“Lowcountry Ready…”

August 25, 2009: Cathy Hanes, Director of Charleston County Emergency Preparedness, educated Rotarians today on best practices as we prepare for the 2009 Hurricane Season. Cathy began her career in 1982 as a paramedic and later moved into the field of emergency preparedness. As head of the county division, Cathy’s team develops a plan, sets evacuation routes, as well as, oversees shelters and public transportation. It is important to note that Cathy’s team prepares for all types of natural disasters and man made disasters, and the only type of disaster that is not a threat in Charleston County is volcanoes. Today, we will focus on hurricane preparedness.

The first rule to insure your safety is to be prepared. Take personal responsibility for your safety as emergency responders may not be readily available; the four steps of preparedness are “get a kit, have a plan, stay informed, and get involved”. The outline below if a brief overview of what each of those steps entails.

Get a Kit
You should have a kit that can sustain you and your family for 7 to 10 days, it should contain, food, water, medicine, batteries, flashlight, battery powered radio, can opener, first aid kit, baby needs, and pet necessities. Also before the storm arrives, check your flood insurance, update your kit, fill gas and propane tanks, and protect your home and business.

Have a Plan
Decide to stay or go, if you go know your evacuation route, and leave early. If you can not evacuate move to a Red Cross shelter, usually housed in a near by school, transportation is provided by Carta and the Charleston county school district, and take your supplies with you. In general, you should have a family plan, of where to meet in case of an emergency; choose a place inside your neighborhood, as well as, a place outside of the immediate area. Choose a friend or family member that lives outside of the area that can be a point of contact for all of you in case your family is separated during the event. Remember to plan for the elderly and those with special needs.

Stay Informed
Have the contact numbers and the emergency plan for your employers and/or schools. Have a battery powered radio so that you can tune into satellite broadcasts for updates, and if you are out of town and have internet access stay tuned to ready.gov for updates.

Get Involved
Take personal responsibility, attend local training, and offer to volunteer for the CERT, community emergency response teams. After the storm, get involved in clean up; enter with caution, check for damage to gas and power lines, open windows and doors to increase ventilation and separate debris using the C.H.E.A.T rule. “Don’t CHEAT our environment”, debris can be picked up and disposed of more efficiently if it is divided into groups of C-construction materials, H – hazardous materials (batteries, oil etc), E – electronics, A -appliances, and T- trees and vegetation.

In closing, we encourage all Rotarians to get prepared and help be “Lowcountry Ready”, for questions or additional information access the following sites: http://www.charlestoncounty.org/, http://www.ready.gov/, http://www.redcross.org/.

Submitted by Elizabeth Wooten Burwell,, Keyway Committee Chair