On October 21, at 10:21 a.m., the Office of Emergency Management (OEM) along with the Environment Health and Safety (EH&S) communications team coordinated participation from the UCLA community for the Great California ShakeOut.
As part of the day’s activities, OEM conducted a giveaway through EH&S’ Instagram page, and student Kaela Birozy (pictured here with OEM’s Tylor Headrick, Sean Devine and Amanda Ogden) won a $50 gift card to the Ackerman Bookstore and an emergency preparedness backpack filled with essentials.
The ShakeOut, which occurs each October, is the world’s largest earthquake preparedness drill, and provides Bruins the opportunity to practice reacting safely and calmly to an emergency earthquake scenario whether at home or at work. According to UCLA’s Director of Emergency Management Lisa Martin, the event also provides for a test of UCLA’s emergency communications systems.
“With each exercise, Emergency Management has the opportunity to observe something new and improve our preparedness and response,” Martin said. “For drill participants, it brings to life the possibility of only having seconds to protect themselves from shaking or falling items in a real earthquake emergency.
“Thinking through an action plan in advance also helps you stay calmer and more focused when the real thing occurs — and in southern California, it is critical for all of us to be prepared.”
In the event of an earthquake, three key steps wherever you may be are drop, cover and hold on.
Drop onto your hands and knees; this protects you from being knocked down and allows you to crawl to any nearby shelter.
Cover your head and neck with one arm and hand; if a sturdy table or desk is nearby, crawl under it for shelter or crawl next to an interior wall (away from windows). Stay on your knees and bend over to protect vital organs.
Hold on until shaking stops! If you are under shelter: be ready to move with it if it shifts. If you are not under shelter: hold on to your head and neck with both arms and hands.
Members of the UCLA community are encouraged to log into the BruinAlert site (oem.ucla.edu/bruinalert) to be sure contact information is up-to-date to receive text notifications. In an actual emergency, when you receive a BruinAlert, next visit the Bruins Safe Online (bso.ucla.edu) website for more information. OEM recommends bookmarking the site and sharing it with others who may want to be informed about emergency events at UCLA.
