Surviving Disasters with Les Stroud

- Funding for "Surviving Disasters with Les Stroud" provided by Westinghouse, power for over 135 years.

- [Man] Oh my god, look at the damage.

Look at the damage.

This is my back area right here.

We got siding all over the place.

Look at those trees.

(wind blowing) (dramatic music) - [Les] 2020 is the sixth year in a row where 10 or more weather catastrophes have cost $1 billion each.

In 2019 and 2020, 2,700 tornadoes killed 120 people.

2020 had a record breaking 12 hurricanes, as well as a massive windstorm cutting across Southeast Dakota all the way to Ohio.

Flooding lasting longer than seven months and destroying $3 billion worth of property.

In 2020, 56 Americans lost their lives to flooding.

Two frigid blizzards put over 150,000 people out of power in the middle of winter.

Four major wildfires destroyed 22,000 structures, and killed over 100 people in 2019.

And in 2020, the nation watched as 13 million acres were burned to the ground.

Tens of thousands of pets and farm animals have been lost or killed.

Thousands of businesses bankrupt.

Since the beginning of its occurrence, the pandemic known as COVID-19 has killed over a half a millio people, and it's still happening.

All of these statistics were just the continental United States.

So why are we never prepared?

Why do some of us not survive?

And why is recovery often so painful?

I'm Les Stroud, and I want to help you survive natural disasters.

(dramatic music) - All right, here's Hurricane Michael.

He's here, he's a hittin' the panhandle area.

A lot of people just don't think it'll happen to me.

- It's basic human nature not to want to think about things that will scare us.

- I mean, all you can hear is the roaring of this hurricane.

- The communities really need to understand when a disaster is actually imminent.

Being able to then recognize that, hey, I'm in harm's way, what needs to happen?

That can't be something that happens after the fact.

That you really have to start working and building before that disaster happens to truly be ready.

- When the warnings are coming, that's when everybody goes, "Huh, I should probably go get some milk and some bread."

And if people would just get those basic supplies.

- [Man] A lot of people were weren't preparing, then it became a mad dash for what was left of supplies.

- If you wait until you need to be prepared for something, you're already too late.

(wind blowing) - [Man] Anybody wanna know what it's like during a hurrica?

This is what it's like during a hurricane.

- [Dave] It felt apocalyptic.

Maybe didn't know everything that was going on, but you had a pretty good idea to absolutely nothing.

- [Kandis] Yeah, you're just the stuck.

- No radio, no TV.

Just what you had in your little area.

- [Les] What's that like, that feeling?

- Lonely, lonely.

- Yeah, and it's scary because you don't know what's gonna happen to you.

You don't know if someone's gonna come, a tree on your house, and take one of you out.

You don't know if it's gonna start a fire somewhere.

And nobody could come and help you if it did.

- [Dave] We had a next door neighbor.

We didn't know how they were doing, because we couldn't get to them.

- [Kandis] You couldn't see, you couldn't see anybody.

- [Dave] We couldn't see 'em, we couldn't get to 'em.

- Even on our deck, you could see the table but you couldn't see beyond that.

(tense music) - I think it's important that we look at how we prioritize the limited funding to ensure that we have and can build a comprehensive emergency management program.

- It doesn't take that much eff, and it really goes a long way.

It's that ounce of prevention's worth a pound of cure.

- Even if the emergency services performed exactly as they were designed to perform, there will be a lag time.

And within that lag time, you are vulnerable.

- Having and maintaining home survival storage could not be an easier place to start.

It's a little bit of an investm yes, but doing so gives you your own insurance policy for survival.

Start by having containers that, if not waterproof, at least are water resistant.

I like to have varying sizes.

It enables me to stay a lot more organized that way.

But what do you put in them?

(dramatic music) - If I know enough about where I live, then I know that water's my number one priority.

- Not just to drink, but to wash, and prepare your food, and sanitation.

- A lot of websites and differe agencies will recommend three days to as much as a two week supply of food and water.

But I say, if you can afford it and if you have the space, why not double that to a month per person.

It's nowhere near as daunting as it sounds.

The last thing you want to be doing is running around filling up pots.

- I think it was the day before, we filled up that night the bathtub.

- Froze the gallon gallon bags of water, just to, you know, one that helped us to keep cool, and then you also have water to drink, as well.

Fill up your tubs, fill up everything, as much water as you can get, because you never know when you're gonna be without power and not be able to take showers, get good drinking water.

And luckily we have a pool, so we were able to utilize that to bathe in.

- And how much water each person needs obviously will depend upon the person, and where you are, and the circumstances.

But generally speaking, allow for a gallon a day.

Seven gallons in a week for one person.

Two weeks, 14 gallons, let's round that up to 15.

15 times two to fill out a month, 30 gallons per person, per month.

For pets, you might want to add another quarter gallon of water per pet, per day.

Remember, they will be as stressed as you are.

And I keep it labeled properly, so I can keep the water fresh and purified.

Don't trust small plastic water bottles for storage.

The plastic breaks down on the inside in just a few months.

And don't forget, you'll need to purify your water if it's not from city supply that has been treated with chlorine.

- Your local government actually wants you to stay alive.

They want you to be prepared, because they know when a disaster strikes, they can't be everywhere at once.

So they need you to save yourself long enough for them to save you.

