer families to try to convince.

 

 

[Stosh]

Turning off the electricity is not really a natural disaster and would produce nothing more than an inconvenience as it has in various parts of the country on a routine basis. My thoughts on a natural disaster would involve a tornado hit, major earthquake, hurricane, wildfire, blizzard, etc. where one's life would be disrupted by more than loss of electricity. Finding water, food and shelter in that case, moving to safer ground, emergency medical assistance, selection of survival equipment, etc. would play a more important part than simply turning off the electricity and sitting in the house and play cards by candlelight. In the upper midwest where ice storms occur all the time, loss of electricity is just an annoyance. If this is an Emergency Preparedness exercise, at least make it a real emergency.

 

My solution? It's 10 degrees today. Fill every container in the house with water and store in kitchen area. Turn off the water, open all the faucets especially those in the basement to drain the pipes. Pour all your alcohol down your drains to keep your traps from freezing, flush the toilets to empty all the water reserves, move everyone into the kitchen and start the gas range to heat it. Find a couple of candles, and break out the cards. Realistically, a family in this situation would still be able to eat out of the refrigerator and keep food cool by putting it in the dining room.

 

Having a gas furnace, I would figure out how to manually operate the stupid thing and then I wouldn't have to worry about the frozen pipes.

 

All in all, about the only thing one would actually miss would be the lights, TV and computer. That "natural disaster" I could do by unplugging the TV and computer and put tape over the light switches. No big deal, I haven't done that for a couple of years now and that might just be fun.

 

Stosh(This message has been edited by jblake47)

[raisinemright]

Cool idea. We got to do that real time a couple years ago during the big power outage. It was interesting hearing some stories.

 

My family handled it well. We didn't lose water but just in case, as soon as the lights dimmed, my wife filled the tub. Plus there's 50 gallons in the hot water tank and maybe ten in the pipes. Then there's my neighbors pool.

 

We wrapped the freezer in sleeping bags, got out the lantern and some sidearms and had a good time.

 

Unless you can get everyone in the neighborhood to play I think you might better off having a fully loaded campout planned at a large cabin and take it off the grid so everyone has to work it out together. Maybe tell one parent from each family and no one else so it has some realism.

 

The refrigerator doesn't have to stay closed but usage must me triaged. Fast spoilers like milk and ice cream should be consumed immediately while meat and cheeses can be removed and smoked or made into jerky to last longer.

[Eagledad]

Just before I got back into this scouting stuff, our district use to participate in an Emergency Drill simulation that evolved all the Troops (maybe packs, I dont know), police, and fire departments.

 

Everyone was give a designated two week period where they would get a disaster call. Usually in the middle of the night the city leaders would call a disaster emergency, (probably tornado since that is typical for our area) and then the police, fire, scouts and volunteer emergency clubs would all gather at the local armory for further instructions. This usually involved a 24 hour period where everyone worked together toward following the instructions. I dont know what those instructions were, but the scouts and scouter who participated said that it was a really good experience for everyone because it gave theme a sense of being an important part of the community. And it was a lot of fun working side-by-side with fire and police units.

 

I think what killed the drill was emergency programs like FEMA. There are so many regulations involved with emergency management now that scouts are very restricted from where they can assist. When we had the tornado that took out 10,000 homes a few years ago in Oklahoma City, the scouts were ready go, but told to stay out until FEMA felt it safe. That was a couple months later. We were allowed to help sort through donated clothing items.

 

Personally I cant think of a better way for a community to come together then a community drill once a year. It seems to me that the more our politicians try to put us under one big tent, the farther away our neighbors seem get.

 

I like the power outage simulation idea a lot. That is becoming a common situation here in Oklahoma.

 

Barry

 

[Gold Winger]

"Having a gas furnace, I would figure out how to manually operate the stupid thing and then I wouldn't have to worry about the frozen pipes."

 

You'd have to have someone stand there and manually turn the blower.

 

The easiest way to prevent frozen pipes is to just let the water dribble a bit.

[hot_foot_eagle]

Trevorum:

 

I think your idea is great.

 

The most important aspect is the planning process you described. Even if you don't get 100% participation in the actual exercise, or if you get some cheating, you will still accomplish something worthwhile.

 

Two days without electricity isn't really that big a deal, but it should be enough to get people thinking and asking important questions.