If a fire breaks out near your home and there’s an order to evacuate, what do you grab first?
“One of the easy ways I tell people is to pack their Ps,” said Sierra Hellstrom with the Northern Utah Type Three Incident Management Team, the crew fighting the Bonneville Fire near Salt Lake City. “Their prescriptions, their pets, their papers — documentation that you might need, wills and everything — and then photos, you know, memories you want to have.”
With multiple fires prompting evacuation orders in recent days, experts like Hellstrom say it’s important to stay prepared.
“I personally keep all of my prescriptions in a little basket inside of a cabinet at my house so that if I ever needed to, I can grab them and go,” she said. “All of my photos are in a photo album next to my safe that has all of my documentation in there; my will and my mortgages and my deeds to all my vehicles and everything like that.”
As the Joint Information Center Manager for Salt Lake County Emergency Management, wildfire is constantly on Tina Brown’s mind. She’d add two more Ps to Hellstrom’s list: people and phones.
“So, people, we want to think not just about the clothing that we're wearing today, but clothing to get us through the next few days, or a week or so,” she said. “You want shoes that are sturdy and comfortable. You don't know how long you're going to be evacuated for or away from your home.”
Phones and a way to charge them are essential, she said, not only as a way to communicate but because many important pieces of emergency information can come through text messages or push notifications.
“Sign up for emergency alerts,” she said. “Make sure you're getting not only your city alerts; make sure you can get the integrated public alert and warning system alerts.”
Brown said having a family communications plan is also essential. Questions like who to contact if you are all displaced, how you reconnect and who else you might need to get in touch with in an emergency all need answers and should be practiced beforehand.
In addition to documentation like wills and mortgages, Brown also highly recommends packing pet vaccination records because some emergency shelters might require them before allowing an animal inside. Proof of address is also important to remember for when you are allowed back to your home.
“I recommend this because if you are evacuated, you may be gone for quite a while, and the first responders, law enforcement, they want to make sure that you are the resident of that property before they let you in,” she said.
Brown’s biggest rule of thumb is having enough supplies ready to get through the first 96 hours of an evacuation on your own. Water and some non-perishable, high-protein snacks like trail mix or beef jerky are her favorites. That also includes at least a half tank of gas to get anywhere you might need to go.
“Know your evacuation routes ahead of time and practice them,” she said. “I would recommend more than one evacuation route, because if the one that you plan on and you choose could be closed because of the fire.”
And it isn't just people who live near the wilderness who need to be mindful of and prepared for the effects of wildfire. An evacuation can happen anywhere in Utah.
“The truth is we all live in a WUI or wildland urban interface area, so everybody should be thinking about wildfires and how to best prepare for them and a potential evacuation,” Brown said. “You're not immune to it just because you're in concrete and green space.”
Brown said anyone worried about what could happen if they were to be evacuated should start small. That means getting to know their city or town’s emergency managers.
“First and foremost, contact your local jurisdiction,” she said. “They may have evacuation zones already pre-planned, so working there first would be my first advice.”