So all of their websites have exact lists of what you will need.

(dramatic music) - What are the things that you need on a daily basis that if you didn't have them, would be a bad deal?

- Now the good news is, you're gonna make it entirely personal based on your and your family's needs.

But the most important thing is to customize your home survival to fit your life, your lifestyl.

Simply put, if you don't like lentils, don't put lentils in your survival kit.

- What do I have where?

Is it easy to get to?

If I had to leave quickly, if this is a tornado, could I do that?

If I had to hunker down, do I have enough toilet paper?

Just think through those things, diapers, baby formula.

- But you have a nice, warm meal, it can improve your morale substantially.

- And we've always, all of our life, kept at least two weeks of food on hand in the house.

- [Peter] And have some fun food, too, you know?

Maybe have some chocolate bars, and some cookies, and stuff that.

Give yourself a boost.

- [Les] List out on paper a menu lasting three months, followed by a shopping list.

Involve your family in the process, make it fun, but do it.

You can purchase your survival food over a long period of time so you don't notice the cost.

Each time you shop over the next year, add one or two items designated to go into your emergency storage.

If you buy one or two cans of tuna, buy three or four.

If you purchase a 12 pack of toilet paper, pick up a second one.

In much shorter time than you think you'll have a one month supply or more stored up and ready.

- Get extra cans of food when you go grocery shopping.

I mean, that's something you can have as a little bit of peace of min.

- Don't forget as well to date and label your containers.

What else should you have with you at home in preparation for a disaster?

You'll need toiletries and hygiene supplies, and general medication, such as painkillers.

Start now and keep a tally of how much of these you would normally use in a week or a month.

Establish some emergency contacts that live outside of the danger zone.

People you can contact to notify that you're okay or maybe that you're on your way.

Caution them if you have pets in tow.

But remember, it also may be impossible to communicate with the outside world.

- And I just remembered laying there underneath that table just gripping it and sitting on that the floor with the dogs And you know, my greyhound, Cookies, is just kinda frozen in place underneath the table.

Binky's just hanging out.

You know, Binky's my little beagle mutt.

But just chilling, and they see okay.

But I remember I was more scared for them.

Like, I was hanging on to them and just trying to be like stay right here, stay right here.

(dramatic music) - The kind of golden rule when you talk about pets and natural disaster, is if something is not safe for, then it's not gonna be safe for your pets.

Making an emergency kit with food, water, carrier, any sort of medications that your dogs need.

If you're bringing your family in because there's a storm coming, bring your dog in, too.

Just like your family's gonna be upset and they're gonna be nervous, your dog's gonna be nervous.

If you bring the dog inside, it's mostly just making sure that it's dog proof, in a sense, especially if they're in the rooms that they're not used to being in.

Keeping anything that's poisonous or hazardous to their health.

Putting in one of their dog toys or something like that that's familiar, again, just keep them calm.

Vaccination records for rabies and things like that.

Having a picture of your dog available, as well as any sort of markings that are unique to your dog.

There's gonna be these centers set up with hundreds of dogs that are there.

And so being able to really quickly say, it's the chocolate lab, he's got a little white patch right on the shoulder here is gonna really expedite the process and make it easier for the people who have these dogs to be able to find them.

You can have the microchip and have it not be effective if your dog is out there on its own.

It hasn't been found yet, it's found by somebody who doesn't bring it into a vet to get scanned.

That's kind of one of the misconceptions of, oh, I just put a microchip in and it's fine.

But it's only fine when they get to somebody who can read it.

And that's why it's also really critical to have a dog tag with a phone number.

Because the vast majority of the time, whoever's gonna find your dog is gonna be able to read that, but not at microchip.

And when people don't realize that it's a passive chip that only is activated with that scanner to give a number.

That's great if when your dog gets brought into an SPCA or someplace where they can read that.

If it's out in the woods, that chip is totally useless.

And so you're gonna need something, like a GPS tracker, something that's more active that you can actually locate your dog.

It's a little GPS tracker that sits on the collar and it has a cell connection in it, has a GPS chip.

And you're able to basically specify a zone, your safe zone.

As soon as your dog leaves that safe zone, you get a ping.

There's a track option, which basically has much more rapid GPS pings, where your dog is going so that you can go pick it up and bring it back.

- Make sure you have multiple contacts, set up well ahead of time, whose main concern will be your pets.

(dramatic music) - Who needs glasses?

Who needs batteries for their hearing AIDS?

Who has medication?

- People need to keep their medicines on hand.

And that's really important, 'cause a lot of people were calling the police department.

"I'm out of my heart medicine, what do I do?"

- Being able to provide information to, you know, folks that might have access and functional needs.

We didn't even talk about that, right?

So how do we address and deal with folks that have access and functioning needs in a disaster environment?

- [Les] When it comes to children, store food they like, and keep some age-specific games and toys.

They'll need to be distracted during a stressful time.

- And one of the things that I think saved our sanity.

We had enough games, six, seven, eight decks of cards.

- Basically just trying to stay entertained.

Trying to stay entertained.

- Without electricity?

- Without electricity.

So card games, board games.

Be very thankful for the solar lanterns.

- Communications will be vital.

You need to consider how will you reach the world outside of the disaster zone?

Your phone company's towers may be down.

Your internet may be out.

You may want to consider getting to know your local amateur radio operator.

