Hailstorm and broken windows

          Recently Abilene was hit by a major hailstorm – golf ball to baseball sized hail.  Over 200 cars were severely damaged.  The hail even went straight through some roofs.  One of the universities had the windows damaged on one side of virtually every building. Plywood was brought in by the truckload.  You get the picture.  The Special Collections area of the library has large windows on the damaged side of the building although only the study tables are directly behind those windows. Fortunately the archives are in a separate room without windows on the damaged side.  That brings up the need for both organizations and individual to have a disaster plan.  Prevention should be at the top of your to do list.  That means proper storage for your valuable papers.  Some people have fireproof safes or rent safety deposit boxes in banks.  Universities and other organizations have duplicate copies of the most valuable material in off-site storage.  Now, of course, computers offer another mechanism for storage.  Backing up in lots of places, as you know is important and really essential - the cloud, external hard drives, thumb drives, CDs.  For organizations microfilm is an excellent option. 

             For material that is important to you, like photographs, store them in a dark room or closet without windows.  Keep the material off the floor.  Don’t store anything that shouldn’t get wet in the basement.  If you must use a basement, keep items off the floor six to twelve inches to protect from flood damage.  For different reasons, an attic is a bad place to store valuable papers, photographs, and so forth.  The heat will cause rapid deterioration.  Do remember where you put things so you can access them quickly.  Make a list of what’s where if you have to.  My cousin lost some old family photos to a fire because she forgot what drawer she put them in and couldn’t find them in the rush of evacuation.  Make copies and store them elsewhere if you can.  Keep up with the changes in technology and update your records accordingly.  The internet is a great place to store your material, but it isn’t foolproof.  What is accessible today may not be tomorrow.  Just think Betamax.

               Off to New York tomorrow. More on disaster planning later.