Director of the National Office of Disaster Services (NODS) Sherrod James says coming off the heels of preparedness for Tropical Storm Bret last week, NODS hopes that persons will maintain their level of preparedness and not let their guard down.

“What we are actually hoping is that persons are a bit more out of that mode of complacency, thinking that ok, I really don’t have to pay attention until August, September, October [because] that’s usually traditionally when we see most of the serious action in our neck of the woods”, James said.

He noted that NODS has always advocated that it does not matter how active or normal the forecast is for the season, “It just takes you not being prepared for one”.

“And that’s why we’ve always advocated that you can get a hurricane, a storm, in any month of the year; within or outside of the hurricane season.

We just name it the hurricane season because that is when we see the most frequent form of these things”, the NODS Director stated.

According to him, it is good that people are now going about looking at their disaster management, preparedness, and response plans with their families, community, organizations, and colleagues.

James concluded, “It is always good to have that in the forefront, cause at the end of the day it’s not just about something you do when something is happening.

It’s your lifestyle and therefore we have to make this part of our everyday living because hazards come sometimes with warning, sometimes without.  So, we always have to make sure that we have a measure of vigilance”.