What to Do Before and After a Weather Emergency

What to Do Before and After a Weather Emergency

Jesus Garcia, Public Affairs Specialist, Food Safety Education Staff

In 2023, the U.S. set a record for natural disasters with 28 weather and climate emergencies that cost $92.9 billion in damages, according to Climate.gov. Winter storms, wildfires, heatwaves, flooding, tornados and hurricanes can bring immediate damage to a community, but the lingering effects include foodborne illness.

Food that has been exposed to fire, flood water or a power outage for too long can contain harmful bacteria that make you sick.

Knowing how to keep food safe and how to determine if food is safe will help minimize the potential loss of food and reduce the risk of foodborne illness after weather emergencies and power outages.

Power outages

• Before: Fill empty spaces in your freezer with frozen plastic jugs of water, bags of ice, or gel packs. Also, freeze items that you don't need right away.

• During: Keep your refrigerator and freezer doors closed. A refrigerator will keep food safely cold for 4 hours after power loss if it is unopened. A full freezer will hold a safe temperature for 48 hours, and a half full freezer for 24 hours if it is unopened.
• After: If the power is off longer, you can transfer food to a cooler and fill with ice or frozen gel packs. Make sure there is enough ice to keep food in the cooler at 40 degrees F or below. Add more ice to the cooler as it begins to melt. Discard any perishable food after the safe timeframes if you are unable to transfer to a cooler.

Floods

• Before: If possible, raise refrigerators and freezers off the floor by placing cement blocks underneath them. Move canned goods and other shelf-stable foods to a higher area.
• After: Do not eat any food or drink bottled water that came in contact with flood water. Discard any food that is not in a waterproof container (those with screw caps, snap lids, pull tops and crimped caps). Discard any cardboard juice/milk/baby formula boxes and home-canned foods that came in contact with flood water because they cannot be effectively cleaned and sanitized. Undamaged, commercially prepared food in all-metal cans and retort pouches can be saved if you remove the labels, thoroughly wash packaging with soap and water and sanitize them.

Fire

• Before: If you have an emergency kit, pack nonperishable snacks to sustain you for a couple of days. These items include canned meats, beef jerky, protein or fruit bars, dry cereal, dried fruit and peanut butter.
• After: Discard all food that has been near a fire. Food exposed to fire can be damaged by the heat of the fire, smoke fumes and fire-fighting chemicals. Sanitize cookware exposed to fire-fighting chemicals by washing in soap and hot water then submerging for 15 minutes in a solution containing one tablespoon of unscented, liquid chlorine bleach per gallon of drinking water.

For more tips on how to determine food safety in the event of a weather emergency, visit Keep Your Food Safe During Emergencies: Power Outages, Floods & Fires. You can also visit our toolkit to help you craft emergency preparedness messages.

For more food safety information, contact the USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline at 1-888-MPHotline (1-888-674-6854), email [email protected], or chat live at ask.usda.gov from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday to reach a food safety specialist in English or Spanish.