Sense of Security

It is easy to feel safe and secure in our daily lives. It is easy to assume that nothing will ever happen, that disasters never occur where you live. We asked one of our Founders and Senior VPs to discuss why that mentality can be dangerous.

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On July 24th some time ago, I was in my office in Orem, UT when I received a phone call from a woman in Southern California. As we were talking, an earthquake shook her home, and she became very afraid. I did my best to instruct her. “Get under a doorway,” I said, trying to calm her.

When the quake ended, she ceased to panic, thanked me for my assistance and went to assess the damage. I sat back, took a deep breath, and mused about the singularity of the experience.

Within hours, one of my employees came into my office and told me that a customer had just experienced a flash flood in Phoenix, Arizona. The street where she lived had literally turned into a dangerous river. After the employee left, I pondered what I had experienced that day. A feeling of smug security came over me. I thought, How grateful I am to live in Orem, Utah where things like this rarely happen.

Within a few hours a policeman came to our corporate headquarters and told us that we would have to immediately evacuate the building. A nearby chemical plant had caught fire, and there was a possibility of an explosion taking place. When I arrived home, a short distance from my office, another police officer was informing our neighborhood that the area had become unsafe and that we may have to leave until the emergency was contained.

The lesson I learned that day has stuck with me over the years: No one is immune to all danger, and no one lives in a place that is totally free from the unexpected.

-Don W Pectol, VP, Emergency Essentials.