Ok, well, i've learned a valuable lesson this past week, and that lesson is: Be more than prepared.
i'm willing to say that when disaster strikes here, in the Bay Area, things would not be quite as bad. This is because, unlike New Orleans, after a major quake power can generally be turned back on without electrocuting the populous that's still wading through the city. Sure, most of the infrastructure would be shot, (and probably fairly localized) but a fair number of roads would still be passable. It's just one of the benefits of not living in a coastal city that is below sea level in a Hurricane prone location.
So yeah, over the next few weeks i'll probably be stopping by the local REI and loading up on enough supplies to last two weeks instead of the recommended three days.
To be honest, i'd actually suggest that regardless of where you happen to live, you ought to consider doing the same. Stuff like this happens, and when it does, you'll probably need that supply stocked, trashcan of love to save you.
Ah well, rest up, and check your stock of batteries.
i've been in just about every natural disaster type there is. The only ones i've (thankfully) not been in are wild fires and tsunami, but yes, i've been through multiple hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, floods, plagues of insects, earthquakes (ok, minor ones, but enough to get my attention). Each and every one of them suck.
But you know what? As my preference for the sorts of disasters i'd be willing to go through again, i'd put earthquakes fairly high on the list, and at the bottom would go tornadoes, hurricanes and wildfires. 90 or so seconds of albeit terrifying earth surfin' and you're done for the next 75-100 years. Hurricanes? You get them again, and again.
So to that person on CNN talking about how they'd rather go through another hurricane than deal with one of them California earthquakes?
You're nuts.
The "nice" thing about tornadoes is that damage is usually pretty localized. When St. Anthony Village here in MN got clobbered on April 26, 1984, a large chunk of the town, and a shopping center were destroyed. But less than five miles away, everything was still fine. National Guard units responded within hours, and while there were a bunch of people homeless, there were more than enough shelters and supplies to keep them all safe.
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Tornadoes are horrible, and we get "tornado-possible" storm fronts relatively often here in Wisconsin, but a tornado's damage is relatively pinpointed, since funnel cloud touch down conditions last maybe about 60 seconds.
We just got the worst run of tornadoes in *decades* two weeks back in the Madison area, and it decimated a couple blocks in town, but that's just a couple blocks. Still, the flashlight/water/spaghettios combo is never a bad idea.