Don't store diapers in the basement.

Don't close an important thoroughfare until you have an alternate route for traffic.

Don't establish your emergency operations office in the floodplain.

These are some of the simple lessons learned during the Summer of Soak in southwestern Wisconsin. There was a predictable deluge of helpful advice from official sources during and after the floods this summer, most of it dealing with assistance in navigating the bureaucracy and lists of whom to call for help. In an attempt to catalog practical advice and interesting observations, we contacted several people who spent weeks on the ground in the water.

GETTING THERE

"There's no substitute for a good GPS unit in a flood, but they're worthless when you can't get there from here," said Meg Galloway, the state's top dam expert and chief of the DNR's Dams and Floodplain Section, with a side expertise in watershed management, which means she was on duty non-stop.

The suggestion that a road not be closed until an alternative route is set came from Patrick Beghin, the emergency operations director for Columbia County, where the closing of the Interstates that slice through there caused havoc affecting the entire state.

"We can't shut the Interstate system down without putting an alternate route in place," he said,

He also noted that the tourism industry probably shouldn't be telling everyone "we're open for business" while the roads to get to those open businesses are flooded.

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

Mary Lou Santovec and her husband, Rick, were flooded from their Jefferson home, and Mary Lou, a writer, had a few lessons to remember and pass on for the next flood.

"I won't keep any remains from estates in the basement ever again," said Santovec. Fortunately, the night the waters first threatened their basement, which contained parts of three relatives' estates, they had guests for supper who insisted on emptying the basement immediately.

Galloway, known for a wry sense of humor, also noted it would be wise to keep your disaster equipment in a state office building that is not built in a floodplain, because if there is a flood, you can't get there. (Such was the case in Waukesha County.)

A more specific location tip came from Beghin: "We have had some meetings with our assisted-living facilities. We had to evacuate a couple of those during the floods and we all came to the conclusion that they shouldn't store the (adult diapers) in the basement. They soak up water and make a real mess and weigh about 40 pounds when they're wet."

PREPARATION

"Learn how to install a sump pump during a crisis, not after," said Santovec.

They went through four sump pumps, as the constant pumping 24 hours a day for two weeks wore them out. One lasted for only four hours.

"I can change a sump pump in 10 to 15 minutes," she said.

Shirley Connors is the emergency management coordinator for Rock County, an area that was on flood alert from the winter through the heavy flooding in June. She had lots of practical insights.

"Wear slacks, shoes and socks, no shorts and not barefoot and not bare-legged, if you have to go in the water. You never know what type of debris is in there, and a lot of people were breaking out in rashes afterwards because they were finding that bad stuff was carried in that water," said Connors.

"Wear rubber gloves, too, and shower immediately and use soap!" she said.

"Long sleeves should be worn when cleaning up debris," she said.

And, adds Santovec, "even if you don't fish, buy a pair of waders."

HIDDEN HEALTH RISKS

"Several weeks after the flooding we had a spring-fed lake that was overflowing and people called and wanted to go to another area and get sandbags and move them," said Connors. "We had to remind them to be sure to not take the sandbags that had already been in the water. That is a way to transport (bacteria) from one body of water to another.

"Playground equipment, even the swing set in your back yard, has to be extremely cleaned and washed down, even the sand in your sandbox if it has been underwater, should be replaced because it has been contaminated," she said.

COMMUNICATION

"Everyone has lessons learned, what went wrong and what didn't," said Lori Getter, the crisis communications manager for Wisconsin Emergency Government. At her level, two mechanisms for information sharing, previously untested, worked quite well.

Public information officers were called in from nearly a dozen state agencies to help cover shifts for 24 hours a day for three weeks.

"The need for information was huge," she said, and the emergency government Web site, with updated closings and flooding alerts, was getting up to 50,000 hits daily. A new software program that coordinates up to the minute information from numerous sources, called "E-Sponder," apparently worked quite well.

"People still want to talk with a real person," said Getter. "We had calls from people from all over wanting to know how to get across the state. There was such a demand for information, coordination was a struggle because that information was changing so fast."

IT'S NOT WHAT HAPPENS, IT'S HOW YOU REACT TO WHAT HAPPENS

"The three P's, 'grab your pills, purses and pets,' that lesson hasn't changed," said Julie Loeffelholz, a veteran Grant County emergency government staffer.

Emergency workers and residents don't usually have time to consider the philosophical lessons of a flood.

Loeffelholz welcomed the chance to respond:

"The disaster happens, and it brings out two types of people. First, there are those who want to get everything cleaned up immediately and will work tirelessly, almost to exhaustion to have everything 'back to normal' as quickly as possible.

"And then there are those who will ignore the problem and pretend it didn't happen and will do nothing until it literally becomes a public health emergency, with mold growing 8 feet high onto the walls and they can't manage it and refuse to do anything about it.

"The irony of this is that more and more I am finding those who fall into the latter category. I have found no rhyme nor reason as to why people react as they do. The latter happens to the wealthy and poor, the ambitious and the lazy. People I expect to pick themselves up and make it happen just founder while those who have been needy all their lives, suddenly find the strength to brush off the mess and get on with life. I have spent most of my adult life studying people and their responses to situations, and most of these studies in the last years have been under disaster situations. I have come to no conclusions nor great logic."