As you’ve probably heard, there was a major WMATA accident here in DC yesterday. Our local chapter responded quickly by touching base with the NTSB, supporting the emergency responders with food, water, and blankets, and providing mental health assistance.

These accidents are quite rare, but there are a few simple steps you can take to prepare for this type of event. As our friend Amanda Ripley says,

the more information you have given your brain before anything goes wrong, the better you will do. Translation: read the safety briefing cards and listen to the flight attendants. The National Transportation Safety Board has found that passengers who read the safety information card are less likely to get hurt in an emergency.

Amanda Ripley also has some insights into the passenger’s activities after yesterday’s crash:

As is so often the case in disasters, people did remarkable things for one another. Survivors report fear, confusion and kindness–but not panic:

“In the moments after the crash, passengers made tourniquets out of T-shirts, struggled to pull debris off others and sought to calm the hysterical and the gravely wounded. Inside the worst-hit car, waiting on ambulances and the “jaws of life,” an Anglican priest led a group in the Lord’s Prayer. On the ground below, a civilian Pentagon employee told a wounded girl he wouldn’t accept her last wish—she was going to live.”

With these reports we urge you to get trained in CPR/AED so that if you ever find yourself in a position like the one yesterday, you can jump into action and use your skills to help others.

Filed under: Disaster Response, Preparedness