As a bare minimum for your equipment kit, flashlights with lots of spare batteries stored separately to protect from corroding.

A first aid kit, a knife or multi-tool, strong tape, strong rope, a battery, hand-cranked, and or solar powered weather radio.

You may also lose the use of your toilet.

If so, you've got to consider an alternative.

Keep a separate waterproof box with all your legal papers, such as insurance and marriage certificates, birth certificates and passport, and extra cash in case the bank machines are down.

And as an extra step, you can take photographs of your important paperwork as well to store in the cloud or on a separate hard drive.

Taking photographs and or video of your house beforehand.

So that when you're documenting the damage to the insurance company saying, hey, this is what it looks like after the storm, this is what it looked like before the storm.

A home standby generator like this is ideal.

It'll run this whole house, but it's pricey.

So start small, figure out what your absolute needs will be.

You may be content with just being able to operate your refrigerator.

Either way, some form of home standby power generation, be it through solar, or propane, or gas, or battery is ideal in a blackout.

- On a Friday afternoon when you come home from work, turn off the main breaker to your house.

See what it takes to live in your house without electricity over the weekend.

- [Les] If you must travel and you drive, you'll do well to prepare your vehicle.

- Disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, floods probably, where there's debris everywhere, you're gonna get a lot of flat tires.

Have a one of these puncture kis that has the tire plugs in them.

They're really easy to use.

And then I also recommend having one of these small compressors.

Spend a little bit of money and get a nicer quality one, because the cheaper ones, they may work at a time or two before they burn out.

(intense music) - Whether or not to evacuate is an incredibly personal choice to make.

Do you know where you and your entire family can even go?

It's hard to leave, no one is denying that.

But waiting and attempting to leave later is almost always worse.

- I didn't go to bed till four or 5:00 AM, and there was one particular friend that was actually having a panic attack in her home.

And at 3: 00 AM before the 12:00 PM landfall, she wanted to get out of her house with six dogs, and a partner and go find a hotel somewhere.

And I said that time has passed.

The time to evacuate has passed.

I can not tell you to get on the road to maybe find a hotel, which I can probably guarantee you, you won't.

They're all booked eight hours, north, west, east, south, all over you.

And you will be stuck on the highway as this thing rolls in, with all your dogs in the car.

You cannot, you have to hunker down now.

The time to hunker down is now.

And I remember her last message was, "Am I gonna die?"

(dramatic music) - Too many people don't appear to evacuate soon enough.

And so they ended up scrambling and grabbing whatever they can and getting in the car.

- So I put two changes of cloth, I didn't even pack, like, my medication, a hairbrush.

Like I just sorta chucked, you know, a couple of things in the bag.

We were going to grandpa's, it'll be fine.

- [Rodric] You and I, if a hurricane was coming down and we're gonna be impacted and we needed to evacuate, we could say, oh, you know what?

I'm in New Jersey, which is east of Pennsylvania.

I can go West, I'll jump in my car, take my family, stay at a hotel for a week.

There's a lot of folks that don't have that resource.

They don't have that ability.

And those are the folks that we see that get stuck in shelters, for example.

They have nowhere to go, or no other resources.

So they're at a shelter for a long time.

I observed that during Super Storm Sandy.

- Well, when you're told to get out you sort of grab things.

And it makes you wonder the kinds of things that you grabbed.

Like in my case, I grabbed my passwords for the computer.

Now, what's that about?

Tom grabbed the computer and the iPad.

Basically no clothes, you know, I think we slept in clothes the first couple of nights.

- [Les] How we prepared?

- We weren't prepared.

We had maybe a change of underwear.

We didn't even grab all the medications we should have.

It's just strange what comes into your mind.

You know, I mean, like we're religious people.

Probably somebody would have grabbed rosaries, never even thought of rosaries.

You know, I grabbed my daily reflection books, but that was it.

- [Les] Lay out a map and learn the possible evacuation routes well before the need arises.

- [Max] And when you think about folks that may have less resources, right, their priorities are paying some of the bills, getting food on the table, taking care of their children, things like that.

And they may not have the resources or even a vehicle to travel.

In urban areas, you know, certainly there's public transportation and there's things like that, but during a natural disaster, with wind speeds that could be picking up, there's a lot of times where things are rerouted or those folks might not have the information, or know where to get that information to understand what those changes are.

- Here's a good rule of thumb in case you have to leave and take survival supplies with you.

It may not be you or someone with a lot of muscle strength who has to pick up the supplies and carry them outside.

It may be an eight year old child.

Don't make your survival supplies too heavy.

Anything that you think needs charging that would be helpful during a disaster, charge it now.

Lastly, when it comes to your home survival storage, don't forget a can opener and don't forget disposable plates and cutlery.

Let's recap your preparations.

Water, food, toiletries, and medications.

Seniors and access issues.

Children, pets, basic emergency equipment, communications, travel, legal paperwork and cash.

Car preparations, house preparations, including emergency electrical power.

Evacuation procedures.

- If we don't know what we're facing, we can imagine something infinitely worse.

- When we return, I'll take you to the eye of the storm.

(dramatic music) So many natural events, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, blizzards, all of which are inevitable.

None of which need to become a disaster, unless you're unprepared or you can't get out of the way.

Yet no matter how well prepared you are, you may still find yourself in the path of devastation.

