The logo
The civil security logo is recognized all over the world. It is therefore easy to recognize the people who help people during emergencies or disasters. The orange circle, visible from a distance, means alert. The triangle represents stability, balance and harmony, blue is the color of peace.
Emergency Preparedness – Emergency Response Plan
The Town of Huntingdon has adopted an emergency response plan for civil security.
The purpose of this action plan is to anticipate the unforeseeable, that is to say to prepare the municipal interveners to manage possible disasters that could affect the safety of the population of Huntingdon in the short and medium terms.
The ultimate goal is to maximize the actions of the municipal authority during unconventional emergency situations. By structuring the actions in advance, it acts on the reaction time of the interveners, whether it is at the level of coordination, human and material resources, communications and the interveners affected.
As such a plan requires continuous updates and refreshing of actions, the Town of Huntingdon proceeds with an annual training as it would do for first aid courses, for example.
Preparing for disasters
You are the first person responsible for your safety!
In an emergency or disaster situation, it is up to you to take the first steps to ensure your own safety, that of your family and the safeguard of your property.
What can you do?
- Find out about disaster risks in your area by contacting your municipality or by looking it up on the Internet. Get to know what steps you can take to protect yourself and your loved ones.
- Prepare your Family Safety Plan.
- Always have an emergency kit in your home. Your kit should contain enough material, food and water to provide for your basic needs during the first 3 days of an emergency situation. You can bring it with you if you must evacuate your home.
- Make sure your belongings are properly insured.
Did you know?
Did you know that over 2500 homes, located in 40 municipalities on the banks of Rivière Richelieu and Lac Champlain, were flooded in the spring of 2011, during the spring floods in the Montérégie region? The disaster, which lasted 69 days, required the evacuation of over 1500 citizens.
Preparations for various disasters
A family safety plan is very useful in case of an emergency. Take a few moments to prepare your own plan. It’s easy! Visit the ministère de la Sécurité publique Web Site to know more about a “Family safety plan“.
In the event of an emergency, you may need to provide for your necessities while waiting for help to arrive. It is important to prepare an emergency kit that will hold you over for about 72 hours.
An emergency kit for your car can also be useful in the event of a mechanical breakdown or winter storm.
When an emergency happens, every citizen is responsible for his or her own safety.
Floods are among the most frequent and costly natural disasters. Conditions that cause floods include heavy or steady rain for several hours or days that saturates the ground. Flash floods occur suddenly due to rapidly rising water along a stream or low-lying area.
In recent years, excessive heat has caused more deaths than all other weather events, including floods. A heat wave is a prolonged period of excessive heat, often combined with excessive humidity. Generally temperatures are 10 degrees or more above the average high temperature for the region during summer months, last for a long period of time and occur with high humidity as well.
More and more people are making their homes in woodland settings, rural areas or remote mountain sites. There, residents enjoy the beauty of the environment but face the very real danger of wild fires. Wild fires often begin unnoticed. They spread quickly, igniting brush, trees and homes. In a wild fire, every second counts!
A tornado is a violently rotating column of air extending from the base of a thunderstorm down to the ground. Tornado intensities are classified on the Fujita Scale with ratings between F0 (weakest) to F5 (strongest). They are capable of completely destroying well made structures, uprooting trees and hurling objects through the air like deadly missiles. Although severe tornadoes are more common in the Plains provinces, tornadoes have been reported in every province.
Winter storms can range from a moderate snow over a few hours to a blizzard with blinding, wind driven snow that lasts for several days. Some winter storms are large enough to affect several states, while others affect only a single community.Many winter storms are accompanied by dangerously low temperatures and sometimes by strong winds, icing, sleet and freezing rain.
A thunderstorm is considered severe if it produces hail at least 1 inch in diameter or has wind gusts of at least 58 miles per hour. Every thunderstorm produces lightning, which kills more people each year than tornadoes or hurricanes. Heavy rain from thunderstorms can cause flash flooding and high winds can damage homes and blow down trees and utility poles, causing widespread power outages.
An earthquake is a sudden, rapid shaking of the earth caused by the breaking and shifting of rock beneath the earth’s surface. Earthquakes strike suddenly, without warning, and they can occur at any time of the year, day or night.
If your car breaks down, if you’re in an accident, or simply when faced with winter weather extremes, you will find having the following items in your vehicle quite useful:
- Shovel, snowbrush and scraper
- Sand or salt
- Traction mats
- A large amount of windshield washer fluid
- Gas-line antifreeze
- Flashlight with spare batteries or a hand-crank flashlight
- First aid kit and scissors to cut the seatbelts
- Small toolkit: (screwdriver, pliers, etc.)
- Highway flares or a warning light
- Jumper cables
- Bottles of drinking water
- Non perishable food
- Blankets
- Warm clothes (socks, spare boots, gloves)
- Hand and foot warmer strips
- Road maps
- Charger for your cellphone
- Coins or a calling card – if you don’t have a cellphone
- Lock de-icer (to carry with you)
- Spare fuses (for your car’s electrical system)
- Joint report of automobile accident form
Sheltering and evacuation – Protective measures
There are two categories of sheltering:
Preventive sheltering: Preventive sheltering consists of protecting the population in an area before an apprehended event occurs and the danger appears serious enough to affect the safety of people.
Emergency sheltering: Emergency sheltering of the population is the protection of the population in an area during or immediately following the occurrence of an event whose danger threatens the safety of the people there.
There are two categories of evacuation:
Anticipatory Evacuation: Anticipatory or preventive evacuation is the evacuation of an area before an apprehended event occurs whose danger appears serious enough to potentially affect the safety of persons.
Unannounced Evacuation: An unannounced or emergency evacuation of a location is conducted during or immediately following the occurrence of an event whose danger immediately threatens the safety of persons in the location.