Tutorial Tuesdays! Being Prepared

There has been some talk recently about being prepared, storing food, and being self reliant. Much of this chatter has been questions and answers on "why" all the fuss? What should I do? What should I store? What should I prepare for? A lot of those answers came in the form of "We need to do this in case we are involved in an emergency, financial, or natural disaster situation."

This week California is again on fire. Seems we have a nut case arson out there who lit many fires and, currently as I write this at 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday, we have:
over 250,000 people in a mandatory evacuation
over 700 homes consumed
and still over 12 fires.

One small community of 36,000 was completely evacuated last night.

I live about 25 miles from the nearest fire to our home. Currently it looks fairly safe for us, although in years past we have been put on evacuation alerts when the fires have been even further away, so you never know.

We, because where we live, have a situation that may or may not be unique in that we are isolated as far as transportation. We literally have 2 roads to the west and one road to the east for commuters to access in and out of our valley. Beyond our valley we rely on one central freeway pass for our main supplies, fuel, food, you name it, it comes up that one pass.

That one pass has been closed for the past 18 hours.

This isn't a huge thing, those of us who have lived here long enough understand that every time there is a fire, snow, or heavy rains chances are the pass will be closed for a number of hours.

Why do we store food, water and other supplies? Because, if like today, the pass is closed, so are all of our fresh or new supplies. We have experienced in the past that it only takes four hours for the food stores to completely clear of their supplies, water, batteries, etc. People begin to panic when it finally occurs to them that they have nothing to sustain them when those trucks can't drive up and stock the shelves.

We are safe, but our supplies are not. They have been cut off for at least a few hours. The community where I live has seen tremendous growth, in the last two years we have probably doubled in size. That means about half the folks here now have no history to follow and will be more than likely unprepared for the situations that happen when the pass closes.

For those of us who have listened to the leaders in both church and state, we have prepared and should be comfortable and fine. For those who have figured they are safe because of the environment we live in, or their financial security, whatever, they will be caught off guard if the roads remain closed for over 24 hours.

Today's tutorial: Get prepared. Do not procrastinate. Do not rely on your financial security, or the facts that you feel it can not happen to you. Try to see down the road and imagine what would happen in your own area if the transportation were cut completely off. If no trucks, trains, or air were able to get to you. How quickly would your supplies diminish?

For detailed ideas on what to store and how to prepare click here!