when disaster strikes, where do the unhoused go?

 when disaster strikes, where do the unhoused go?

We are constantly told to prepare for the Big One.

Store water.
Store food.
Keep copies of your identification.
Have a grab-and-go bag.
Know where you will go.

But what if you don't have a home?

In 2025, the Greater Vancouver homeless count identified 5,232 people experiencing homelessness in a single 24-hour count.

That included people who were sheltered and people who were unsheltered.

And even that number is a minimum.

The people conducting the count acknowledge that a one-night count does not capture everyone experiencing homelessness. It misses people who are couch-surfing, people without secure tenure, and others whose housing situation is hidden or temporary.

So let's stop pretending the number is simply 5,232.

5,232 is the number we can document from that snapshot. The real population without secure housing is larger.

Now imagine an earthquake.

You have no home.

You have no basement where you can store 72 hours of water.

No refrigerator full of food.

No locked closet containing emergency supplies.

Maybe your identification, clothing, phone charger and everything else you own are in one backpack.

Maybe your belongings are split between a friend's place, a storage locker and wherever you can sleep.

Maybe you are already sleeping outside.

Where do you go?

Vancouver has designated Disaster Support Hubs. After a major disaster, these can become places where people receive information and, depending on the circumstances, access food, water, supplies and shelter.

But emergency preparedness cannot simply tell people:

“Store three days of supplies at home.”

What if you don't have a home?

What if the disaster destroys the little you have?

What if the person you are staying with has nowhere safe to go either?

And what about people who are living in vehicles, couch-surfing or moving from place to place?

These people are already vulnerable before the earthquake happens.

A disaster doesn't erase that vulnerability.

It can magnify it.

So I want to know:

What is Vancouver's plan for people who are unhoused when a major earthquake strikes?

Where do they go?

Where do they get water?

Where do they get food?

Where do they sleep?

How do they replace identification and essential belongings if everything they own is lost?

How are people who don't have a permanent address accounted for during an evacuation?

And most importantly:

Have emergency planners actually planned for people who have nowhere to evacuate from?

Because preparedness should mean everyone.

Not just people with houses, cars, pantries and storage closets.

When disaster strikes, nobody should be told:

“You should have been prepared.”

We should already have a plan for the people who have the least ability to prepare.

#earthquakepreparedness #Cascadia #Vancouver #MetroVancouver #Surrey #homelessness #unhoused #emergencyplanning #TheBigOne #housingcrisis