Reply #4: "a way to register contact information or find family members" [View All]

[Lisa]

Oh, geez. I witnessed a mass evacuation way back in 1989 (fire-threatened community). The #1 desire of the people getting off the buses and aircraft, even ahead of water and food, bathrooms and a place to sit down, was to know what had happened to their families! At the time, limited technology meant that the only tool available was a fax machine linked to a landline -- and bulletin boards with sign-in sheets. It made a huge amount of difference -- evacuation centers in multiple places were able to swap updated lists almost instantaneously.

When I looked into it, I learned that disaster planning experts were way ahead of me, of course, and had "information" right up there as a key need.

With the rise of the internet and cell phones, I thought that exchanging information would be even faster, so the families wouldn't have to wait for news. But ... if the information isn't even being collected, and nobody seems to realize it's important ... I thought that FEMA and other such groups would have plenty of people on staff who know way more about this than I do. Have things really gotten that bad? Are they assuming that people don't have anyone who'd be concerned about them?