Every year, it feels like the Earth is becoming a scarier place. Floods, fires and hurricanes are becoming more powerful and frequent. And earthquakes, tornadoes and tsunamis have always been unsettling.
In my neighborhood in the mountains of Colorado, we live with a fear of wildfires. As I write this, the sky is hazy and there’s a faint smell of smoke in the air from a growing number of blazes to the west.
To regain a sense of control, I came up with a long term, short term and very short term plan. I call it my 5-1-1 strategy.
At any given time, I have a set of five-year, one-year and one-hour wildfire goals. For instance, most houses destroyed in wildfires are ignited by floating embers from the main blaze. My five-year plan includes saving up to refit my deck with fire retardant treated wood.
My one-year plan involved cutting three dead trees in the yard and replacing two windows (which often blow out in a fire if they are not insulated). My one-hour plan involves a list of family treasures and a “go bag.”
“That’s really helpful,” Robin Cox, director of the Resilience by Design Lab at Royal Roads University in British Columbia, told me when I laid out my 5-1-1 plans. “Just thinking about disasters and hazards and risks in your area — like wildfires or flooding or anything else — is the critical first step.”
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