It’s The End of the World!

In 1978, historian Barbara Tuchman published a book called A Distant Mirror: the Calamitous 14th Century that provided a portrait of Western Europe in the 1300's. Tuchman's premise was that the 14th century in many ways reflected the social upheavals and crises of the 20th Century. Given the calamitous year that has been 2020, Tuchman's comparison is even more relevant today.

The 14th century was indeed a time of tremendous upheaval and people at the time can be forgiven for believing they were living in the end times. The Black Death was ravaging Europe, with one historian estimating that the death toll could have been as high as 60% of the population. The Hundred Years War was being fought between England and France, with unemployed soldiers turning to pillaging the countryside during the brief periods of peace. There were peasant revolts, brought on by starvation and heavy taxation. The Great Schism had sundered the Roman Catholic Church, one of the key unifying elements in medieval culture. The ending of the Medieval Warming Period created unsettled weather conditions that produced droughts, floods, and cold winters resulting in famine. The social order was changing as well, with the collapse of the feudal system and the transition from a subsistence economy to a commercial one.

The 14th century was a bad time, but it was easily rivaled and, some historians would argue eclipsed, by the 6th century. In 536 CE, Europe, the Middle East, and parts of Asia experienced 18 months of darkness, thought to be caused by an exploding volcano, possibly in Iceland. The pall caused the coldest winter in the past 2300 years and led to widespread crop failures and famine. This was followed by the Plague of Justinian that is believed to have wiped out the equivalent of 50% of the population of Europe over the next two centuries. The combination of the two so weakened the Byzantine Empire that Justinian was unable to reunite the core of the old Roman Empire by retaking Italy, an event that may have had a major impact on European history.

The point here is that, as bad as things got, people survived. The result may not have been what one would have wished, but people survived. The events of the 6th Century produced the Dark Ages, which actually were not so dark and were actually a time of innovation and creativity that is often overlooked. The Carolingian dynasty created a strong, centralized state that produced innovations in architecture, art and education, while Arab scholars made major advances in mathematics and science.   The wars and tribulations of the 14th Century led to the Renaissance and the rise of modern states and  economies. The history of disasters is full of stories of communities that have rebuilt following crisis: San Francisco, Galveston, Chicago, New Orleans. They remind us that all the worlds wisdom can be contained in the phrase. "This to shall pass".

Don't misunderstand me; I am not recommending complacency. In a time of political upheaval, plague, fires, hurricanes, and floods, complacency is the last thing we need. What I do recommend is shaking off depression and taking action to create change. Prepare for crisis; mitigate the potential effects. Above all, be prepared to recover from whatever comes and go on. Remember, as Louis Pasteur said, "Fortune favors the prepared."  

In These Dark Days, Social Media May Offer a Gleam of Light

Social media has always been a two-edged sword. It is the purveyor of misinformation and has been responsible for generating a lot of fear over COVID-19. There’s evidence that it’s being used by foreign governments to generate much of that fear and there is no question that it is being manipulated for political purposes.

Yet, in this time of doubt and fear, social media can also provide us with tools that allow us to counter that fear with simple human decency.

• Within minutes of the announcement of the public health order directing a “shelter in place” for six San Francisco Bay Area counties, the regional leader of a social organization of which I am a member posted instructions on Facebook cancelling all activities and providing guidance for how events would be rescheduled when the order was lifted. His manner was calm and business-like and spoke volumes about his leadership. Within a few hours, instructors scheduled to teach at the cancelled activities had posted offers to hold their classes online. Other members organized chat sites to provide companionship for anyone who was feeling alone and isolated. Someone organized a site to help the artisans who would no longer be able to sell their goods at events. Still others offered their services for anyone needing assistance in shopping or running errands.
• Our church cancelled services last week in accordance with the directives that preceded the public health order. This Sunday our pastor offered a prayer service via conference call and is exploring the possibility of streaming the service next Sunday. The church is organizing a “buddy system” that matches volunteers with people in high-risk categories who may need help with shopping or other needs. The pastor has already called everyone that might need help to identify any immediate needs.
• Even before this, our neighbors began reaching out on the Next-Door app to offer assistance to those who were self-isolating. A lot of these volunteers were teens and young adults and the offers were free of any charges. One mother offered the services of her sons to help teach them lessons on selflessness.

