The Great California Shake Out

Yesterday was the museum's first time participating in the Great California Shake Out.  It's an annual chance for people and organizations to practice what to do if an earthquake were to hit the area.  It's a great time for going over emergency preparedness plans, kits, and drills, to make sure everyone in your family knows what to do in an emergency, and to make sure your home/car/business is stocked with up-to-date emergency supplies. The ShakeOut had over 9 million participants this year from all over California, and many other states participated in their own ShakeOuts.

For a person born and raised in New Orleans this seemed like a great idea to me. I know what to do in case of hurricanes, but with hurricanes you have some advance warning.  What do you do for earthquakes, which can strike at any time?  I got to spend a few weeks doing research on the ShakeOut for drills and procedures, and also for what the museum should have on hand for emergencies.  I talked with people from FEMA, NEDCC, various California agencies, and local museums to create a list of all the supplies the museum should keep at the ready.  Of course, many items (stocked food and water, crowbars, etc.) are really for worst case scenarios.  But as we learned from Katrina, it's better to be prepared for the absolute worst case scenario than be taken by surprise.

The day of the ShakeOut, at exactly 10:18am we had our earthquake drill. We practiced Drop, Cover and Hold On, getting under the tables and listening to the ShakeOut's recorded earthquake sounds (which were for a much more urban area than we are in, but we got the idea) and imagining what would be in the most danger of falling.  Afterwards we did a building inspection, making sure we knew the most likely problem areas and where to turn off the water and electricity if we needed to.  The big part for me was when I tested our Emergency Preparedness Plan.  We have a binder with a list of phone numbers of who to call in case of emergency- both museum board members and other museums who participate in maintaining a container of emergency supplies.  Happily the plan worked, and I was able to update several phone numbers and contact names during the process.  What amazed me was how few other organizations in our area were participating in the ShakeOut.  Several people I talked to had no idea what to do in the event of an emergency of any kind. Maybe because there's no official 'earthquake season' the way there is a hurricane season there isn't a concentrated push at certain times of the year to prepare people the way we do in New Orleans.  Maybe many people are just waiting for the problem to hit and then they'll figure out what to do.  Or maybe I was just talking to a minority and most people are prepared.  I certainly hope that is the case.  But the Imperial Valley Desert Museum is as ready as possible for the next earthquake to hit Imperial Valley. Now we just have to finish preparing for the apocalypse.