Have a Plan

The best way to protect yourself and your family is to be prepared. Take these steps to ensure their safety:

• Install safety features such as smoke detectors and fire extinguishers in your home.
  
  
• Become familiar with your community's severe weather warning system and make certain everyone in your family knows what to do.
  
  
• Become familiar with your community's disaster preparedness plans and create a family one. Practice this plan every six months to make sure that everyone knows what to do.
  
  
• Identify escape routes from your home and neighborhood, and designate an emergency meeting place for your family to reunite if you separate. Remember that in large disasters, major roads could be blocked or destroyed.
  
  
• Make certain all adult and teenage members of the family know where your gas, electric and water main shut off controls are and how to turn them off if there's a leak or electrical short. Keep necessary wrenches close by.
  
  
• Learn about your workplace's disaster safety plans and the plans at your children's schools or day care centers.
  
  
• Establish a contact point to communicate with concerned relatives.
  
  
• Develop a detailed list of your possessions now because many of them could be destroyed during a loss.
  • Go through your house room-by-room
  • Note the quantities and values of each item, serial numbers, and purchase dates
  • Take photos or videos of your things to help document them
  • The Insurance Information Institute and knowyourstuff.org both offer software to help you keep track of your items
    
    
• Put together an emergency kit