In Case Of Emergency, Read Blog

Some of you may have noticed the paucity of posts on the blog this week. I apologize for that. It’s largely due to the large amount of feedback I received from the article I wrote in the Washington Post’s Outlook section “It’s An Emergency: We’re Not Prepared” as well as from the online discussion on Washingtonpost.com about the article the next day.

I have received comments from all over the country and the world, from people involved in all aspects and all levels emergency management as well as from those not at all involved. There were suggestions, questions, criticism, praise and even offers of help. I appreciate it all. And, I am in the process of answering each email directly. The response was overwhelming, and as a result, this blogger was a bit overwhelmed, to the point that I haven’t had the time to post. In fact, I haven’t even had time to write up the fascinating discussion I participated in with DHS Secretary Chertoff and FEMA Administrator Paulison.

In the coming days, I will be posting some of the many emails I received on the blog as a way to further spread some of the interesting comments that came in. There is so much knowledge and experience about preparedness out there, and I want this blog to be a place where this huge asset is aggregated, analyzed and highlighted. This type of interactive conversation is exactly what I envisioned when I started this blog — a central place for addressing the often overlooked, but vitally important, societal issue of citizen preparedness.

I thank everyone for their comments and promise to get back to a regular stream of posts this week.