Drop, Cover, Hold During Earthquake

What do you do when you've just responded to earthquake carnage and another shaker hits?

You "drop, cover and hold" and then move into action all over again... that is, if you're George Butts.

The Manhattan Beach resident and president of the Manhattan Beach CERT Association understands the importance of heeding the sage advice of "drop, cover and hold" when an earthquake strikes.

And when the official statewide Great California ShakeOut hits California at 10:20 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 20, Butts, who just spent the last nine+ months planning, preparing for and participating in a Beach Cities Joint CERT Organization ShakeOut staging last Saturday in Manhattan Beach, wrote in an e-mail, "We should remind all that no matter where they are to at least drop, cover and hold. I will be doing the whole nine yards at my office."

All students at Manhattan Beach Unified School District schools will be doing much the same, according to a district press release that stated, "An alert will sound to signal the start of the drill. Those who are inside school rooms and offices will be directed to stay inside, while those who are outside will remain there. Then everyone will practice how to Drop to the floor, Take Cover under a sturdy object, and Hold On to it until the shaking stops.

"In addition, all schools will carry out their evacuation plans. When given notice, everyone will be led outside to designated assembly areas where an emergency responder will give directions. Students, all school personnel, volunteers, and visitors will stay in designated areas until given official notice to return to the school buildings."

It's easy to think that we're immune to earthquakes and the major damage they can inflict, but those in the know say that anyone who lives where an earthquake can strike should prepare for the quake in advance, thereby minimizing the ill effects an earthquake could bring.

For Butts, preparing in advance for an earthquake includes simple things such as installing latches or "little children's push locks" on upper cupboards to keep glasses from tumbling out and sending shattered glass all over. 

It means knowing how to shut off gas, water, electricity and the like at your residence or business.

It means staying indoors and not running outside when an earthquake hits, and implementing the "drop, cover, hold" regimen in which one drops to their knees, preferably under something sturdy, covers their head by bending over while kneeling and placing their arms and hands over their head, and then holding the sturdy thing they are under until it stops shaking.

Butts notes that every person who knows how to care for themselves, their family and neighbors in a disaster means that one less emergency responder will be required to attend to them, freeing that individual to deal with others.

Last Saturday in Manhattan Beach, Butts was one of 100 responders from Beach Cities CERT who joined together to respond to the aftermath of a staged earthquake. Included in the 100 volunteers were 37 Manhattan Beach CERT members who partnered with their volunteer comrades to respond to gas explosions, fires, people trapped in the debris of collapsed buildings, car accidents, downed power lines and the like.

"It was just a great exercise," said Butts. "We learned what worked and what didn't. Our multi-layered communications didn't work. But we learned from it."

Butts and other participants will sit down to debrief the Oct. 15 ShakeOut drill this Saturday. They will talk about how to enable better execution to happen so that they can practice and shore up areas that can be improved upon.

The huge Oct. 15 drill, which incorporated several volunteer CERT groups and city agencies, did have its lighter moments. Butts told Manhattan Beach Patch that he got a chuckle at Tuesday night's Manhattan Beach City Council meeting during his report when he said that the mannequins used at 330 Sepulveda Boulevard in the Skechers parking garage, in which all lights were shut off and people and mannequins were trapped, "had the nicest shoes you could imagine."

One scenario MB CERT has planned and practiced for is the need to drain pool water into a fire truck for use when water pressure is low or nonexistent. Last Saturday, volunteers put their training to work, using a high-pressure hose with a 13-foot draw, donated to MB CERT by the MB Property Owners Association, to drain a residential pool into am MB fire truck.

A loss of water pressure could manifest in large uncontrolled fires in any area of Manhattan Beach. Butts told MB Patch that the city has maps that show where pools are located so that emergency workers can drain them to help put out fires.

The volunteers on Saturday drained their assigned 500-gallon pool in seven minutes. Jokingly, Butts recalled the time a few years ago when he let his pool water be drained into a fire truck and then had the water put back into his pool. 

"It took about three weeks and a filter cleaning to clean the pool," he said of the dirty water that came from the fire truck.

Butts said that "cribbing," removing individuals from debris, is "always a challenge," and at the drill last Saturday, the cribbers used "wood blocks and leverage. It's just time consuming," said Butts of the effort to carefully remove earthquake victims.

For the day, CERT handled 540 communications, many of which were passed up the command chain. The number is the most the group has ever received during an exercise such as this, according to Butts.

Manhattan Beach city agencies participated, too, including the police, fire and public works departments and the Emergency Command Center. Even city council met at city hall to initiate disaster aid. "It wasn't just an exercise for CERT," said Butts. "They [city officials] were looking at the whole city to see how everything was being done." 

Butts isn't quite sure about what prompted him to get involved in MB CERT but says that his father was a volunteer fire chief in a small upstate New York city for some 20 years and then was a volunteer EMT and paramedic in North Carolina until he was 70.

Before Butts and Battalion Chief Frank Chiella of the MB Fire Department put their heads together in Butts' backyard in early 2008 with a handful of others, CERT in Manhattan Beach, which began in 2003, consisted of training people minus any keystone organization.

At the fateful February 2008 meeting, the group decided to incorporate, giving the CERT effort structure and unity.

"We're still in our infancy," said Butts of the young organization that now has some 300 trained members, with about 100 that actively participate in training and drills. "We're still children at this."

"One of the biggest things we can do is, if, after you finish this class, you don't return, at least we've trained you how to take care of yourself, your immediate family and neighbors," he said.

MB CERT's goal is to train one percent of the city's population, and Butts says the organization is on target to do that next year. The next goal will be to train two percent of the residents.

For now though, the president of MB CERT will drop, cover and hold today at 10:20 a.m. and then take a vacation until his next training class begins in January. 

E-mail MB CERT for more information about the organization.