The San Francisco Chronicle publishes​ a must read "Preparing for Disaster: A guide to surviving the next big quake or fire."   It is worth reading.  Start by taking pictures of your home and personal property.  Get the whole family involved and make it a fun project. It's a great opportunity for each member of the family to take stock of your possessions and their value, sentimental as well as monetary.

I have lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for twenty-two years with the last ten through the Caldecott Tunnel in Contra Costa County.  Our house is located in a semi-rural area abundant with a variety of native oaks ranging in size from seedlings to magnificent multi trunked specimens.  The landscape is considered Oak Woodland, as described in Plants and Landscapes for Summer-Dry Cllimates published by East Bay Municipal Utility District (a valuable book for anyone living in the East Bay):

"Oak woodland is a signature vegetation type of the San Francisco Bay Region, especially in areas of rolling hills or gently sloping terrain.  Scattered oaks stand out against a background of mostly annual grasses that are green in winter and straw colored in summer or form dense groves in the clefts of hills and in valleys."

In the same book under Fire Safety:

"Another price of living near wildands is the likelihood of some day experiencinga disastrous wildfire.  In summer-dry climates fire is a regularly expected natural event.  Prior to our public policy of fire suppression, most acreage in lowland and mid-elevation Calfironia burned every ten to fifty years.  The most destructive fires occur in hilly areas, which, because of the views and surrounding open space, is where much suburban development has occurred."

The first few years I remember lots of rain.  Rivers, including the Russian River, flooded towns and homes.  One year I remember smelling smoke that had driffted all the way down from Oregon.  The last several years have been different.  Devastating fires in Napa and Sonoma seem like they are becoming an annual event.  Pacific Gas & Electric shut down electrical service to many communities throughout the area.  We experienced two outages.  The first for slightly less than 24 hours and then second for slighty over 24 hours.  Other homes nearby on a different power grid were not as fortunate to have their power restored so quickly.

When I first moved to San Francisco I worried about earthquakes.  Now I worry about earthquakes and wildfires. Two different types of emergencies.   

Several years ago during a red flag fire day, fires were burning up North, the air was dry and static was in the air.  It was the moment I understood how easily a fire could start in this sort of dry hot weather.    Add in some hot dry wind from the east  (verses the cool wet fog from the ocean in the west) and those sparks can travel and spread quickly.   That was the year I put together an emergency binder as well as put all important papers/documents in an a portable file ready to be grabbed when evacuating.

Each year during fire season on those especially dry days the sound of a siren in the distances raises the hair on the back of my neck.  I glance to make sure my accordian file bag is within reach.  The bag holds our passports, birth certificates and all manner of iimportant papers and copies of papers that would be needed in the event of a real disaster.   

This past year I prepared more especially given the possibility of being without electricity for several days. My goal is to prepare emergency supplies and procedures for two scenarios.  The first revolving around evacuating and the second is sheltering in place in your home or on your property in a tent if the home is not safe.