3 Ways To Make Your Home Safe Against Earthquakes
While some places are more prone to earthquakes, there’s always a chance that an earthquake could take place almost anywhere on the planet.
With small earthquakes, you may not even feel the earth moving beneath you. But if and when a large earthquake strikes, you’ll want to be prepared so that you and your family can be safe in your home. To help you see how this can be done, here are three ways to make your home safe against earthquakes.
Secure The Structure Of Your Home
The very first thing you need to do to ensure that your home is going to be safe and that you’ll be safe in your home in the event of an earthquake is to secure the structure of your home.
If you’re already worried about how well the ground beneath your home is handling the load of the structure, you should definitely look into ground improvement. Along with this, you can hire a professional engineer to check things like your foundation, porches, patios and any other feature of your home to ensure that it’s as solid as can be. If there is anything amiss or steps that could be taken to help make the structure more secure, you can then choose to go forward with these processes if you deem them necessary for your safety and security.
Anchor Heavy Items
As for what you have inside of your home, it’s best to make sure that everything heavy is solidly anchored in place well before an earthquake takes place.
When things get rocking and rolling during an earthquake, it’s very easy for things to move around inside of your home, even things that might be too heavy for you to really move on your own. So if you have big bookcases or other pieces of furniture, you’re going to want to anchor those items to the wall so that they won’t fall over on you or anything else during a big earthquake.
Create A Safe Area
When an earthquake starts, it can take a second to realize what is going on. But as soon as you understand that what you’re experiencing is an earthquake, it’s vital that you get to a safe place to wait out the shaking.
In some homes, it can be hard to know where a safe place will be, since you don’t want to be close to windows or under anything that’s too heavy and might fall on you. Knowing this, you should try to create a place in your home that is going to be safe for you to be during an earthquake. This could be under a table or desk or flat against a wall with nothing near you. As long as you’ve thought about this beforehand, you’ll be able to act quicker in the real scenario.
If you’re worried about earthquakes affecting you at home, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you make your home a safe haven.