You can't evacuate, there's no way out.

You have to face the onslaught.

The numeric system for categorizing events, such as earthquakes, hurricanes windchill was never meant to sensationalize.

It's only there to help you understand what's coming and what just happened.

- [Radio] Hurricane Michael is now a Category 4 hurricane.

This will be an unprecedented event for the Florida panhandle.

- Each category is associated with the style of devastation or catastrophe your community could face.

From your house at maybe the tropical storm to Category 2 level, to your whole town Category 4, Category 5 level.

You're look at 1 as they're dangerous, you will see some damage.

2, now we're looking at extremely dangerous, we'll have extensive damage.

Category 3 hits a Major Hurricane status, and that is 111 miles per hour to 120 miles per hour winds.

And that is considered devastating damage to whatever's in its path.

Category 4 hurricanes, with 130 mile per hour winds to 156 mile per hour winds, and Category 5 hurricanes with 157 and beyond are both considered catastrophic damage.

- I'd like to take you now into the path of disaster.

The real story of survival comes from those people who've had to stare down the throat of the beast.

Who've had to endure an intensity that's quite impossible to describe.

We can learn from them what to do and what not to do.

But I have to caution you.

Reliving a disaster can trigger PTSD.

So maybe, pour a cup of herbal tea, breathe deep, and try to relax.

We'll learn quickly that complacency is the wrong way to approach a disaster.

- They were talking about it could be a catastrophic event for our area.

- By then if you didn't evacuate, you were stuck here.

'Cause there's three bridges that get out of Panama City Beach, too.

You know, if they close those three bridges, you're stuck on the island.

(dramatic music) - [Joey] Oh man, look at this, look at this!

Here we go, folks.

Buckle up, 'cause we're in for a ride.

Got dumpsters flying around over here.

The bay is all the way up to here, which means the bay will be all the way up to Highway 98.

(wind blowing) Hurricane Michael, he's here!

- [Les] Joey Mandeville made it back to his house where he has to ride out the storm.

- [Joey] It's complete, utter devastation.

(wind roaring) That's a tornado, it's spinnin'.

My ears are poppin'.

We've got debris flying all over the place, man.

I can't believe I'm standing out in the middle of this.

I've got a busted window out right here.

And as you can see outside, it's just nothing but absolute hell going on outside.

Oh my god, I cannot see my neighbor's house right now.

Look at this.

(wind roaring) Oh my god, look at this.

(tense music) - I heard many stories of people who have listened to weather forecasters cry wolf for years about the storm of the century, the Big One, only to experience some wind and some rain.

So here's a tip in this matter, listen to your local news.

Your local forecaster, your local government.

They only have your best interest in mind, and they know the same streets and roads that you do.

And they're not prone to hyperbole.

- The anxiety comes from not knowing what you're up against.

- You're seeing the stuff on TV.

"Oh, we're gonna have a little winter weather.

We might get an inch or two, but nothing major."

- September 8th was a regular day.

- More water, more rain, more wind.

I was still really okay.

I mean, we've been through that before.

- Possibility of severe thunderstorms.

We've had those before, so we were not expecting anything different than what we've experienced.

- I watched it make landfall.

And I remember looking at the radar data, all these greens, yellows, red, and swirling, and seeing the eye, and recognizing the streets.

Tindall Air Force Base, my family's street, my childhood home.

- And I don't even know what causes a bomb cyclone, but it was a super cold blast of air.

- We woke up, looked at the computer.

It still looked like it was coming right at us, it was a Category 2.

- So all we did was we loaded up our ambulances, we made sure everything was running, we didn't have any flat tires, batteries were good.

- Woke up around eight or nine in the morning, it was already running and you could see tide also rising.

It came up above the seawall and started creeping up.

- I'm scared, I'm nervous.

- You couldn't see what was happening 'cause you had no internet.

You know, you had no way to know about anything.

- I honestly wasn't even really tracking it online.

That's how little I was worried about it.

That's how complacent I was.

- And eventually we just decided there was nothing else we could do.

Close the doors and we got in the closet.

- And then all hell broke loose.

Winds have really started picking up now.

-The sound was so loudthat you couldn't even hear the stuff ripping off the house, like our back porch.

And it just, we don't even know where most of it went.

And then the carport was peeled back like a can.

(wind blowing) -The roar, the suction of your ears, and the toilets being sucked in.

We were yelling at each other to talk, to communicate.

It was so, and it doesn't go away.

Just hours, and hours, and hours of that.

- All right, we're definitely in it now.

Has got to be over a hundred mile an hour.

Pretty much sustained.

- And next thing I know, I see our neighbors tree over here, big, huge pine tree.

It looks like the ground got so soft, it didn't even snap.

It wasn't the fact that the woo snapped, it was the fact that the ground was so soft with the water that it just started tilting, and just kept tilting.

And next thing I know, it just falls on the corner of house.

And I just hear a big boom.

- All right, so tree came through the roof here.

Obviously water damage.

Big pine tree from the neighbor's yard came straight down up in there.

(wind blowing) Another big, huge gust.

- Everything, all the road run off, the sewage, the ditches, everything.

Any dead carcasses going up in the air.

Like I'm here to protect the family, the daughter, the dogs, everything, and I was helpless.

- Knowledge should help calm you down, not scare you.

