LOS ANGELES, AUGUST 28, 2023 — During National Preparedness Month in September, the American Red Cross Los Angeles Region urges everyone to prepare for worsening climate disasters affecting Southern California communities that have experienced recent extreme heat, storms, flooding, as well as increasingly longer wildfire seasons year over year.
Severe weather like this is part of a worsening national trend in which the American Red Cross has responded to nearly twice as many large disasters across the country as it did a decade ago.
As rapidly intensifying, weather-related events pose serious challenges to its humanitarian work and the people it serves, the Red Cross has announced an ambitious national plan to take urgent action. With more climate-driven disasters upending lives and devastating communities, the organization is racing to adapt its services and grow its disaster response capacity across the country, while also funding new international programs on climate response and preparedness, as well as minimizing its own environmental footprint.
Here in Los Angeles, this includes helping protect the community against local emergencies, recruiting and training more volunteers to respond to disasters locally and across the country.
“As the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events grow, more people need help more often,” said Erica Frausto-Aguado, Regional Disaster Officer, American Red Cross Los Angeles Region. “Yet as fast as our volunteers are working to help, the needs are escalating faster. That’s why it’s critical to not only prepare yourself for risks in our community but to also help families in need — both locally and in other parts of the country. Join us by taking a preparedness class and becoming a volunteer to help others.”
For National Preparedness Month, take three lifesaving actions — get a kit, make a plan and be informed — to help protect yourself against local emergencies. Request a free preparedness class at redcross.org/la-request. You can also deliver relief and care to families facing climate disasters by becoming a Red Cross volunteer at redcross.org/VolunteerToday.
MOUNTING U.S. DISASTER RESPONSES
Today, the Red Cross is responding to nearly twice as many large disasters in the U.S. as it did a decade ago. Right now, the Red Cross is readying volunteers and supplies along the Gulf Coast in advance of Idalia, even as we remain on the ground helping communities recover from the deadliest wildfires of the last century in Hawaii, a powerful typhoon in the U.S. territory of Guam, and 1-in-100-year flooding in the Northeast, among other disasters.
In the first half of 2023 alone, the nation experienced a record 15 billion-dollar disasters, including catastrophic atmospheric rivers in California and deadly tornadoes in the South and Midwest — all on top of extreme heat, which made July the country’s hottest single month on record. What’s more, the U.S. is just now entering its typical peak time for wildfires and hurricanes.
ADAPTING TO THE CLIMATE CRISIS As extreme weather disasters increase, more people need help from the Red Cross in the U.S. Nationwide, the organization is taking bold and thoughtful actions to adapt its services and grow its capacity by: