Staying Prepared With SERVPRO of Belle Meade/West Nashville

9/16/2020 (Permalink)

Look back, if you will, to December 31st, 2019. What were you doing? Who were you with? Were you having a great time with a big group of your closest friends just counting down the minutes until you could put the drag that the last year might have been behind you? Just looking forward to a new year and all the possibilities that it would bring. Now think back to that night again only, this time, try to picture everything that 2020 has managed to throw at the world. Were you in any way prepared for any of this?

By now it’s pretty easy to see that almost none of us were ready for this year. Asking anyone to be ready for a global pandemic is a pretty tall order; let alone the whole world. Here in Nashville, we happened to have a tornado just a week before the world went into quarantine. Add hurricanes and wildfires to the mix and it begins to put into perspective how unprepared a lot of us are for these situations. It’s never too late, or early, to begin thinking about what can happen next. Here at SERVPRO, we understand as well as anyone what it means to be ahead of the curve when bad things happen.

Let’s start with some easy, albeit effective, steps you can take to be better prepared in case of an emergency. 

Step one: Have a plan. 

It’s always good to have an idea of what you need to do, and what you need to do it, in case of an emergency. Get together with your family to plan out escape routes in case of a fire and make sure everyone knows their way out. Does everyone know where the fire extinguishers are… You do have an extinguisher, right? Everyone should have a nice solid flashlight next to their bed too (in my experience, emergencies are never convenient). 

Step two: stock up. 

The great toilet paper and hand sanitizer shortage of 2020 was short-lived, thankfully, but should’ve been a large wake-up call to a lot of us. It’s never a bad idea to keep plenty of sanitary items stocked up but you could also go the extra mile and consider things like clean potable water, food (things you can make without electricity), matches/lighters, extra clothes, a first aid kit…

Look, there are a million resources online that will give you a better idea about these types of things. You don’t have to become “doomsday prepper” level of stocked up but, after some of the craziness we’ve seen this year, I wonder if those people aren’t onto something.

Outside of some of the more home-based emergencies, resources like ready.gov or, the National Security Council’s own, nsc.org are great resources for anyone looking to get ahead of their next unforeseen event. There they provide in-depth guides and plans to almost every kind of disaster you can imagine: natural or otherwise. And that’s kind of the point, isn’t it? Being prepared in those situations that you might never have considered?

From articles about how The First Five Minutes Are The Most Crucial In A Medical Emergency to What To Keep Ready In A Home Emergency Supply Kit, these are things that most of us might never have thought of. So study up. Begin to think about the worst things that might happen; so that you can make the best of those situations when they occur. Make safe and sound your new normal.