Shortly after news of the fires broke, the American Logistics Aid Network reached out to their non-profit partners to get a handle on what types of donated logistics services and equipment they anticipate needing – and where.
At the moment, we’re told that local relief organizations have the supplies they require in the short term, because nearby communities have been incredibly generous. In fact, these organizations are already being logistically challenged by the outpouring of donations, all of which needed to be sorted, categorized and organized in order to get them ready for distribution.
Most of these organizations have little to no experience running that kind of ad hoc warehousing and transportation operation – especially under such dire circumstances – so ALAN has been especially busy providing these organizations with the just-in-time guidance they require. Along those lines, we’ll be hosting a California fires logistics call on Monday at 3:30 Eastern time for non-profit organizations. (All non-profits are welcome, so if you’re already assisting with relief efforts in the area or are planning to do so in the future, you can register at this link.)
We are also gathering and sharing key information about how the fires are affecting logistics infrastructure and resources, including information on road closures, power outages, curfews, and more. (Check out our Disaster Microsite at (https://www.alanaid.org/operations/_ and our Supply Chain Intelligence Center at https://www.alanaid.org/resources/ for details.) These free resources exist to help non-profits and businesses make better-informed decisions about how to keep essential supplies like food and water moving into disaster-affected areas, which is crucial at times like these, and we are honored to be able to provide it.
Finally, we are preparing to fill requests for donated logistics assistance – which is where the industry comes in.
How To Help
If you have logistics capabilities like warehouse space, trucks, equipment, or supplies you’d be willing to donate to support fire relief efforts please offer them now. We’ll need a lot of support in the coming days, weeks and months. And the more advance information we have about available resources, the more quickly we’ll be able to fulfill requests for assistance and get survivors the help they need.
In addition, please visit our Disaster Micro-Site (https://www.alanaid.org/operations/_often. It’s where we’ll post all requests for fire relief assistance we receive – and where we already have a large number of unfilled requests that are related to other disasters. We’d be grateful if you could help us fill one or more of them.
Please also consider making a donation to support our response activities. We rely on your financial support, and your gift will allow us to continue providing the donated logistics assistance that is so critical to helping communities like Pacific Palisades, Altadena and others recover.
On a final note, please don’t try to send supplies to Southern California right now. Relief organizations and disaster survivors have no place to store or keep them – and trying to handle the wave of incoming products can turn into a major challenge at a time when they’re dealing with other priorities.
