Emergency Preparedness in Dunsmuir
Emergency preparedness is essential for the safety and well-being of the Dunsmuir community. Its purpose is to equip residents with the knowledge and resources needed to effectively respond to emergencies, minimize risks, and foster resilience in the face of potential hazards. Through a coordinated approach, the city aims to enhance public safety and encourage individuals and families to be ready to protect themselves and their loved ones during critical situations.
Several initiatives contribute to this goal:
Resilient Dunsmuir Plan (Safety Element): While currently in development, this plan will focus on enhancing the community's ability to withstand and recover from disasters by addressing local vulnerabilities and promoting sustainable practices.
New Siren System: Designed to provide timely alerts and notifications during emergencies, this system helps residents receive crucial information when it matters most.
Ready Siskiyou Alerts: This alert system keeps the community informed about potential threats and emergency updates, allowing residents to take appropriate actions in a timely manner.
Ready Set Go: This program encourages community members to prepare personal evacuation plans and stay informed, fostering a proactive mindset toward emergency situations.
El Niño and Winter Storm Preparedness: El Niño can bring heavy rain, flooding, high winds, and mudslides to our area. This section provides flood safety flyers, storm season tips, and simple steps residents can take now to protect their homes and families before storms arrive.
Dunsmuir Operational Procedures for Emergencies (DOPE): These procedures outline the city's response strategies, ensuring local resources are effectively mobilized during emergencies.
NWS Skywarn: By participating in this program, residents can become weather spotters, helping to monitor and report severe weather conditions, which enhances community awareness and safety.
Together, these initiatives reflect Dunsmuir's commitment to emergency preparedness, promoting a culture where residents are informed, engaged, and ready to respond effectively in the face of any emergency.
Resilient Dunsmuir Plan (Safety Element)
The City is updating its General Plan Safety Element to create the Resilient Dunsmuir Plan (Safety Element), a comprehensive resilience strategy that addresses natural hazards, climate adaptation, environmental justice, and community preparedness. This integrated planning effort combines the Safety Element Update, Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP), Local Hazard Mitigation Plan (LHMP), and Environmental Justice Element into one coordinated approach.
The Resilient Dunsmuir Plan (Safety Element) establishes the policies and strategies that guide Dunsmuir's emergency preparedness and hazard mitigation efforts. Visit the Resilient Dunsmuir Plan (Safety Element) (button below) for additional information about this important planning effort, community workshops, project timeline, and opportunities for public involvement.
Data collected from the first stakeholder meeting held 02/11/25
Safety Element: The last major update was in 2006. The current Safety Element has multiple deficiencies. This plan is focused on reducing our risk from all hazards through land use planning.
Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP): The last CWPP update was in 2016. The CWPP should be updated at least every 10 years to remain commutative for some wildfire mitigation funding sources. This plan is focused on wildfire risk reduction.
Hazard Mitigation Plan (HMP): The City has never had its own Hazard Mitigation Plan. We are currently covered under the Siskiyou County HMP, which will be formally adopted this year. This plan is focused on reducing all hazards and risks.
New Evacuation Siren Policy
The City of Dunsmuir, the Dunsmuir Fire Department, and the Siskiyou County Sheriff have worked together to create a new Evacuation Siren Policy.
Every day, you hear the Noon Signal, a 5-second siren tone. And you probably even recognize the Fire Call Signal, a 5-second on, 5-second off tone that repeats 5 times when there is a Fire Call for the Fire Department. But did you know there is an Evacuation Signal?
When will the Evacuation Siren sound?
The Evacuation Siren will only sound when an Evacuation Order is issued for the City of Dunsmuir. The Siren will not sound for an Evacuation Warning.
Why is this? The Evacuation Siren is reserved for the most dire of situations. An Evacuation Warning means “There is a potential threat to life and/or property. Those who require additional time to evacuate and those with pets and livestock should leave now.” While an Evacuation Order means “Immediate threat to life. This is a lawful order to leave now. The area is lawfully closed to public access. YOU MUST LEAVE NOW!”
This is why an Evacuation Siren will only sound when an Evacuation Order is issued.
What will the Evacuation Siren sound like?
When an Evacuation Order is issued for Dunsmuir, the siren system will sound a 2-second on, 2-second off tone that repeats for 2 full minutes. This tone will sound faster than the fire call signal and last much longer—long enough for you to check Ready Siskiyou so you know where to go.
Why doesn’t the tone last longer than 2 minutes? The Evacuation Siren tone lasts just 2 minutes because it’s just long enough to alert you something is happening so you can check Ready Siskiyou. By the time you are reading the Evacuation Order, the siren will stop, and you’ll know what to do. A more prolonged Siren could make it difficult for first responders to communicate via radio.
We are working on a future yearly test of the Evacuation Siren so that residents will become familiar with what it sounds like.
More details to come!
Sign up for Ready Siskiyou to receive emergency alerts, like evacuation orders, directly to your cell phone or landline.
Ready Siskiyou has replaced CodeRed as the Emergency Alerting platform for Siskiyou County.
