Selena Xie's blog

It's early for snow, so you better hurry and read the Red Cross's handy Winter Storm Safety Checklist which provides valuable tips and a good refresher on winter etiquette!

Winter Storm Safety Checklist

Harvard Medical School has recently released an iPhone app teaching you the basic about H1N1 and allows you track it as well. Tech Crunch explains:

The Swine Flu Application includes videos, animations and text that allow you to learn the basics about swine flu, how to reduce the risk to you and your family, and how to prepare your business for the pandemic. The app also features real-time updates and news from Harvard Med School about H1N1.

When you see a large group of elementary school students outside, they are either at recess or being fire-drilled. The difference is in the eyes – kids at recess look happy and engaged while kids being fire-drilled have glazed over eyes because it seems so pointless. As the fire instructor at my weekly CERT training remarked, “if there were a fire, I wish it would be at a school because those kids are drilled.” They know what to do, where to go. Fire fighters cannot go into residential homes and force people to be safe. I, like elementary school kids, never gave much attention to fire safety because obviously it is never going to happen to me.  I learned a few things last night that have made me think differently (having a fire chief bark at you for three hours will do that to you).

Everyday, it seems we hear about a new typhoon or earthquake has plagued a part of Pacific Asia. Here is a round-up of the disasters as provided by Reuters:

* On Sept. 26, Typhoon Ketsana tore through the Philippines, submerging houses, triggering landslides and killing nearly 300 people.

* On Sept. 29, an undersea earthquake sparked a series of tsunamis in the South Pacific that tore buildings apart and washed people to sea, some still in their beds. The death toll in Samoa, American Samoa and neighbouring Tonga nears 200.

* A day later, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit Indonesia's Sumatra island, toppling hundreds of buildings in Padang city, killing more than 1,000 people and trapping many more under rubble. Within 24 hours another quake struck Sumatra.

Last night, I attended my first CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) class. The classes are held in the CTECC (Combined Transportation, Emergency, Communications Center). Let me tell you, the building. is. amazing. First of all, they have a Wal-Mart sized 911 Call Center that looks like a combination of the New York Stock Exchange trading floor and the control room from War Games. On the floor, they receive all of the 911 calls placed within Travis County (except for those placed on the UT campus and in Plugerville). Besides the call responders, there are also police, fire, transportation, and medical stations on the floor ready to respond to any emergencies.