What We’re Watching: 1/20/12

At the end of each week, we post a "What We’re Watching" blog as we look ahead to the weekend and recap events from the week. We encourage you to share it with your friends and family, and have a safe weekend.

Severe Weather Outlook

This weekend, our friends at the National Weather Service expect a mixture of winter weather in several parts of the U.S. Heavy snowfall is expected to continue throughout parts of the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains with some flooding likely. They also predict freezing rain to impact parts of the Great Plains and Midwest.
Additionally, high winds are forecasted throughout parts of the Rocky Mountains, Great Plains and Central parts of the U.S. Heavy rain with the potential for flooding is forecasted for the Pacific and, unfortunately, severe drought conditions are expected to continue across the South.
Stay up-to-date on your local forecast by visiting weather.gov or mobile.weather.gov on your mobile device. And remember, you can prepare for winter weather, or any kind of severe weather, by visiting Ready.gov or m.fema.gov on your mobile device.

The Great Central Shakeout

The countdown to the Great Central U.S. Shakeout has officially begun, with only a little over 2 weeks away from the exercise. On February 7 at 10:15 a.m. central, millions of Americans will stop what they’re doing to participate in an earthquake drill and "Drop. Cover. Hold on." I encourage you to participate in this exercise to ensure you’re prepared in the event of an earthquake. 
So far, more than one million people have registered to participate in the Shakeout across the Central U.S. You can still participate even if you live in other regions. So if you haven’t already, sign up to “shakeout” – then encourage your friends and family to register too.

For more information on the Shakeout or to learn how to host a Shakeout event, visit The Great Central Shakeout. And check out Ready.gov/earthquakes to learn how you can prepare your home, workplace or school for an earthquake.

Picture of the Week

Volunteers from Habitat for Humanity build two new homes for tornado survivors. Jewish and Muslim New York University student and staff volunteer at the job site work side-by-side. FEMA funding and coordination with volunteer agencies help make cooperation like this possible.



FEMA Think Tank

Thanks to everyone who submitted ideas and comments to the Think Tank. So far, there have been more than 100 ideas submitted from people across the U.S. As promised, Deputy Administrator Serino will hold the first monthly conference call next Thursday, Jan. 26 at 1:30pm CST – so save the date on your calendar.

The conference call is open to the public, so anyone interested in listening in on the discussion can join. The call in number is 800-593-0692 and password is Think Tank January. You can access the captioning for the event and follow the discussion and pose questions on Twitter by searching and using #femathinktank.

You can also continue to contribute to the conversation by using our collaboration forum and submit a new idea and comments.

Presidential Policy Directive 8

Be sure to comment on the Presidential Policy Directive-8 (PPD-8) frameworks that are currently open: Mitigation Framework, Prevention Framework, Protection Framework, and Response Framework. The campaigns will close soon, so visit our community today and make sure your ideas are heard.