Second, we need to increase our efforts to impress upon animal owners the need to have personal disaster plans in place. This means preparing and distributing materials for owners, clubs, stables, farmers and commercial establishments. Finally, when disaster strikes, we must be ready to be responsive and sympathetic. When responding to the needs of people's animals, we are not just dealing with property that may or may not be of significant economic value. We are dealing with fellow creatures capable of pain, fear, panic, depression and post-traumatic stress.
Disasters are the great levelers in the literal and figurative sense.
They often bring rich and poor, human and animal, to a common state. Disasters teach us that we are all in this together and by working together we increase the chances that we all will survive. Tamara Chism Duncan. Robert D. Linnabary, John C. New, Barbara M. Vogt, Carol Griffith-Davies and Lee Williams, 1993. Federal Emergency Management Agency.