Are We Ever Prepared for Natural Disasters?

This week’s storms make today’s Centerpiece resonate like a thunderclap: Natural disasters--be they earthquakes or floods--are terrifying in their randomness and power.

Can we ever really be prepared?

When we sent free-lancer Ken McAlpine to find the answer, we planned to tie his report into the anniversary of the Jan. 17 Northridge earthquake. Natural disasters being unpredictable, of course, we now have the chance to link the story to the floods, making our bosses think we’re geniuses.

Earthquakes and floods have much in common: Both can separate us from our homes, cut us off without food, water and power, and interrupt the daily pattern of our lives.

But even though we live in disaster-prone Southern California--have I mentioned fires yet?--most of us don’t prepare the way we should. McAlpine noticed a lot of people at the supermarket buying batteries after the Northridge quake. Shoptalk’s Leo Smith was inspired to write about umbrellas this week after getting drenched a few times.

McAlpine’s story includes tips that can serve you well in any disaster, but it also chronicles his own epic battles with procrastination. Seems that every time he felt the urge to retrofit and modernize his family’s emergency kit, darn if his favorite TV show, “Hard Copy,” wasn’t on.

“Though I don’t want to start a contest, I’m the world’s worst procrastinator, so bad that even earthquakes can’t get me moving,” McAlpine said. “So one of the reasons I wanted to do this article was to provide the kick in the pants I needed to prepare my own family.”

McAlpine fears earthquakes more than any other natural disaster.

“I’m sure there are some people who genuinely aren’t afraid of earthquakes, but they scare me,” he said. “I grew up back East where you could see natural disasters coming.

“There’s also something really frightening about the earth moving underneath my feet. The earth is supposed to be solid, the one thing we can count on and, when it moves, the feeling of helplessness is hard to describe.”

But easy to forget. “Less than two weeks after the Northridge quake, I’d stopped putting my shoes next to my bed,” McAlpine admitted.

McAlpine hopes that his next encounter with a natural disaster finds him as prepared as a Boy Scout.

“There are still a few things I need to do,” he said, “but for the most part we’re pretty prepared. That doesn’t make me feel the least bit confident, but it does make me feel a little bit better. I just hope we never have to use the stuff.”

Knowing Mother Nature, don’t count on it.