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Are We Prepared?
With this major disaster happening in Japan. A news media broadcast I watch this morning showed training for citizens to prepare for a earthquake in California. Then they asked a official if they felt the US was ready for a similar disaster. He answered that we are years behind being ready for anything that big.
California is not the only area that will have a earthquake because there are faults across the US that could slip and slide and shake any area.
The East Coast could be hit by a tsunami that I heard can be caused by a major land slide across the Atlantic.
9/11 may have been a wakeup means to put preparness out there for everyone but have we gone back to our comfort zones and let building a better system slow down?
There maybe other disasters to worry about like hurricanes that haven't hit areas of the country in sometime.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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Are we prepared? No where near the point we should be. As you mention there are faults across the country with a big one in the east/midwest area with the New Madrid Fault. Considering the last time there was something significant, this area is drastically unprepared for a quake of almost any magnitude. Also the construction in this area is not the same standards as in more earthquake prone areas.
Preparation does have costs involved, it costs money to train, to equip and so forth. Now let's look at the financial state of most budgets and you see places decreasing even a more realistic and daily emergency just in a basic fire response. What we do have is a very complacent society which lacks personal responsibility.....it is always someone else's problem. When talk is there from public safety, the voices are quited with a feigned excuse as it is just "fear talk" or some union conspiracy etc.
What does hold true, do you want to pay a little now, or a lot later? Unfortunatley, I do believe that answer has been already stated.
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Permalink Reply by Norm Tindell on
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You bring up a good point. Sadly, the National Disaster Medical System has had its budget reduced to a fraction of what it should be. I'm thinking of those words from a country song:
"Have you forgotten how it felt that day?
To see your homeland under fire
And her people blown away?"
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Permalink Reply by Bull on
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I just dont understand how we have money to help other countries, and none to help our own country ??? All the budgets and grants are getting decreased because our country is so broke...but yet we will send billions across sea's......Can someone enlighten me with a logical answer, or even just an answer ???
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Permalink Reply by Bobby Hunter on
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Bull - I agree with you. We are a broke country, but yet we seem to send billions to other countries every week to help feed, cloth, house etc there people while our own are sitting here asking for help and the gov turns in back on them.
Time to take care of our own first, then when able to help help others. The public safety system and Military are the last thing that should see budget cuts, The saftey and security of the american people should be a priority. All the funding for whatever is needed should always be there and be increased every year, not decreased. We in the fire service just like in the military need all the right equipment, gear, training that is needed to do the job and to do it right. If an earthquake that size hit the US we as a country would be in trouble, not just the local area that it hit. This size earthquake would max out the system. 9-11, Katrina were wake up call for the citizens and the goverment, How many more wake up calls do we need, these tragic events showed us that we as a public safety system & as a country don't have the budgets, training, equipment to handle these events. Time for the goverment to get its head out of its ass and stop the BS spending that they do and put the $$$ where it belongs...Public Safety & Military and those services that when all hell breaks loose those services are the first ones's to jump to the rescue.
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Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on
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Bull,
Money sent elsewhere (for example, earthquakes in Japan,New Zealand, Haiti, Chile) is Humanitarian Aid and also serves to make the U.S. look good for providing it, it's P.R.
Money spend within the U.S. to states, cites, fire departments, is socialism and needs to be eliminated.
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"Money sent elsewhere (for example, earthquakes in Japan,New Zealand, Haiti, Chile) is Humanitarian Aid and also serves to make the U.S. look good for providing it, it's P.R."
Money to help out for the above example is fine, We should help out when a natural disaster happends, But the year round billions being sent to other countries to help is BS when we have tpeople going through the samething here (Poor, Homless, starving), We need to help our own people to... After all its our tax money that goes over sea's. Its just like these celebs who go on TV asking for money to send over seas to help the poor , starving & homeless..but these are the same celebs who go out to a $5,000 dinner everynight and walk right by 30 homeless and turn there nose up at them. Helping out people in need is what America is all about, But helping just selected few because its good PR is F'ed up.
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yeah but those $5,000 dinners? It's their money, why shouldn't they be able to spend it on themselves, certainly not for the poor or homeless, those people need to get jobs and pay for what they want or need.
On the other hand, helping in other countries makes us look good and helps to repair damage to the U.S,' reputation so it's definitely worth it. After all you can't expect an entire nation to take care of itself or its own people, we should help them.
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Permalink Reply by FETC on
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Wanna know what bugs me? Watching the news coverage of people crying that the USA should be doing more... Let's look at what has happened here in the US? How many of these countries have sent millions to us? None. We have had some big disasters, people... citizens of the US still living in disaster trailers, neighborhoods being rebuilt by actors or habitiat for humanity, neighborhoods that will never - ever will recover from what happened here in the USA. Same goes for sending troops to places that we now, can never ever leave due to civil unrest. Places and money, our money that is not making our country better, fiscally and/or economically.
Back on track, being better prepared here.... well not enough money to prepare the fire service for the basic requirements. Laying off firefighters, and looking to add greater burden on the already overtaxed volunteer system. You see our population in this country is far more taxxing on services (all services) than what the services provided back then. Want the same or more services with less workerbee's. Sorry doesn't happen, therefore, as the politicians do, Hold your breath and hope it doesn't happen on their term.
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Permalink Reply by Scott Taylor on
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how can I argue that?
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Permalink Reply by 0t4h7dtwvwzdf on
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We'll come together no doubt. But, no, we are not.
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Permalink Reply by Damo on
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We had over a weeks notice to prepare for the hurricane that hit New Orleans, and looked what happened there. So, what chance does California have, if like Japan they are given nine minutes.
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