- You need information, especially during these types of events.

Information is key for your survival.

- She was leaving, she said, Jane, come out.

You've got to see this, I think you're in trouble.

- We had food for weeks, we had water for weeks, but we didn't know the rest of the story.

- And I started taking pictures.

I'm being that idiot that's going around, ooh, look this doing that.

- And then as it moved over where I knew my home was, I remember thinking, and I will never, ever forget it, am I watching my parents die live on radar?

(somber music) - I remember looking at Lexie going, that's not a good sign.

Because there was nothing to lead us to believe we had anything to be concerned about and we're already losing power.

We went down to watch the storm come across the lake, and we're taking pictures of the sky and Zach's videoing.

And it was just like that.

It's like it saw us and said, we're gunning for you.

Like, here we come!

- [Zach] Oh, there it is, oh, that's so cool.

- [Wendy] Oh my God, look it, look it, look it.

Coming around the corner, do you see, did you get that?

- [Zach] We gotta go inside, mom.

(wind blowing) And mom's gone!

Holy.

Holy.

I never felt this before in my life.

Whoa, that is some strong wind!

What the heck is going on?

Holy!

- Crack, thunk, crack, thunk!

The trees were cracking and hitting the ground, and hitting the house, and the house was vibrating.

And all this stuff was hitting the front of the house and the windows.

- We saw the tree was through the roof.

We couldn't see any damage up to that point.

The window was smashed.

- And we got the animals.

We found my cat, who is hiding inside my couch.

And as soon as the rain started coming again, we ran downstairs and we slept down there all night.

We were terrified.

We were terrified.

- When the reality sinks in, that yes, this is really happen, it's very tempting to scramble, to let your adrenaline take over.

But this is the time to calm down, to assess your situation, and to make a proactive decision based on that information.

- The storm's pickin' up, I grabbed my book.

I'm looking forward to read, I can't concentrate.

What's the wind doing, what's going on?

And I'm tense, I'm nervous, I'm worried.

- And my daughter, who was eight at the time, was very scared.

- The freezing rain, which of course covers electrical lines in ice, and then they break.

So we lost electricity, which means that we lost heat.

The temperature outside made it down into the negative 20s, negative 30s, I think.

- And no heat?

- No heat.

- It felt like it was there was something out there and it was just destroying the world.

- And then the next thing I knew, the police came into the town and came into the subdivision and said, "Get out."

And then some of the other neighbors went door to door.

The fire was behind us and the smoke all over.

Trying to even get out of the area was a real challenge to try and get out of smoke, which we couldn't do.

- While we were there, the roof started peeling off.

- [Man] It rained, but it turned into freezing rain.

And all the trees still have their leaves and everything on , so the weight of the ice was breaking and bending the trees.

And then it turned into snow, and the snow covered pretty much all of Western South Dakota.

- [Woman] We had the police scanner on and we were listening to it, and they were getting, of course, medical calls.

- You could hear on the scanner where their rescue trucks, their police cars were getting stuck in the snow.

- Hear the desperation in the cops' voices and the firemen, they wanted to help these people.

They wanted to get to 'em, they couldn't.

- There comes a point in the storm where emergency services will no longer be able to help you.

911 operators, the police, firefighters, they're not always gonna be available in the worst, darkest part of the storm.

- We kicked into gear while the last wall was actually coming through, 'cause we actually got a call of a pregnant lady with a broke foot that was entrapped.

I'm a medic, so me and my platoon Sergeant, and then two people follow this out to the house.

Took us like two, three hours to go about five miles maybe.

- [Man] The roads were icy, six to eight inches of snow on top of a couple of inches of ice.

- We traveled about 50 miles to Grants Pass and we're fortunate enough to get one of the last rooms.

And that was a real issue, was finding a safe place to stay.

- You're trapped in your house, it's dark, you know, and if you haven't prepared, you might be in your bathtub with your mattress over top of you.

Scared, is this, am I gonna make it?

- Hiding in your bathtub under a mattress with a Category 5 hurricane raging above you.

Nothing about that sounds appealing.

And yet albeit without the mattress, that is exactly how the story of Bobby Jordan and Pam Swafford played out.

- [Radio] Michael could develop into a potentially catastrophic event for the Northeastern Gulf coast.

- [Radio] Reports from the reconnaissance aircraft indicate that maximum sustained winds have increased to near 85 miles per hour with higher gusts.

And Michael is forecast to become a Major Hurricane by Tuesday night.

Wave seas building a 50 to 60 feet South of Apalachicola on Wednesday.

Widespread power outages, downed trees blocking access to roads and endangering individuals, structural damage to homes and businesses.

Isolated flash flooding and the potential for a few tornadoes.

- You could hear it roaring at seven in the morning.

That sound was like a jet.

Unbelievable this actually could strengthen to Cat 5.

It is gonna be the greatest stom ever to hit the Florida Panhand.

Out there is rough.

We're protected right now by the bayou.

We won't be for long.

- [Man] So there's no way getting around this thing, it's not gonna stop, it's not gonna hook the right.

But this is it, the eye comes in from Panama City, Tindall Air Force Base, Mexico Beach.

That's the eye wall.

That's the blinding 100 mile an hour plus winds, for hours.

So for you folks in the path of the eye, stay in your house.

Don't go outside.

