The Key to Disaster Plans: Rehearsal, Rehearsal, Rehearsal

Get a household disaster-preparedness plan and rehearse it.

That’s the bottom-line advice from disaster experts as Santa Ana winds continue to fan catastrophic fires in Southern California.

There are many steps you can take to protect your home and family against fire, or to lessen the damage, says Linda Lockwood, a neighborhood activist in Hancock Park. “But first you have to make it a priority. We tend to live in fantasy land here.”

“It really comes down to education,” says Larry Barton, a management professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. “Your best preparation is to discuss everything with your family in advance and have a detailed plan in case of fire.”

Barton studied more than 800 natural disasters--fire, flood and earthquake--for his new book, “Crisis in Organizations.” Ironically, he says, although fire is the leading fear for most people in terms of household catastrophes, they have lowered their guard.

“Because of the widespread use of smoke detectors and fire alarms, both families and businesses tend to think the danger is lessened,” he says. “This is false denial.”

Barton wants to see a return of routine fire drills at home and at work.

“Every year in my household, we go through a fire drill in the middle of the night. My children dislike it intensely, but they know what to do when I wake them up.”

But before you shake people out of bed at midnight, he says, sit down with the family and map it all out.

That is Lockwood’s principal advice, too.

She and her husband, Simon, owners of Lockwood Construction in Hollywood, have designed the “Lockwood grid system,” an emergency-preparedness blueprint that started out in their own neighborhood and has spread by word of mouth to many parts of the city. It organizes neighbors in six-to-eight-block areas into self-sufficient communities during natural disasters.

Whether you wake up to a fire or have advance warning of one, Lockwood says, rehearsal will pay off.

“You have to practice how you’re going to escape, because in a panic you can’t think. Do a run-through with your family, then you’ll have it in your head,” she says. “Kids are less frightened than adults--they have fire drills at schools, and they get it immediately. Choose the best exit for getting out of the house. Then try an alternate route. Check the windows to see if they open.”

She emphasizes the importance of assigning specific roles. Who picks up the baby? Give older children responsibility for younger children. Someone must be assigned to an elderly parent. Who picks up the pets? All this should be mapped out and rehearsed. And once out of the house, the experts say, don’t even think about going back in.

After the importance of evacuation drills, Lockwood and Barton offer this checklist of fire prevention and preparedness steps:

* Establish a relative or close friend as an out-of-state contact for all members of your family to call, should you become separated in a large-scale disaster. Have everyone memorize the telephone number.

* Take a walking tour of the outside and inside of your house, videotaping and describing everything of value that you’d need to replace, from a TV set to your silver and china. Copy the tape and send it to your out-of-state contact. “It takes a couple of hours, but will be worth it if you do have a fire. You’ll be first in line to get insurance benefits back and you won’t have to re-create your household under stress,” Lockwood says.

* Photocopy all insurance papers and send them to your out-of-state contact. You will need them for fire-damage claims.

* Assemble the things that can’t be replaced by money or insurance (photos always head the list) in one spot--under the bed or in a closet--so you won’t have to snatch them up in a panic.

* Get high-quality fire extinguishers and familiarize yourself with the instructions.

* Get smoke detectors. They can be battery-run or wired into your electrical system or a burglar-alarm company that will notify the fire department.

* Check detectors and fire extinguishers twice a year, along with all the flashlights in the house. “I do it whenever we set the clock up or back for daylight saving time,” Lockwood says. The equipment will also save money on your homeowners insurance.

* Remove any volatile materials from your house or garage, such as gasoline for the lawn mower, oil or kerosene. Flammable glues, polymers or paints for crafts projects should be removed from the house once projects are finished.

* “As much as it kills you,” Barton says, “get rid of ailing electronics such as the stereo from the ‘50s that just goes in and out, or the TV that blinks on and off. The wires have become thin and this stuff is high risk for starting a fire.”

* If you’re an apartment or condo dweller, you need a floor plan, a floor warden and a stairwell monitor for each floor of your building. Call a building emergency meeting and plan it--not everyone will show up, but you’ll get the leaders who can work out evacuation routes.

Disaster planning can be as simple as parking the car headed toward the street, Lockwood says. “Set aside one weekend and say, ‘We are going to do emergency preparedness.’ It won’t take much out of your life, and look at the payoff.”