Earthquake Drill Makes School Goers Alert, Confident

by Gil Camporazo

Not only the students and pupils of the school are prepared and ready for a natural disaster like earthquake, but the loss of lives may be prevented if they know what to do during the earthquake as pointed out by the Balabag Elementary School principal after the conduct of an earthquake drill to join the entire country of Mass Earthquake Drill which is done by the school and other government agencies simultaneously this morning.

The Balabag Elementary School in the Division of La Carlota City, Negros Island Region through its School Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (SDRRM) headed by the School Head, Mr. Gilbor I. Camporazo with the cooperation of  Brgy. Balabag Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (BDRRM) headed by Punong Brgy. Joel Rumbines conducted the earthquake drill on June 22, 2016 in line with the 2nd Quarter National Simultaneous Earthquake Drill 2016.

Cubay Elem. School Earthquake Drill

My school, Cubay Elementary School as a routine activity on disaster preparedness and consciousness conducted an earthquake drill Thursday, July 11, 2013.

Earthquake drill

Before this is done, we have to satisfy first the four stages of the earthquake like planning or organizing the earthquake drill, developing the school earthquake evacuation plan, orientation prior to the conduct of earthquake drill, and the actual conduct of earthquake drill.

These stages where already discussed to the members of the school disaster management committee and to the pupils last year. This year's activity is a follow-up. We the school heads do understand that this earthquake drill would only be effective if it is done regularly. Not only done, when some parts of the country is experiencing a calamity like the earthquake. "Constant practice makes perfect" so to speak.

Phases of Earthquake Drill (PageWise, 2002)

In conducting the earthquake drill, there are 6 phases of self-explanatory things to comply with, such as Phase 1 - Alarm, Phase 2 - Response, Phase 3 - Evacuation, Phase 4 - Assembly, Phase 5 - Head count, and Phase 6 - Evaluate.