Know Your Zone
Siskiyou County OES and the Dunsmuir Castella Fire District have collaborated to identify your evacuation zone. Evacuation Zones are listed in evacuation orders. Visit Genasys Protect(Click Here) to find your zone. Memorize your Zone number; City Hall is in Zone DUN-6523. However, your 4 digit number is unique in Siskiyou County, so you don’t need to memorize the three-letter prefix, just the four-digit number. There are multiple different zones within Dunsmuir.
Evacuation Terminology
Evacuation Warning: There is a potential threat to life and/or property. Those who require additional time to evacuate, as well as those with pets and livestock, should leave now.
Evacuation Order: Immediate threat to life. This is a lawful order to leave now. The area is lawfully closed to public access. YOU MUST LEAVE NOW!
If you feel threatened, don’t hesitate, LEAVE, even if no evacuation warning or order is in effect.
Always Stay Prepared
1. Get Ready: Being ready for wildfire starts with maintaining an adequate defensible space and by hardening your home by using fire resistant building materials. Visit our Dunsmuir Firewise page (click here) for more information on how to protect your home from Wildfire.
2. Get Set: Create a plan with your family to evacuate your home should a wildfire strike. Put together an emergency supply kit. Learn how to talk with young children about fire safety. Visit the CalFire page (click here) for information on how to build a Wildfire Action Plan and how to put together an emergency supply kit or Go-Bag.
3. GO! Implement your Evacuation Plan once you receive your Ready Siskiyou Alert or feel your safety is threatened.
For information on preparing for more than just wildfire, visit Ready.gov.
If you have any preparedness or hazard questions email HazmitReady@outlook.com.
El Niño and Winter Storm Preparedness
El Niño is a natural climate pattern of warmer-than-average ocean temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific. It can bring wetter, more intense winters to California. A very strong El Niño, sometimes called a “Super El Niño,” raises the risk of heavy rain, flooding, landslides, falling trees, power outages, and road closures. El Niño does not guarantee a wet winter or any particular storm, but one big storm is enough to cause serious damage.
Dunsmuir has flooded regularly over the last 100 years, with major floods in 1914, 1916, 1940, 1955, 1964, 1974, 1997, and 2017. The 1974 flood caused about $5 million in damage and destroyed 25 homes. Today, 67 structures in Dunsmuir are in the 100-year floodplain and another 165 are in the 500-year floodplain, along the Sacramento River and Alder Creek. Visit the Dunsmuir Flood Info page (button below) to see if your home is in the floodplain.
Get Ready Before Storm Season
Sign up for alerts. Sign up for Ready Siskiyou to receive emergency alerts, like evacuation orders, on your cell phone or landline.
Know your flood risk. Go to the Emergency Preparedness tab on the main menu of the City’s website and click on the Flood Preparedness tab to access the FEMA Flood Map Search button. Enter your address to see if you are in the flood zone.
Pack a go bag. Include 3 days of water and food, 7 days of medications, plus chargers, cash, and documents. Visit Ready Siskiyou (see link below) for the full go bag list.
Clear drains and gutters around your home before storms arrive.
Check your insurance. Most homeowner and renter policies do not cover flooding, and flood insurance generally takes 30 days to take effect. Visit FloodSmart (see link below) to learn more and get a quote.
Sandbags
Free sand and bags are available on the west side of the Dunsmuir Community Center, past the steam locomotive on Dunsmuir Avenue. Bags are in the black box marked BAGS. Fill and take what you need.
When Water Rises
Never drive or walk through floodwater. It can be deeper and faster than it looks. Turn around, don’t drown.
Stay away from the river and creek banks during high water.
Follow evacuation warnings and orders (see Evacuation Terminology above). If you feel unsafe, leave, even if no warning or order is in effect.
Call 911 for life-threatening emergencies.
Flyers and More Information
Links to use:
Ready Siskiyou go bag list: readysiskiyou.gov
FloodSmart: floodsmart.gov
Cal OES Storm Season Safety: https://www.news.caloes.ca.gov/stormseason/
NOAA El Niño conditions: https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/ensodisc.shtml (NOAA updates this page monthly, so the link stays current)
The NWS forecast and Dunsmuir Flood Info links already exist on the page
The dope plan
The Dunsmuir Operational Procedures for Emergencies (DOPE) establishes an emergency organizational structure, assigns tasks, provides guidance, specifies policies and procedures, and provides for integrated coordination of planning, response, and recovery efforts for large-scale emergencies. The DOPE serves as the City of Dunsmuir’s Emergency Operations Plan (EOP).
Paradise Lessons Learned Video
"A High and Awful Price: Lessons Learned from the Camp Fire" is a mini-documentary taken from interviews with first responders, disaster response officials and the survivors of the Camp Fire, passing on their hard won knowledge to those who may someday face their own disaster.
NWS Skywarn
The National Weather Service (NWS) in Medford serves the Dunsmuir area. The NWS Medford is always looking for SKYWARN Spotters. SKYWARN is a volunteer program with between 350,000 and 400,000 trained severe weather spotters. These volunteers help keep their local communities safe by providing timely and accurate reports of severe weather to the National Weather Service. Anyone can join; all you need to do is take a SKYWARN training course. You can take the online SKYWARN training anytime (click here).
For the official NWS forecast for Dunsmuir (click here).
ONE LESS SPARK
Jumpstart grant
(Click here) for the PDF version of this flyer which contains the working links for each item listed.
