Lesson · Seismic Risk & Structural Safety

Drop, Cover, Hold On: Why the Protocol Is What It Is

The reasoning behind the standard earthquake response, what it is protecting against, and the specific situations in which the default advice changes.

  • K-12
  • Teacher
  • Student
  • Visitor
  • Responder

Learning objectives

  • State what the drop-cover-hold protocol is protecting against, and what it is not.
  • Explain why moving between rooms or outdoors during shaking increases injury risk.
  • Identify the safest available cover in a room within a few seconds.
  • Describe how the protocol changes for a wheelchair user, a bedbound person, and someone in a vehicle.

In the field

Ordered, and meant to be workable under pressure. Numbered because the sequence matters.

  1. Identify, in the room you are in now, the sturdy object you would get under.
  2. Clear the space above beds and desks of anything heavy that could fall onto a person.
  3. Practise the protocol once with everyone who uses the room, including the wheelchair and bed variants.
  4. Anchor tall furniture and appliances to the wall before you need them to stay put.
  5. Agree that nobody runs outside during shaking, and that the meeting point is used only after it stops.

Sources · 3

The tag under each source states what was actually checked. “Authority named · URL not re-resolved” means the issuing body and document are named, but the link was not re-resolved for this lesson. It is not a claim of verification, and the authority’s own current bulletin always supersedes anything here.