Why are these acts of kindness so important? One of the lessons learned in previous pandemics, such as the 1918 Influenza Pandemic, was that many people died needlessly because there was no one to care for them. Fear kept neighbors from checking on the sick and providing food and hydration. Social isolation is not confined to pandemics; many of the deaths in the 1995 Chicago heat wave were the result of people living alone without friends or neighbors to help. Social isolation, as distinct from social distancing, can kill.

Even more important is that these simple acts remind us that we are in this together and share a common humanity. If history is any guide, things will get worse before they get better. But history also tells us that most of us who contract COVID-19 will survive. How will you remember these days? As a time when we came together to face a crisis or as at time when fear kept us isolated?

Solving the Water Storage Problem

More that anything else, disaster survival depends on water. Assuming there are no pre-existing medical issues, the average person can survive for two weeks without food. Lack of water can lead to death in a matter of days.

The minimum amount of water needed per person is around two quarts per day, but this varies based on factors such as temperature and physical exertion. It’s this subjectivity that causes a problem in suggesting how much water a person should store. The oft-quoted recommendation of one gallon per person per day can be inadequate under some conditions and overkill in others.

A major problem is storage. While there are available water supplies in the average house (e.g. water heaters, toilet tanks), most people would prefer a more conventional supply such as bottled water. However, in these days of environmental consciousness, many bottled water containers available in supermarkets are designed to degrade after a period of months. Stored too long, they begin to deteriorate. There are containers designed for long-term storage, but they can be expensive and not all are easy to store. Part of the problem with long term storage of water is the need to periodically replace the stored water, something that many people neglect.

At last years International Association of Emergency Managers conference, a new company called Waterfull introduced a potential solution that is both simple and effective. The system is built around a pressurized 30-gallon water container that is connected in-line with a water source, such as a garden hose. As the water source is used, the water in the container is constantly refreshed. The water is easily accessed via a spigot attached to the container. The price point is roughly around $500, about the same price as a pallet of bottled water.

The concept is not new; I saw something similar offered following the Loma Prieta earthquake. However, Waterfull has put  a lot of thought and engineering into the design and materials used in the container. The container is sealed against contaminants, made from food-grade plastic, and designed to prevent algae growth. It replaces nine cases of bottled water in a much more efficient storage size. It may not completely solve the issue of water storage but is certainly a step in the right direction.

Who’s to Blame for California’s Fires?

President Trump’s insistence on blaming the state of California for the devastating wildfires is yet another example of over-simplifying an issue without regard to the historical context.

The President is quite correct to attribute at least some of the cause of the fires to a forest management policy that is focused on preventing fires rather than on maintaining a healthy forest. Fire is a naturally occurring phenomenon that increases the health of a forest by removing underbrush and stimulating reseeding. Our emphasis on fire prevention has increased the fire load to such an extent that major fires now burn hotter that normal, destroying  trees rather creating the conditions for healthy growth.

However, the President seems unaware that this policy originated with the federal government following the Great Fire of 1910. This fire, also known as the Big Burn, destroyed some three million acres in northern Idaho, western Montana, eastern Washington, and southeastern British Colombia, an area the size of Connecticut, and killed 87 people, mainly firefighters. The fledgling US Forest Service received considerable praise and, more importantly, an increased firefighting budget.

A major result of the fire was a shift in the role of the Forest Service from conservation to fire prevention. The Forest Service was originally established to protect federal lands from exploitation from timber companies and developers. However, after the Great Fire, the desire to prevent a repetition of such a devastating fire meant that the mission changed from one of conservation to a primary focus on fire prevention. The result is the current policy that actually encourages more devastating fires by preventing the smaller fires that are a natural part of forest ecology.

It is important to acknowledge that the origins of our current forest management policy lie with the federal government. Over 57% of the forest land in California is federal land, under the control of the US Forest Service. President Trump has recently cut some $40 million from the Forest Service budget earmarked for hazardous fuel reduction, the same mitigation measure he is demanding of the state.

Laying the blame on California alone for bad forest management policy shows a lack of understanding of the historical context of how this policy originated. It also ignores other factors such as poor maintenance by utilities and climate change or the fact that many of these fires occur on private land over which the state has no control. There are a lot of factors contributing to these fires and we would be better served by addressing them rather than attempting to fix blame for political purposes.

