Evacuation can reduce morbidity and mortality by ensuring households are safely out of the path of, and ensuing impacts from, a disaster. Our goal was to characterize potential evacuation behaviors among a nationally representative sample.

We added 10 questions to the existing Porter Novelli’s (PN) ConsumerStyles surveys in Fall 2020, Spring 2021, and Fall 2021.We conducted a weighted analysis using SAS 9.4 to examine distributions and estimate associations of potential evacuation behaviors of each survey separately.

When asked about barriers to evacuation if public authorities announced a mandatory evacuation because of a large-scale disaster, ~7% reported nothing would prevent them from evacuating. Over half of respondents across the 3 surveys (51.1%-52.4%) had no preparedness plans, and almost two-thirds of respondents (63.7%-66.2%) did not have an emergency supply kit.

Knowing potential evacuation behaviors can help frame messages and provide a starting point for interventions to improve disaster preparedness and response. Overall, data show that there is much work to be done regarding evacuation behaviors and overall preparedness in the United States. These data can be used to tailor public messaging and work with partners to increase knowledge about evacuation.