That's almost cliché. During any large evacuation, there will be lines at ATMs and gas stations around the evacuation zone.

Getting extra cash and gas is usually one of my first step when preparing for a possible emergency. If I need it, great. If I don't need it, I won't need to visit the ATM for a while.

Keeping the lower half of my gas tank for emergencies means I can drive 150+ miles before I need to fill the tank. "Don't stop at the top of the escalator."

IMO, It's not cliche, more like unprepared. This dam has been in declining condition all week and I first seen the reports on the 7th. By the 9th, the problems were with the dam were widely reported but it was not until this weekend that the danger was raised to imminent and the reason for the evacuation.

I am sure there will be a lot of armchair quarterbacking on why the call for evac was not done sooner etc. However the fact that the dam had sustained damage earlier in the week, would have been cause for me to start preparing then and not wait until the last minute which is all too often the case for those without a preparedness mindset- no matter the disaster.

BTW, my early interest in this dam and evac is because we have old friends in that area, but they are upstream and in no danger.

Exactly. We store anywhere from 20-30 gallons of gas. In theory and in the event of an evac, with the truck tank full at 32 gallons and 30 gallons in Jerry cans, this gives a range of over a thousand miles.

To put this in perspective. If we were in the Oroville CA area and depending on traffic etc, we could drive without refueling to any of these major USA centers without a refueling.
Seattle WA
Denver CO
Phoenix AR
Albuquerque NM
Jackson Wy
Boise ID

Needless to say it would take an unheard of and massive western regional disaster event where in a 1000-1200 mile range, that one could not find fuel.

Living in earthquake country, I try to never drop below one half tank. And that is in a case where my preference would be to bug in if there should be a damaging shaker.

I doubt you would need much fuel to get beyond the confines of the watershed affected by the Oroville situation. Just be sure you sleep high.

Wildman and others..yes and we saw the photos of the bashed up cars,a lot of panic there.without making a joke out of this it must of been like a scene from a old movie where the guy runs
down main street shouting "the dam busting head for the hills"
I get the impression that it was the same thing.people were given the impression that at any moment the spillway was going to fail when from the looks of the guys in the yellow jackets standing around that was not the case.
another thing is the car wrecks.even if you were all prepped up
and on the way to you planned safe area how about the next guy who is driving like a fool.did the police have a traffic control
plan? just think about it will be like when the Big One hits.
I hope someone holds some "lessons learned" meetings.

Looks like the dam disaster threat is over (for now.)

California Residents Allowed to Return Home After Dam Spurs Evacuation

Evacuations lifted for communities below Oroville Dam

I wonder:

Will anyone prep up in the event these rain predictions create an even more serious repeat of a no notice evacuation?

Will anyone decide never to be caught in such a situation totally unprepared, again?

Is anyone going to be suspicious of what their state agencies release to the public, and how warnings are worded?

It sounds like the danger isn't past, but it's down below panic levels. If I were in that situation, I would seriously consider packing up my household and re-evacuating to higher ground until the evacuation warning was lifted

Wild, if just half of the people do something in the way of prep that would be a plus coming out of this mess.
even if folks 100's miles away are encouraged to set a box of food and water aside that would be something.
from what i read about that local town it sounds like things are not going very well.spending for emergency gear might be out of reach and i'll bet it's like that for more people than we think.