- [Bobby] Careful, Pam, I'm tellin' ya.

(wind blowing) - [Man] It's 28.89 and falling.

I've never come anywhere close to that in 40 years watching the weather.

- It's ramping up to plus 150.

- Yeah, yeah, we're approaching the eye wall making landfall here, and we are hearing the building shaking.

And that's from these wind speeds reaching up over 60 mile per hour here.

- [Pam] Oh my gosh, I've never seen anything like this before.

(tense music) (Pam screaming) - [Bobby] Just gotta watch if something's flying through here.

Watch out Pam, get down in case that window breaks.

- Bobby, where are you?

- I'm in the kitchen.

There's some rumblings, that must be a tornado.

Get down for a minute there.

- There is catastrophic damage being down right now.

- At one point Bobby was standing in the sliding glass door filming and the wind knocked him down.

(tense music) Bobby!

- [Bobby] It knocked me off my feet, Pam!

- [Pam] Oh my god!

- [Les] At this point, Bobby and Pam take refuge in the last safest place in the apartment, the bathroom.

But directly above them, Theresa Sheffield and her friends are also hiding in the top floor bathroom.

However, the entire roof of the apartment building is now being ripped off by the Category 5 winds, and they are exposed to the full force of the storm, raging down upon them.

- Then the roof went off in one piece.

The sheet rock from the ceiling in the bathroom fell on me.

Spices were flying into the bathroom from the kitchen and those kinds of things.

And then (exhales) constantly that wind, it wouldn't stop.

You know, I thought we're gonna have an eye.

Is it gonna like, you know, let us have a little break and we can figure out what's going on?

Maybe get downstairs to the laundry room.

But no, we never had the eye.

We figure what saved us was the trusses fell on top of the framing where we in the bathrooms.

So it stabilized the walls where were enough to keep them up because the walls all around were gone.

- I was just tall enough to reach from the tub and I laid down, the roof had already come off the top and water was pouring down.

I don't know where that wind's coming from.

The side window's probably blown out.

And the door, it was just going (grunts) - Could hear the windows blowing out and the stuff flying off the walls, and the roof flying off, and the (humming) like that.

Just super loud.

- [Bobby] Maybe the laundry room would've been safer.

I don't know what's going on up there, I'm scared for them.

- I am, too.

Bobby, don't open the door.

I have been through a lot in my life, and I'm a three time cancer survivor, but I have never been through anything like that.

(somber music) - Let's recap some basic information for surviving a disaster.

Complacency is your enemy.

Source your information from local sources, local news, local government, local weather forecasting.

Remember that your pets may become frantic during a disaster.

Remember that windows are places of danger.

You may need to sacrifice that favorite mattress or blanket just to keep warm.

If you haven't hunkered down in one room already, you will likely have to at some point, and the safest room in the house is often the bathroom because building codes dictate that there are stronger walls and ceilings to house the plumbing.

Emergency crews are dealing with the disaster, too, and they have roads covered in drywall, nails, and glass to work around.

They may not be able to get to you.

Curiosity may be the motivation behind the action that gets you killed.

Be careful about taking too many chances.

Stay clear of anything that can fall on you or smash beside you, even if that means crawling under a table for protection.

- During the storm, I just think, you know, most folks are just buckling down, just making sure that their family's safe, everyone's well.

And after that, I think that's when all the, you know, the economic issues come in.

All the other concerns about, well, you know, how do I get back to work?

My job was destroyed, potentially.

- When we return, how do we recover from a disaster?

(dramatic music) (sombre music) - [Woman] They talked about the stages of grief.

And I think the first one is denial.

Well, you can't deny it when you see it.

But you just look at it and say wow.

- I felt like I was shellshocked.

I just couldn't believe that we had just lived through that.

- And then it gradually starts clearing up and you're starting to see all of the damage outside.

- Our friends that lived upstairs, we knew they did not survive.

- It looked like a bomb went off and just peeled everything away.

It was just dirt, and garbage, and wood everywhere.

Tile and you name, it was just all over the place.

- There wasn't an inch of this property where there wasn't trees, branches, debris.

It looked like a bomb had gone off.

It was the most devastating thing I've ever seen in my entire life when I walked out of this house.

It was the most devastating thing.

- Once you kind of start being able to see everything, you just, you get that dreaded feeling of wow.

What just happened?

What just hit us?

- This is the true picture of catastrophic destruction.

Along with the utter devastation of your own home, whether that be an apartment, a trailer, a condo, or a sprawling estate, you must now be on the lookout for gas leaks.

Some of which are burning, and the rest spewing toxic fumes into the air.

House fires, broken glass and nails everywhere.

Electrical wires still live with current laying across your driveway.

And perhaps one of the most insidious things to deal with, putrid sewage and animal corpse filled black water gushing out of broken pipes everywhere.

And yet, in spite of all of this, none of us give up.

We have to find a way out, deal with what we are facing.

Take stock of what has happened, and make a proactive decision on how to move forward and rebuild.

- It's one week after Hurricane Michael.

Back at the apartment to see if we can salvage some pictures and such.

To try to get into my place.

Then it was just like an eerie silence at home.

And there's also an eerie silence on the outside of, now it's done, now what?

You know, what's next?

We didn't know if my parents were alive for 36 hours after that.

