The SNAP Program: Get Confident

Now comes the most fun and important part of SNAP. If you never practice your plan, the chances of it working on the day of the disaster is limited. Practicing will insure that people will know their roles and responsibilities, that the mapping of your neighborhood is accurate and that you have the safety equipment needed to accomplish the tasks.

Conducting a drill is not something that can be done without some planning. The goal of a drill is to build confidence and provide an opportunity for learning. Start easy and work up to more difficult drills. The following tools include tips on how to organize and conduct an effective drill, directions for how to administer the drill in your neighborhood, the scenario and objectives for the drill and directions for evaluating the drill. Look over the scenarios to decide which drill is best suited to the level of planning and readiness in your neighborhood. Each drill clearly lists the estimated time it will take to complete the drill, the level of difficulty, and the type of drill. There are lists of tasks that need to be done before the drill as well as suggestions for evaluating the drill. After the drill, it's important to make time to talk about the drill, the lessons learned and make any changes to the plan if needed.

We will be updating and adding new drills to this site. Many of the drills will focus on earthquakes. Others will help to broaden the scope of your plan to include other emergency and disaster scenarios, ways to use your plan to improve your overall community preparedness and planning for social activities.

The Office of Emergency Management would like to know when you are conducting a drill in your neighborhood. You can send us your drill evaluation and any questions to snap@ seattle.gov.

Once you learn how to conduct effective drills in your neighborhood, you'll likely come up with some practice drills on your own. If you do, please email us your scenarios so we can share them with other neighborhoods.

Conducting Effective Neighborhood Drills (PDF)

Planning Process for a Neighborhood Drill (PDF)

Neighborhood Drill Log (PDF)

Getting Organized Beginner Drill (PDF)

Beginner Tabletop Drill - Task Responsibilities (PDF)

Intermediate Functional Drill - Map Your Neighbhorhood (PDF)