Used the bug out bag today

You know the old saying "Can't happen here"? That is the way that I felt living in the middle of nowhere. I live in North Central Arkansas in a quite college town of about 50,000. I also might add about an hour from where "The Simple Life" TV show was shot, since everybody seems to know about that. Nothing much happens here, but I have made some bug out plans with my family. I live about 30 miles from a very large nuclear reactor and prevailing winds would put a cloud on my doorstep in about an hour from what I have learned.

Today around noon my significant other calls me and tells me that she can see a plume of smoke from a fire by our place. The interesting thing is, she could see it from over thirty miles away, and as it turns out it was toxic release from a chemical factory explosion. The local PD took over the cable TV and announced a evacuation. Took me about six minutes to get my gear and be well on my way, about as fast as possible. Things weren't as bad as first thought, there were some chem burns, and the evacuation was scaled back to about a mile from the area. It was however a full blown chemical emergency in a town I didn't even know had anything like that.

You never know. Be prepared.

damn, that's a scary situation..
how long did the evacuation last from your home, and also from within the one-mile radius?

The whole town to the West was given an order, which was put on "Stand By", whatever that means. I was already gone by that time, when I hear evac - I go. We didn't need to get out on this side of town because there was very powerful wind all day blowing it away from us. A one mile circumference is being patrolled and air sniffers are up to see if anyone can go back within 24 hours. A little more info here, they neglect to talk about the very large evac of several large businesses, a few thousand people:

http://www.katv.com/news/stories/0104/116948.html

Good thing you were ready. Even better tho that is wasnt as bad as first suspected. Any idea what chemicals were involved?

"The state Emergency Management Department said federal documents from 2002 show that the plant has hydrofluoric acid, sulfuric acid and methanol on the premises, though it did not know if those chemicals were involved in the fire."


Judging by the size of the secondary explosions, there was probably some methanol in there.

We are fortunate in that no "natural" disasters usually occur here. Two nuclear plants are 10 & 15 miles up the coast & they're storing the spent fuel on site. Given that no natural catastrophes are scheduled to appear...pray to Murphy?

Hydrofluoric acid is used to etch glass. Sulfuric acid is used in Lead Acid Batteries (think car, truck, and marine). Methanol is wood alcohol, while ethanol is grain alcohol.

This is one reason I started the Disaster Preparedness topic quite some time ago, and others have started one more specific to bugout bags (evac bags).

Jayflash, natural disasters can take a variety of forms, not just volcanic or seismic. Let me see what I can do about that scheduling....... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Wow, thats wild.
Glad to hear you and your family are ok.

I have one small emergancy bag, but am in the process of making a couple more for differnet situations.

Actually, I just ordered 4 hard shell pelican cases last night.

I think the boyscouts are right (which I was when I was a little kid), always be prepared. Especially when you dont think you need to be.

My problem is organizing the "bags". What to put in them and what goes in which. You dont want to take too much, but you dont want to left without somthing you need.
I need to get a descent first aid kit for one.
Food and water is another worry of mine. Sure I can run out of the house with a couple pelican cases in my back pack. Full of lights, a gun, knife, first aid, gps, camera, emergancy blanket, matches, etc. But what am I gonna eat and drink?
Granola bars are abou the best I think, in terms of size weight and shelf life. Unless I get some MREs.
Water on the other hand is tricky. Its heavy, and takes up alot of space.

Heres CNNs page for it.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/South/01/07/plant.explosion.ap/index.html

HF is very nasty stuff! Unlike Sulfuric exposure who's effect are immediate, HF can produce delayed effects. If you were near the vapor cloud read this

For HF... http://hazard.com/msds/mf/cards/file/0283.html

General Index... http://hazard.com/msds/

GregR

Yea it is nasty stuff. Im sure HazMat's got a lot of work on their hands with this one.

Yea,,,, I would be outta there !!!
See ya in a month after the "smoke" clears.

geeeez

Smokes bad enough,,, but with burning chemicals in it? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/ooo.gif

jtice, OT, but have you checked your review page lately?

Joe

lol,....

yea thats about as off topic as it gets...

Yes i know all about it.
I was Hacked last week, havnet had time to get it back up and running. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif

Sorry for the trouble.
I will at least have the beamshot database back up this weekend.

No trouble, just never checked your site before, wanted to be sure you know about the punks.

Still haven't let the people that live behind it back in. They keep saying no report of toxic fumes, but there are still a couple hundred people in shelters. Fire burned for over 48 hours. One critical injury, burned badly. The other major injury was a guy I ride bikes with, looks like he is going to get a skin graft on his hands.

Other than that - very fortunate for all.

Around 2:00 p.m. I saw it from thirty miles away also. By then it had cooked up a cloud that looked like a low storm front headed to maybe five miles to the north. This was many, many times larger than the pics we see in this thread. Darn scary I tell you.

Hate to hear that about your friend. I'm sure you know the advances in that procedure have been significant. It won't be any fun but this should go well for him.