Anniversary of 2011 Eastcoast Earthquake: Were You Prepared?

If you live on the east coast, you remember, probably perfectly, what you were doing sometime around 2pm on August 23. I for sure do. I was sitting at my desk here at GovLoop wondering why in the heck our office was shaking like an amusement park ride.

That August 23 earthquake that stretched from Mineral, VA, all the way up the east coast had an estimated magnitude of 5.8. Holy heck! My friends in NYC, Boston, and Providence experienced a few min later freaking out pretty much everyone, and resulting in a TON of tweets (check out this animated map).

Seeing that I’m from the east coast, and never experienced first hand an earthquake before, I really had no precise knowledge of how to protect myself. And I’m pretty sure I wasn’t alone in that. Luckily for everyone, no deaths and only minor injuries were reported. But things could have been very different. What would have happened if that earthquake was a 7, 8, or 9?

These days, I am working on a project with FEMA to help build and empower a community with the goal of helping to prepare our country for man-made and natural disasters. Called the National Preparedness Coalition Online Community, this online community is bringing people together to learn and prepare for disasters, so we are all better off in situations like these.

Here’s my ask of you. Please join. The community is open and free for anyone, and you’ll gain some critical information that might help one day save your life. This is the kind of thing that you can’t leave up to others to teach you. You have to empower yourself, your family, and even help empower your friends and coworkers. Once something happens, it’s too late.

Are you already into preparedness? If so, do you have a preparedness event going on in your area? For you folks, please add your event to the calendar for everyone to see. You are helping in a simple, incredible way.