#EMVine Challenge

I never thought I would admit this but…I love vine.  If you ever saw my first post, one sad afternoon in June, you remember that I entered the Vine world kicking and screaming.  I mean, really?!  Six second looping video clips?  Who wants to see that??  It was very reminiscent to my introduction to many types of technology.  The world wants to change and here I am content, but eventually I give in and hate myself for not being the first one to do so.

 Honestly? Will Sasso made me do it.

Another thing I’ll admit, but am slightly less surprised to do so, is that emergency management is not a message we can expect people to seek out sans current disaster.  And even then the information that is sought is always too late in terms of preparedness, and more response and mitigation based than anything else.

Emergency preparedness is on the average individual’s mind, oh about, never percent*.  It seems to me that if we want to change the culture of community preparedness, we need to be in the middle of that culture.  We have to be fun, interesting, engaging, captivating and relevant.  I know I’ve said it a hundred times, but we have to meet people where they’re at.

That’s not exactly what I had in mind…

Last week, following the most excellent National Capital Region Social Media in Emergency Management (#NCRsmem) conference, my fellow blogger and Twitter friend @Preparedness2Go wrote an interesting post about the use of hashtags in emergency management.  The post was spurred because one of the presenters had an amazing recap of their response as the tweeter for the Boston PD, but personally didn’t like to use haghtags.  While I understand (and even rejected them as a nuisance to read through in my earliest Twitter times), my response was that sometimes we do things we don’t want to do, or we don’t like, because that is what puts us in the middle of conversations that are going on about us without us.

But without a disaster, conversations are just going on without us.

I think we have some opportunities to insert ourselves into those conversations. So long as we’re being interesting and relevant, people will listen to what we have to say.  Take, for example, Gloria Huang – Red Cross Tweeter Extraordinaire.  She nailed this during Sharknado, making quick-witted, off the cuff live tweets during this SyFy masterpiece that made preparedness interesting, fun, and very noticeable!

My challenge to my fellow #SMEM lovers is to spend a little time during September and make National Preparedness Month our excuse to join those conversations.

For the month of September, I’ll be attempting to combine my love of Vine and emergencies by researching trending topics and creating Vines that are both relevant and preparedness driven.  By hashtagging a trending topic and #EMVine, it’s possible to join a popular conversation and create a buzz about preparedness.

I’m not even gonna ask permission!

Since many of my Twitter friends and followers, as well as my own MRC units, will be participating in 30 Days, 30 Ways, a preparedness game that encourages followers to complete daily tasks for prizes through social media outlets, I thought it would be the perfect connection.  Not only are we sneaking in creative entries into the game (snicker!) we’re also creating six-second public service announcements that, if interesting and visible enough, have the ability to lead others to seek out what this “preparedness stuff” is all about.

And sure, maybe they won’t care.  But you can only ignore a redundant message for so long before you’re curious.  And I have my sights set on the assistance of the “Vine Famous” …

Tanya

P.S. You can always follow @tjlasagna and Vine at Tanya Ferraro or Tanya Ferraro MRC!

*Not a scientific measurement.

August Disaster in Place – Chemical Event!

Below you will find the August content of my monthly Disaster in Place.  Disaster in Place is an email series I began in May 2013 to engage Medical Reserve Corps team members to think practically about preparedness for just a few minutes a month and increase our alert responses (what we use in Virginia to see who is available to respond in disaster).  It comes complete with training and educational opportunities for those who are so inclined.  (I wrote a blog post introducing this series back in May!)

I’ve been instituting the Disaster in Place training series with my three MRC units since May and am happy to share stats, info, and previous months’ with you.  Feel free to participate, use and share, but if you do, please let me know so I can keep track of the reach of this program!  It would be quite appreciated.  I’ll be posting these every month…enjoy!

August Disaster in Place – Chemical Event!

Good morning!

Welcome to the fourth of our monthly Disaster in Place series. As always, please click on the alert link in this message and indicate you did or did not participate in this exercise so we can track that everyone knows how to receive and respond to requests with  availability!

This month’s scenario is a chemical event.

A chemical exposure can happen for a few reasons, including terrorism and human error in a factory or even at home. If you were exposed to a chemical material, how would you react? Would you know to remove exposed clothing and wash for fifteen minutes with soap and water (or what we call decontamination)? What if that chemical was at home and a family member or friend was exposed?

For information about various chemical agents, including lists, FAQ’s, and decontamination, check out this fantastic resource from the CDC: http://www.bt.cdc.gov/chemical/

For additional training on hazardous materials at home, visit this free online course from FEMA, IS-55.a: Household Hazardous Materials ? A Guide for Citizens http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/IS/courseOverview.aspx?code=IS-55.a

For even more training, check out this course from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health – Intro to Chemical Agents: http://www.jhsph.edu/research/centers-and-institutes/johns-hopkins-center-for-public-health-preparedness/training/online/intro_chem_agents.html

And remember these important numbers: Poison Control Center – 800-222-1222 and Virginia 2-1-1 for all types of questions, connections and resources.

Hope you enjoyed this month!
Tanya