Why Do We Still Kill The Messenger?

There was an interesting article in Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle about one of the survivors of the recent fire that destroyed the town of Paradise. The gentleman in question was born and raised in Paradise and built a home there. That home was destroyed in the Camp Fire last November. But unlike the other disaster survivors, this man receives no sympathy from his neighbors and has had to endure threats and vandalism. The reason? He works for Pacific Gas and Electric.

PG&E has had image problems since the San Bruno pipeline explosion in 2010 that resulted in a conviction for obstruction of justice. The company has a reputation for placing profits above safety, a reputation that was reinforced by the company being found responsible for major fires in California in both 2017 and 2018. The company faces multiple civil suits from those fires and consideration is being given to charging the company with manslaughter and possibly even murder.

But are the employees working on recovery culpable in any way? The individual that the Chronicle article highlighted is both a native of Paradise and himself a disaster survivor. The work he is engaged in is community restoration. Yet he and other workers have had their vehicles vandalized, been verbally assaulted, and had garbage thrown at them. They are abused not for who they are or what they are doing but because they are a visible and accessible representative of a powerful company that the abuser has no real power to influence.

This an extreme case, to be sure, but how often are we rude to people who are trying to help us simply because they are the only representative of an institution accessible to us? Mind you, I have limited patience with rudeness and inefficiency, but I try not to open a conversation with a customer service representative with a verbal assault. I remind myself first that I want their help and secondly that they, in most cases, don’t have the power to make any real decisions. In other words, they’re not to blame for their company’s errors; they’re trying to help fix the problem.

Executing a messenger who brought bad news simply because they represented the sender went out of style years ago. Next time you’re angry with a company, write the chairman or president; don’t beat up on the person who’s only trying to make things better.

Paranoia Strikes Deep

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you're always afraid
Step out of line, the men come and take you away

These lyrics from “For What It’s Worth” were written by Stephen Stills back in 1966 and reflected the turbulent times surrounding the Vietnam War and the social upheaval that was taking place. It seems, however, that they are just as relevant, or maybe even more so, to our times, as we have allowed our fears to overcome our good judgement.

Here’s a recent example that highlights what I mean. Former FBI Director James Comey tweeted an innocuous message that was interpreted by a right-wing conspiracy group to be a reference to Jihad and was construed as the “go” order for a false flag attack. Using the first five letters of various Comey tweets with the same hashtag, the group identified the “target” as a charter school in a rural California county. As luck would have it, the school’s annual fund raiser was scheduled for last weekend. After reading about the threat on the Internet, several people contacted the school and local law enforcement to express concern.

There was never a direct threat to the school and local law enforcement felt that the threat was baseless. If you had to make a decision to cancel the fundraiser or go ahead with it, which would you have chosen? It’s a “damned if you do; damned if you don’t” no win situation for the school leaders. In the end, the school leaders opted to cancel, not out of concern over a potential attack, but for fear that armed vigilantes would descend upon the festival to “protect the children” as has happened in the past in other locations.

I do not question the decision of the festival organizers to cancel. It was a difficult decision to make and had financial consequences in terms of lost revenue and sunk costs, not mention subjecting the organizers to second-guessing and ridicule. What I do question is how have we sunk so low that a group of conspiracy theorists writing on a discredited website can force the cancellation of an event completely unconnected to them. Anyone who has studied mechanisms of violent social change understands that acts of terrorism or anarchy are intended to force us to overreact and create the very conditions required for the change we oppose. When we live in fear, we allow small erosions to our freedoms in exchange for security. The trouble is these small losses add up to create significant, far reaching losses of civil rights.

I’ve written before that we cannot eliminate all risk in our lives. This means being willing to recognize when a risk is acceptable and when it is not. It means we have to stop letting our fears drive us where we have not desire to go.

We Have Met The Enemy…

Cartoonist Walt Kelly’s beloved character Pogo is credited with coining the phrase, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” Although Pogo was referring to pollution, it applies equally well to disasters where we are almost always our own worst enemy.

