Hurricanes are mighty tropical storms that threaten coastal communities worldwide. They can cause severe damage to your home due to winds that can reach over 150 miles per hour and devastating rainfall. Thankfully, you can take some precautionary measures to limit the damage. Here’s how to prepare your house for a hurricane.
1. Review Your Insurance
Before you make any changes to your home, you should first review your homeowner’s insurance policy. Understand what it covers and what it doesn’t to determine if you need to increase your coverage. Most insurance companies in regions prone to hurricanes should cover the damages, but you still need to double-check to ensure your home is protected.
2. Gather Supplies
A comprehensive insurance policy will help you recover from the hurricane, but it won’t protect you from the storm itself. You must gather the right supplies and prepare to spend several days bunkered inside your house. Here is a list of everything you might need:
First-aid kit
Prescription medicines
Bottled water
Nonperishable food
Radio
Flashlight
Spare batteries
Portable phone charger
Toolbox
Matches or a lighter
Fire extinguisher
Waterproof bags
Duct tape
Local maps
Cash
These items provide the sustenance and security to make it through a hurricane. If the power goes out, you still have heat and lighting. You’ll have plenty of provisions if you can’t make it to a grocery store. Medical care and communication are also covered.
3. Reinforce Your Home’s Vulnerable Areas
Hurricanes damage homes in many ways, but they cause the most harm through several familiar avenues, such as the roof, windows, doorways and other crevices around the house. Here’s what you can do to reinforce each area.
Roof: Inspect the roof for any loose shingles and repair them. Clean out the gutters to allow for proper water drainage. You should also consider buying truss tie-downs to help secure the roof to the rest of the building.
Windows: Lock your windows and board them up with plywood. Tape the plywood edges so no water flows through the cracks.
Doorways: Stuff the cracks underneath your doors with draft stoppers and towels to prevent water from seeping in.
Garage: You can also block off your garage door with towels or purchase a brace to prevent it from flying away with the wind.
Basement: If the hurricane floods your home, the water will accumulate in the basement first. Remove all valuable items and bring them to the upper floors.
Pipes and cables: Anywhere a pipe or cable enters your home is an opportunity for water to sneak through. You can’t do much to block these cracks, but you can closely monitor them and manage the slow leaks throughout the storm.
Reinforcing and monitoring these areas will reduce the amount of water that enters the building. If all goes well, the hurricane will pass, and your home’s interior will remain dry and safe.
4. Clean up Your Yard
One of a hurricane’s most impressive qualities is its ability to turn harmless outdoor items into weapons of destruction with just one strong gust of wind. With that in mind, you need to do a lot of outdoor maintenance around your house.
First, park your cars in your garage if you have enough room. If they must stay outside, ensure they’re out of the reach of any trees and activate the emergency brakes. Trim all branches close to your house that might cause damage, then remove all dead branches, loose stones and other debris from your yard.
All your outdoor furniture should come inside, or you can secure it to the ground with deck down anchors or another device. Potted plants also belong indoors. Trim what vegetation you can so it won’t tear out of the earth as easily. If you have a pool, do not cover it. Pool coverings are thin and can easily break from flying debris.
Your family should comb over your property one last time to pick up any leftover items lying around before the storm hits. Ideally, there should be no loose objects in your yard.
5. Have Multiple Power Sources
Most hurricanes are strong enough to disable entire power grids, so you must prepare for this situation by installing multiple energy sources within your home. A surge protector is a good start. It will protect all your electronic appliances from storm surges, which are common during hurricanes.
A generator serves as a fantastic second line of defense because it runs on propane or natural gas. Even the smallest models will keep your refrigerator running and air conditioning on if your primary power source goes out and the surge protector fails.
6. Plan an Evacuation Route
You must know where to go if the local government orders evacuation. Consider these factors when mapping out your route:
Make for higher ground and move further inland.
Avoid high-traffic areas like interstate highways. Try to follow side streets as much as you can.
Plan to stop at a grocery store or gas station if they are still open.
An evacuation alarm can signal at any moment as the storm approaches, so you should outline the route in advance and keep a bag of supplies on standby for a quick exit. Fill up all your vehicles with gas well before the storm arrives, whether authorities have called for an evacuation or not.
Prepare Your Home for Hurricane Season
Winter has already begun to pass, which means warmer days and the start of hurricane season are just around the corner. Prepare your home for these harsh tropical storms by following the above instructions and gathering the necessary supplies. You might just save your family’s lives.
