Tornado Survival Tips

Would you know what to do if a tornado threatened your neighborhood? While homeowners insurance Houston may typically help cover the costs of fixing damage caused by windstorm and hail, the personal safety of you and your family is likely to be down to you.

Fortunately the Office of Climate, Weather and Water Services (OWS) provides a range of advice about what to do in such an emergency, including:

•The priority is to take shelter. This can be in a basement or if there is nowhere underground you can access, get under a solid piece of furniture on the first floor.  Ideally this should be in an inside room. Wherever you take refuge, stay away from windows. OWS also advises that mobile homes are not suitable choices for shelter as they are too flimsy to offer the solid protection you are likely to require in a tornado

•Should you be caught outside, try to get to indoor shelter immediately, either on foot or in a car. Tornados can move extremely fast and you may run out of time – should your car start to be hit by debris, the advice from OWS is to pull over and park, keeping your head down and your seatbelt on; or in some cases you may be able to take shelter outside the car below road level.

Once the storm has passed you may find that your community has been severely damaged. In the arbitrary nature of tornadoes, some homes may be left standing while others could be flattened. While there is no predicting that, at least it is possible to say that your homeowners insurance Houston should be the first place you turn for help with the costs of rebuilding and repair.

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