Hurricane Emergency Preparedness

Be Prepared

If you need or choose to evacuate during a hurricane, take your pets with you. NEVER leave them behind. Animals left behind can be lost, injured, or even killed if left inside your home or turned loose outside to fend for themselves. See the Humane Society of the United States’ CASEY (Caring for Animal Safety in Emergencies during the Year) Plan for instructions on what to do in natural disaster situations. It includes how to prepare a disaster supply checklist, an emergency supply kit for pets, as well as an evacuation plan that includes pet-friendly hotels and emergency animal shelters along the way.

We have done a lot of research and talked to dozens of Emergency Preparedness experts, and they all emphasize that evacuating to an emergency shelters should be your last resort. In fact, in some low-lying coastal counties there are no shelters. Instead they emphasize the importance of making plans to evacuate well in advance, and that includes identifying hotels that are pet-friendly. But sometimes disasters happen so quickly a shelter is your only option. To that end, we have a page dedicated to Pet-Friendly Hotels Near Me as well as one to Pet-Friendly Emergency Shelters Near Me so that you will be ready on both counts. Regarding the shelters, be aware that many state counties open them on an as needed basis and do not make the locations public until they are open, so check our More Shelter Info for contact information on those counties. Also, be sure to check with local authorities, radio and newspapers.

Equally important, we have an Emergency Route Planner that allows you to create an evacuation route ahead of time, one that identifies these pet-friendly hotels and emergency shelters along the way. You can then save that route so that you can access it anytime on your desktop, phone or tablet to update in case circumstances change and, most importantly, to utilize while you’re still comfortably in control, at a time well before the storm hits your area.