Bugging out:

. . . Wildfire or firestorm. Waiting until the flames are licking at my wheels (or heels) seems like a stupid thing to do. If my house was on fire, I would run outside, rather than sitting in my easy chair, hoping God is bored with everyone else at this moment in time. . . .
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Nuclear, radiological and chemical accidents. Running like a scalded cat would be my choice here. Try to keep up.

Bugging in:

Earthquake - If I get past the first big shake, I'll camp out in the back yard. . . .

Sue

For me it completely depends on the situation.

For me it's all subjective. I don't like to have specific trigger points because if you've misjudged then it may be too late by the time your trigger is tripped. It means maintaining alertness but I'm ok with that.

I am about a days sail or motor east of the Golden Gate Bridge leading out of San Franciso Bay to the Pacific Ocean. If a huge storm / hurricane / tsunami / flood is predicted, it is not likely I can sail out of the narrow Delta waterways and up or down the California coastline far and fast enough to avoid such things. At this point in time, all I can do is batten down the hatches, put out extra mooring lines to the dock, and deploy extra bumpers.

My big decision is whether or not to bug out in my vehicle and abandon the boat to its fate. I am pondering what factors and data I need to make that decision, which is the genesis of this thread.

In a nutshell, you'd have to know the time that the "event" will arrive or at least a good approximation, compare that with the time you'll need to do whatever you want to do, when the arrival time coincides with your preparation time, do whatever you plan on doing.

In other words, if you know it will take you an hour to bug out and your best guess is that the "event" is one hour away from happening, activate your plan.

[A great example of specific criteria for a bug-out decision.]

Asking what things need to be known in every possible scenario is a huge job. [Only asking each to contribute what they know; the benefit of an online community.]

What you want to know is a full time job for many people, how can you expect to learn about fire behaviour, meteorology, fluid mechanics, engineering standards, and all of the other things that you'd need to know in order to make a decision about any given situation that might occur? It's impossible. [Yep, perfect information and being omnicient is not possible. I will take what I can get!]

I know for a fact that firefighters are taught about specific things to watch for before making their decision to bail out, I also know that they routinely ignore those things as do many professionals. They take their entire body of knowledge and then make a subjective decision on the fly all the time. Which is one reason why I got caught taking cover under a fire truck during a wildfire once. Even the folks who do this stuff for a living can't know all the things that might happen. [A given.]

Using a wild fire as an example, knowing that a fire is a particular distance away is only one piece of data, in order to make a well reasoned decision about when to evacuate you'd need to know the wind direction and speed, the terrain between you and the fire, the fuel load of the terrain, the number and type of any structures between you and the fire, the current and predicted weather conditions, the manpower available to get between you and the fire, the technical resources available and a few other things I'm probably forgetting. Wouldn't it be smarter to have a plan that says that if a wildfire gets within a given distance to you to evacuate? [That's exactly what I am suggesting.] You can overanalyze yourself to death. Literally. In the time you take trying to make the BEST response, you can die. I'd rather over-react then under-react. [Yep, and that is why pre-planning and thougt can be so helpful.]

I might be wrong but I don't think anyone posting here would be able to give anyone specific guidelines on what to do for every possible scenario. [ Just asking each to contribute what they can.] And frankly, I'd be very cautious in believing anyone who claims that they could do so. I've worked at a few emergency operations and controlled chaos is the best way to describe most of them. One need look no further then the recent Station Fire here in SoCal to see where otherwise intelligent, highly trained people made some fundamental errors in judgement about how and where to fight the fire. If the experts can get it wrong, how can a lay person expect to know all the stuff needed in all of the scenarios listed earlier? [Exactly, we all need all the help we can get. That is why I posted - to increase my awareness and knowledge.] It really is very subjective.

...have a copy of their respective city/county/state Emergency Management plans...This will give you an idea of what the county agencies will be looking at in order to make their decisions.

Sometimes events won't let you just plan...

[But with a little thought you can plan for almost everything.]

I would paraphrase Gaston Rebuffat, a famous French alpinist, "You will always regret fleeing too late, you will never regret fleeing too early."

[And how and when would you decide to folloow this advice?]

Like others, when the big earthquake comes, I plan to shelter in place, but you must be flexible and ready to think on your feet.

I am sure that the fact that we maintain an interest in this forum indicates that we are indeed planning for potential problems and taking reasonable efforts to enable as many options as possible. [Such as?]

In the event, however, we often (usually?) must make decisions with far less than full, or. indeed, adequate information. [Almost always.]

Planning is good, but it can reach a point of diminishing returns. [Of course.]

If I do decide to exit from an impending situation, I would incline to do so early rather than later - avoidance of crowds and gridlock is a real concern here. We always hear sad stories about folks who temporized and tried to leave too late. I can't recall nearly so many tales about those who fled too early. There are consequences for leaving too early - typically disruption of one's affairs and various inconveniences, but those are preferable to injury or loss of life, the real possibilities of exiting too late from a significant disaster. [So how do you decide when it is early enough?]

I would like to raise another issue. With respect to tsunamis, the procedure here (Ventura, CA,with a more open coast) is to put to sea with all due haste and seek open water. Safe waters are reachable in about two hours. In fact,our vessels have done so in the past when tsunami alerts have been issued for our area. Your situation in the Bay area is radically different. What kind of advance warning do you need to reach open water from your dock?

I think the difference between evacuating and hunkering down is usually divided between HAVING to evacuate. That's all that would get me out of here.

I am hoping to pick your brains to add considerations from your expertise or experience to help me think through my own decions on whether and when to flee. The more real world, the better.

Thanks.

Large groups moving over any distance is pretty rare, if it has ever happened.

"If there is danger present - why on earth DON'T people flee? It seems like such an obvious thing to do."
Sue

That is my plan, also. I have far more assets here than I could take with me. I would also hope that I am home when it happens. Trying to get home past 300 collapsed overpasses and two or three largish rivers would not be fun.

Sue