Earthquake Preparedness: City Posts Outdated Advice

The City of Santa Clarita recently posted a section on "12 Months to Preparedness", with information on everything from floods and earthquakes to identity theft.

Unfortunately, the section on earthquakes includes information that could CAUSE rather than PREVENT injuries and possibly deaths.

In Ten Tips for Earthquake Safety, you'll find tips from Doug Copp, the Rescue Chief and Disaster Manager of the American Rescue Team International (ARTI).

Copp makes it very clear that climbing UNDER desks and other furniture means that people are CRUSHED more often than not. Why? Because these items get pancaked, and so will you if you're under them. The City of Santa Clarita's earthquake preparedness says to get UNDER the furniture, which is the old-school way of thinking.

According to Copp, you're better off curling up NEXT TO bulky furniture, since when it is crushed it will create a void next to it where you'll be safe. Think about it... you crawl under the desk, the desk's legs collapse, and you're crushed under a heavy desktop and a load of debris. But the actual desk isn't totally pancaked, it's just made a lot "thinner" as it compresses into one flat piece of furniture with no legs. If you were next to that desk instead of under it, you'd have the desk supporting the weight of the collapsing building and you'd have a very small space next to that desk where you'd be safe. He calls these "triangles" of safety.

Same goes with cars. Copp says that if people caught in the San Francisco earthquake (where bridges collapsed with tons of cars on them) had gotten out and scrunched up real small NEXT TO their cars, there would have been many more survivors. Research by Copp and others indicated that there were plenty of "safe zones" next to the cars, but not a lot of safety in them.

Be sure to read the information in Ten Tips for Earthquake Safety - it could save your life! Santa Clarita is definitely in an earthquake zone, so it does help to be prepared.