Vacation, stay-cation, or evacuation: tips to keep animals safe

Know before you go! Animal disaster planning for travelers, hosts, and animal sitters
By Julie Atwood
Your home and animal-sitter should have a copy of your Animal Emergency Disaster Plan, (DAP). Put everything in a binder. Leave a DAP binder on the kitchen counter, and put pet Ready Kits and animal shelter in place (SIP) supplies in easy-access locations, near fire extinguishers. Make a Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) kit for sitters! Include: work gloves, hard hat, safety goggles, respirator masks, headlamp, and pre-set NOAA radio.
Key items to include in your Vacation or Animal-Sitter Disaster Action Plan (DAP)
– Animal emergency and veterinarian contacts
– Vaccination records and medications
– Transportation and sheltering resources for your large animals
– Evacuation Zone Map
– List of local news radio stations
– Detailed “Shelter-in-Place Prep” instructions for equines, “backyard” farm animals, and poultry
– Weather Watch- Red Flag Action checklist
– 10-minute “Go Now!” checklist
– Site map of your property with animal, resource and hazard info
– Animal insurance info
– Advance Care Directive
Animal evacuation and shelter-in-place planning for hosts
Visitors are “transient residents” who often do not have disaster-prep on their minds when planning a trip with pets. Equestrians are usually prepared for individual emergencies, but not for a disaster. Be a super host, and help your guests be as safe and ready as possible if you – and they – are in a potential evacuation situation.
Send a Pet Vacation Preparedness Packet to guests when confirming their reservation. A great host will let guests know about impending and current weather alerts, possible hazards, and area resources. Uninformed and poorly prepared guests are a liability for the entire neighborhood. Here’s a checklist of critical items to help everyone stay safer:
Disaster action plan for guests with pets
– Emergency contacts
– Local resources: evacuation zone map, emergency alert sign-up info, news radio stations, agency’s social media accounts
– Emergency veterinarians & hospitals
– Pet Ready-Kit checklist
– Documentation that pets are ID’d, microchipped, and vaccinated per local recommendations
– Make sure guests know where to find fire extinguishers and know how to use them
– Provide a site map with locations of hoses, emergency supplies, and gas tanks
– Provide clear instructions for disabling electric gates, garage doors
– Alert guests to possible Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) events
– Provide clear, concise instructions for starting a generator
– Clearly explain actions to take that might be automatic or self-evident to you but not to guests
Safe animal travel planning for everyone
Things to consider:
– Where will you go if your destination is evacuated?
– What will you do if your home is under an evacuation order and you cannot return?
– Will you have enough cash to buy essentials (such as fuel) in the event of a prolonged power outage along your route or at your destination?
– Are you equipped to keep pets and equines safe if your only emergency option is a campground?
– Are you taking enough special-needs pet food and animal medications for at least two weeks?
Just like your home plan, your “on the road DAP” must factor in just about every possibility.
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