Maximum Power Equipment

If You Decide to Stay

Take all measures to protect your home and property. It is not only your stuff you are protecting but yourself and your family who have stayed behind. If you have removable hurricane shutters, try to put them up at least two days before landfall. Holding a 25-pound aluminum shutter while balancing on a ladder in 74 mph winds is no fun and can lead to bad things. If you are using plywood, get your wood and nails early.
- There is a risk of less-than-ideal folks wandering around the neighborhood possibly looking for an empty home to rob. Lock all doors and windows, place heavy, opaque drapes in front of windows to prevent outside eyes from looking in, and if you have them, load up on several rounds of ammunition for your rifles, shotguns, handguns, and pistols prior to the hurricane's arrival. Advertise that there are weapons in the vicinity.
Move into your home or garage all pots, patio furniture, grills and anything else that can blow around. Do not sink any furniture into a swimming pool, this is an old-wives-tale and a very bad idea.

Determine when and how you will evacuate. If you don't have a car, don't be too proud to ask others for help. If you do, leaving at an off-hour such as 2am is the best way to assure minimal traffic.
Consult a map in accordance to the advice given on the news. For example, if you live in Florida or Louisiana and the hurricane is said to be heading northwest, you'll want to have a route that heads northeast or north whichever one is safer and shorter.

Keep in mind that some hurricanes are slow travellers. Once you hear about it, chances are you have several days to finalize your plans.
Be sure you are well supplied with any prescription drugs that you or your family take on a regular basis. This can be a daunting task as some insurers will not honor refills until the last refill is nearly used up or has run out. If necessary, drugs must be purchased without insurance; weeks may go by without the ability to get refills, putting your health (or even your life) at risk.

Keep a Hurricane Preparedness Kit packed (see "Things You'll Need"). This assures that you will lessen the amount of things you'll have to do when the time comes. Also, items such as batteries are easier to find when everyone else isn't panicking. As a bonus, if any other event, such as a fire occurs, you'll be prepared for that as well.
Create a "take box". The take box should have everything you need to reconstruct your life in the event you evacuate and everything is lost. Passports; birth, wedding, adoption, divorce, and armed service separation certificates; copies of insurance policies; mortgage information; house and car title; large purchase receipts. You get the idea. If you have a scanner, save yourself space and heartbreak by scanning family albums and images of other keepsakes, burn those to CD and keep a copy in your take box, or make a copy of all your pictures, videos, music and documents on a external hard drive that you can keep in your take box. But remember that CD's can malfunction. Make sure you take along the original documents, if possible, make copies of them. The CD is just for convenience when shown to officials.

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