I like my lip left relatively clean, of course.

I haven't seen either movie Frankie refers to, but if the script called for our hero not to know how to open a can or to be unable to find a tool to do so, I'll accept it as a plot device for some comedy relief.

I'm just curious, but does your city have a plan to set up at least one shelter/relief site somewhere in the city limits? Like a baseball field, city hall parking lot, etc? Seems like that kind of info would be part of any city-run CERT curriculum.

Also, as Katrina demonstrated, often it is the private groups like the Red Cross, Salvation Army, local churches, or even private citizens that get relief centers set up first or in places without "official" relief centers. Obviously, you'll need to hold out for a time before any of these centers can be fully up and running, but I would suspect that help will be a lot closer than hoofing it all the way to San Jose. But these groups won't be there for long, though, so you'll still need to think about what to do "after".

. . .unless you become a member of one of those private groups and become part of the relief effort. You may also become privy to additional information that may help in your personal plans.

Louise and I are in a couple of groups with the purpose of providing relief. On a practical level, though, if the disaster wipes out our town, we're all victims and nobody's a reliever. One of our friends is in the Red Cross, and he's flown to all parts of the country after a disaster because nobody _in_ the disaster, Red Cross, Salvation Army, whatever, can provide help to the community because they're all victims themselves.

Yes, our town has a disaster plan, yes, the town has ideas on where to set up shelters, and no, I don't expect the town to deliver. I look to New Orleans for my expectations of help from the government at whatever level. If my town is hit by a quake of Katrina proportions, I expect no help.

I think I mentioned in another post on this thread that my town officials have said they don't expect the town to be rebuilt to its current condition if it's wiped out in an earthquake. I look at New Orleans, and I believe _that_.

Yes, we all have plans - the government, the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, our CERT teams, my neighbors. If the quake is not so severe that the plans are completely impossible to put into effect, well and good. But the possibililty is that the devastation will be Katrina-like and all the plans will be in the shambles that was my town.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that long-term survival is a worst case scenario. If it's not a Katrina-like quake, I'm a happy camper with plans, supplies, and ham radios to join in the rescue/reporting/communications efforts. My goal is to game plan the worst case, and I've gotten a lot of good information; I've put some of the ideas into effect.

> privy to additional information that may help in your personal plans.

My wife and I were at a meeting where our county's emergency services coordinator gave a presentation on what the county's plans were in the event of a devastating earthquake. They're detailed and involve providing defined amounts of supplies to the population using defined locations and routes. The government _has_ a plan. Then he asked, "The question is, do you trust your government?" That's the additional information I'm privy to in making my personal plans.

The government is made of people and some of them will be like the NOLA bus driver who evacuated and weren't available to drive a bus to evacuate others. Hence, a yard full of empty flooded buses.

In an earthquake, no one will be evacuating until after the earthquake, so those government people will still be in place. Hopefully they'll go to work.

A comic character called "Hungry Horace" had recurring nightmares of being marooned on a desert island, a crate washing up on the shore, and it being full of tinned food he was unable to open. A psychiatrist suggested he go to sleep holding a tin-opener: this should fix the object in his mind and he'd have it with him in his dream. It worked, after a fashion. In his dream he was sitting on the shore of his desert island, tin-opener in hand, eagerly waiting for the crate to appear. But this time the crate was full of tin-openers.

"...this time the crate was full of tin-openers..."

Now that is a real bummer!!!

Excellent points JCW. You may be one of the very few people who actually did grasp my point with the article....

Everyone's situtation, capabilites, and scenarios are very different and any planning or kit must be tuned to those parameters.

If I lived down there in a sure-to-collapse condo, the very first thing I would do is move....then worry about all the other things.

As to sourcing tarps and building materials from the home center next door, I was not advocating looting. With 1000's of our employees standing in the parking lot, combined with 100's from the surrounding businesses, I am quite certain that the home center would do everything possible to assist with tarps, wood, water and any other items that could safely be moved out of the store or outside storage areas. I WAS NOT advocating armed looting on the store....that is just stupid.

My approach to scattering multiple redundant kits about, coupled with a daily wear kit is an approach that works for me in my situations. What would work in SF is likely a derivative.

Another suggestion is to join a local volunteer emergency group. When the condo hits the dirt, report for duty to assist others. You end up serving the community, have shelter, food, water and communications. This is one of my approachs, serving as a ham operator at the local EOC.

I think that we need to define a couple of points here:
1) If your securing food, water, medical supplies, shelter etc then you are foraging.

2) If your taking alcohol, tobacco, TVs etc then you are looting.

I have the advantage over many of you in so far as I live in the U.K. Which is somewhat more tectonically active than many people appreciate.

In the U.K. you have a defence in law under certain circumstances that you where compelled to engage in an unlawful act in order to preserve life or limb. Depending on circumstance it is either a partial defence or an absolute one.

I would be interested to know what American state and federal law is on the matter.

I'm not sure about our laws here in the US, but allow me to pose a situation which might offer food for thought to those who live in urban environments, as well as those of us in the country.

I have several acres of land as well as the knowledge and experience to produce my own food. The situation is this: When food runs out in the city, individuals as well as groups of people will start looking to the country for sustenance.

While I'm willing to share as far as possible, I'm not going to allow myself to be deprived of what my family and I need to survive.

How far would I be willing to go in order to preserve my crops, food stores, live stock, equipment, etc?

When folks are forced to depend on their own means to survive, the situation will undoubtedly be some form of national or world-wide crisis (re...nuclear war as in Mad Max). Will there even be duly instituted law enforcement agencies protecting us from the ever-increasing lawlessness that is bound to rear it's ugly head?

Interesting thought, isn't it???