Disasters are a social construct. That is, they are created by the interaction of impact of the event on our vulnerability. The issue is that we frequently create conditions that increase both the impact of the event and our vulnerability. In Rising Tide, his study of the Mississippi flood of 1927, John Barry notes how the commitment to levees as flood control measures increased rather than reduced the risk of flooding. In The Big Burn, Timothy Egan describes how a major firestorm in 1910 caused the fledgling Forest Service to adopt a policy of total fire prevention, a policy that actually increased the fire danger in national forests. Both policies were well-intentioned but flawed and had consequences with which we still deal today.

History is replete with other examples, some of the them the result of government decision making but many others caused by greed or expediency. San Francisco suffered in 1906 because a system of emergency cisterns was allowed to fall into disrepair because it was viewed as outdated and no longer needed. The Johnstown flood of 1889 was the result of shoddy dam construction. The same could be said of the holding tank that burst and flooded Boston with over 2 million gallons of molasses in 1919, killing 21 people.

We cannot eliminate all vulnerability. It is too late to move major cities such as San Francisco or New Orleans to safer ground. The Portuguese government considered such a move in 1755 following the great earthquake, fires, and tsunamis that destroyed Lisbon and discarded the idea as unworkable and fraught with political consequences. But we can be vigilant about resisting development that creates new vulnerabilities and we can mitigate the hazards we know about.

Surprisingly, mitigation is many times a hard sell, even though we have evidence that every dollar invested in mitigation yields $4 in societal savings and almost the same amount in savings to the US Treasury. That’s an incredible return on investment. The barrier is not financial or even the adequacy of the proposed mitigation. It comes down to the sociopolitical environment and cultural acceptance. In other words, people need to commit to mitigation. Given our track record to date, that’s a major obstacle to overcome.

Emergency Management Solutions December 2018

Emergency Management Solutions December 2018

Clean Up Your Act! New Product Highlight

Every now and then I come across an interesting product that makes me scratch my head and ask, "Why didn't someone think of this before?" I've spent a lot of time in environments where water was at a premium and showering wasn't always an option and would really have appreciated something besides tiny baby wipes. Now a new product called ShowerToGo promises to fill that need. 

ShowerToGo is a massive wet wipe, roughly the size of a bath towel at 24”x 50”. It’s quick, convenient, and disposable. One wipe cleans the whole body, absorbing sweat, dirt, grime, and contaminants.  It's composed of biodegradable material, a major plus.

I can see all sorts of applications for this product, not only in emergency shelters and go-bags, but for support to homeless populations and even for sport camping. Check it out!

www.showertogo.net 

Spontaneous Shelters: Ignore them at you peril

(Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

Here’s an issue that we don’t discuss very often: spontaneous or makeshift sheltering. During the Northridge earthquake, many members of the Hispanic community who had experienced the Mexico City earthquake chose not to go to the official shelters established by the city of Los Angeles. They remembered the severe aftershocks that had killed many and chose instead to camp out in the local park. This presented the city with a problem. With the large number of people in the park, there was an immediate need to provide services such as sanitation, medical care, and feeding. However, providing services would encourage people to remain rather than move to official shelters and serve as a magnet to other displaced residents. Ultimately, the city chose to work with the community and provide the needed services.

A similar problem is occurring in the Camp fire in Butte County. Beginning on November 8, a makeshift tent city has sprung up in a dirt lot next to a Walmart parking lot in Chico. (Walmart has a long-standing policy of allowing overnight camping in its parking lots.) The camp is not an official shelter but has instead relied on volunteers to provide services and on donations of goods and money. These volunteer services are ending soon, which presents the city of Chico with a problem like that faced by Los Angeles.

The situation is a bit different here, though. The vacant lot is prone to flooding and rain is in the forecast. Winter temperatures are in the 30’s and will only grow colder. From the city’s perspective, remaining in the current site presents a health risk to the residents and they are encouraging residents to move to official shelters. Neither the city nor Walmart are actively trying to evict the displaced residents, nor have they established any deadline for them to move. While the campers are not pleased, but so far, the city has avoided any confrontations and is doing its best to encourage an end to the encampment.

These makeshift evacuation sites and spontaneous shelters are not unusual. People feel at a loss and have nowhere to go. Such sites may actually perform a service by allowing people to decompress and sort out their options. However, they also have the potential to turn into a greater problem with both health and safety issues and public relations concerns. Moving quickly to redirect evacuees to alternatives is essential.