We actually had a high school friend's mom walk a couple blocks to deliver herself on the hand signal.

So I was able to hear my dad's voice after about 36 hours and was like.

- And I just felt total (sighs) you know, oh my gosh, we survived this.

How did, you know, and we all just hugged and... - You're gonna be shellshocked.

You've just been through an incredibly traumatic 12 hours or more.

The storm's a long thing, you know.

And literally wondering, are you gonna survive this thing?

You know, it's very stressful for many hours.

- In a disaster, you will go through a traumatic incident.

And so most people will have some degree of post-trauma.

Not just for the people who are in it, but also for the people who are away from it wondering if their loved ones are okay.

- And I loaded up the dogs and my backpack, hopped in the truck, and I literally couldn't get out.

Like I was blocked in everywhere.

- We couldn't get out anywhere.

This whole street was just completely covered in trees.

- After the storm was over, you know, because it was an early season storm, the weather warmed up afterwards.

The snow started to melt.

Now we had to worry about flooding.

- All the pumps run on electricity, so the pumps weren't working.

You had to go out to the areas furthest out west of where the hurricane landed, where they had power, and getting these massive lines.

Massive lines.

You'd wait hours just to get, what, 15, 20 gallons of fuel.

Which our generators would last five gallons a night.

- [Man] All for gas.

This gas line is almost two miles long, wow.

- After Marilyn in '95 and after Irma and Maria, we went three months without grid electricity.

So having a generator is a good thing.

These are just small, little, 2000 watt generators.

They are more than enough to run your refrigerator or freezer.

- [Max] I went to my big store, and there were no generators.

And I asked the guy working there, what happened?

And he said, well, FEMA came this morning and took them all to New York.

- I was working here, the tree service and after Katrina hit we waited a couple of days and headed down.

We were getting stopped by the police and asking us to go over here and try to cut this other police officer out, because you know, her car and everything she had was just blocked in by trees.

- The police were non-existent.

They were all in the same boat I was in.

Their houses were messed up.

They were not worried about going to work.

They were worried about their families.

And so there was no law enforcement for a week.

- In the aftermath of a disaste, there's a certain degree of chaos that's unavoidable.

We don't like using the words "chaos" in public information as it relates to disasters, but the reality is that there's a lot of chaos.

- I was in New Orleans for a week.

We went out to start clearing.

The stores were trash.

The helicopters were insane there.

There were like seven in the air at all times.

And when we got there, one of the soldiers at the Superdome told us, oh, we can't fly at night, 'cause the bastards on the bridges are shooting at us.

That they were taking so much fire they couldn't fly at night.

- [Les] Who's shooting?

- People trapped on overpasses.

People just got stuck there.

People were living on overpasses for days and days and they see these helicopters going around and they just start shooting at 'em out of frustration.

- We did have a mission where we protected property.

I was actually given an ammo for force protection, like, I wasn't out there after looters.

I was out there to protect the medics and our equipment.

- The stores got hit first, and then it moved into the neighborhoods and people's houses were getting looted.

So that's something you have to take into consideration.

Are you able to deal with that?

-This also speaks to the important of investments in community.

Is that areas where you tend to see looting, areas where you tend to see, these are areas that are denied a lot of opportunities day-to-day that are already at a breaking point.

And I'm not trying to victim blame here, I want to be really clear about that, but this is why investments in social capital and investments in social cohesion are so important.

These things that may seem unrelated from a disaster, when you have high crime rates, generations of poverty, lack of opportunity for jobs, how do you think that's gonna play out in a disaster?

How do you think that's gonna play out with additional stressors on it?

- You talk about the haves and have nots.

The haves can live on the coast and they can rebuild.

The have nots might live in proximity and they're kind of left standig with no resources and nowhere to go.

- We need to have these investments in community.

This sort of on the porch with the shotgun this, you know, you loot we shoot, it erodes that.

That sort of approach to preparedness erodes cohesion.

And no matter how much you prepare in your own personal security, it's never gonna match the benefit that you have from community cohesion from social capital, from building social networks.

And that'll always pay off in the long run.

- [Max] The Mad Max scenario is that everybody's gonna turn on everybody else.

First of all, that's not gonna happen.

It almost never happens.

And also barring a global thermal nuclear war, all disasters are gonna be temporary.

And so people are gonna have long memories.

When the pandemic hit, the first thing I did was talk to my neighbors and say, listen, let's all keep in touch and see what we all have and pool our resources.

- When something happens like that then you've got to take care of yourself, and then there's also friends and family that can't go out and get thing.

So you've got to think about supplying what their needs are.

It has taught us to communicate with friends and family a lot more.

I know I've reached out to a lot of people that maybe I haven't talked to in a while.

Just check in, how are you doin?

You okay, you need anything?

I'm here for you.

- You see more and more, a lot of folks don't know their neighbors.

A lot of people don't know who lives in the apartment building on a floor above them.

You know, or the little lady down the street that might need help or might need her driveway shoveled during a snow storm.

Knowing your community and knowing your neighbors, that's very important.

And knowing the individuals in your neighborhood that might need additional assistance.

- [Max] Investing in your community is the best survival skill you can have.

- A strong community approach will always be the best answer.

Now, often the timeline of assistance plays out something like this.

Local groups will get involved.

Churches, Samaritan's Purse, Salvation Army.

Let's face it, they've been through the same things you have.

Local businesses, such as restaurants, may feed an entire neighborhood out of the goodness of their hearts.

National corporations may get involved.

Chain restaurants providing food, or for example, Tide Detergent providing free laundry services.

Eventually, out of state assistance may show up, as well.

Team Rubicon, for example, consisting primarily of military veteran volunteers, can provide everything from medical aid to tree removal service.

And beside them will likely be the National Guard's women and men.

FEMA, and other federal agencies, may come in as well, but often only if your area has been declared a disaster.

Lastly, it's your own insurance company, if you have one.

Now, Sean and Lily who have appeared in this film, made a very strong point for the use of a public defender.

They operate on commission, they only receive money if you do.

Look at it this way, you're gonna need assistance and your insurance company may need convincing.

They assure me it's well worth the fee.

Some organizations such as Team Rubicon operate on a very holistic leve.

Other specialize, such as Shelter Box.

They know that their experience and expertise lies in providing shelter.

They may show up with an entire shelter kit for you.

BBQ Relief has a very mandate of bringing you fresh, hot pulled pork on a bun.

Can you imagine after eating five days of emergency dry rations, somebody showing up with a fresh, hot pulled pork on a bun.

And yes, they have vegetarian options.

- To me, it's really easy.

I mean, the frontline workers are the ones that have been giving every day.

They've been out there, they put themselves out in front of this.

And for us not to celebrate them, not to give back to them, I think would be doing a disservice to that.

And so between them and the first responders that are out there every day, I think they're the frontline workers that we have to celebrate.

- Thank you, Operation BBQ Relief, thank you very much!

(cheering) - [Woman] We found a necklace.

The charm is still in one piece.

- Oh, that is neat, yes.

Thank you.

- Yeah, you're welcome.

We'll keep looking.

- Thank you so much.

- [Les] Well, that was nice.

- Wasn't that nice, it's always a nice surprise.

So I knew about Samaritan's Purse, and then I saw them operating here and I got their phone number and called them.

And I mean, talk about a God thing.

They're here and the HASMAT people are gonna be right here after them.

So this is our chance to be able to get things.

When the environmental people go, they're not gonna be looking for little treasures and things like that.

They're just clearing.

- The National Guard was an integral part.

They were there putting water at the end of the driveway, asking you if you needed food, hygiene products, whatever you needed.

- City and County Emergency Services was the forefront.

There were people out there that had snow ploughs on the front of their truck.

Construction companies, they'd come in with their bucket loaders and their front end loaders and they would help.

And then Red Cross, they provided food, clothing for people who, you know, they provided shelter for people who were able to get out of their homes but didn't have any place to go.

- You know, a lot of folks don't even understand that, you know, their local community has Office of Emergency Management, for example.

You know, a lot of folks, you think about first responders, you think police, fire, EMS, not understanding that there's other layers in public safety.

Emergency management, for example, you know, that that actually do a lot within the community that folks aren't aware of.

- If you've got a damaged apartment or you've got a damaged dwelling and you can't really live in that damaged dwelling, contact FEMA, 1-800-621-FEMA to apply for assistance.

It is important to note that th must be a presidentially-declared disaster in order for FEMA to assist.

We don't go to every disaster, because sometimes the disasters are things that the state, or the local, or the tribe, or the territory is able to handle themselves.

- Community emergency response team.

In some areas it is an actual team that maybe has a monthly meeting and kind of like a search and rescue.

Basically first on scene responders.

So it's not a first responder, like a police or fire, but it's if you're there first, here's the things that you can do to help somebody else, and here's what you can do safely to help somebody else.

- The local communities, there was a couple of restaurants that opened up and was handing out free food.

There's a gentleman here who always tries to help.

He was driving around, making sure people had food.

And there was a couple actual semi-truckers who were coming in.

They would park at the Callaway beside them and hand out food, help out with anything that they could.

Tide Pods was offering to wash your clothes.

- That was set up immediately and a phenomenal number of volunteers willing to listen to do whateve you needed them to do.

- I was blown away by the community that we had.

Like, that left a big impact on me.

Like, I never seen anything like that since I was in the Marine Corps.

- The gratitude towards everyone who helped us, I cannot thank them enough.

- It's overwhelming gratitude and appreciation.

And I'm not sure how we're gonna give back yet, but we will.

- If it seems like I've left you with more questions than answers, then I've done my job.

Your job now is to ask the questions.

What kind of disasters occur where I live?

What supplies do I need and in what quantity?

How do I deal with my senior parents or people with access needs, such as wheelchairs?

What do I do about my children, my pets, my vehicle, my property?

Where's the safest place in my apartment, or house, or dwelling if I can' evacuate?

What are the safest actions to take in my neighborhood if a disaster occurs that I can predict, such as an earthquake?

What local organizations can I turn to as resources?

Churches, businesses, friends, family.

Who do I look for, for rescue?

And finally, what do I do after I'm safe?

I will include for you with this film online resources and written information, but you already have the internet and government agencies to help you do your research.

So I'd like to leave you with an option.

You can begin now and get prepared for the next disaster, or don't and take your chances.

I'm Les Stroud.

- [Presenter] Funding for "Surviving Disasters with Les Stroud" provided by Westinghouse, power for over 135 years.

(dramatic music)