The 5-Minute, 15-Minute, and 1-Hour Wildfire Plan Every Family Needs

Most wildfire preparedness guides tell you to have a go-bag. Very few tell you what happens when you only have five minutes to use it.

Wildfires move faster than almost any other natural disaster. A wind-driven fire can travel a mile in minutes, and evacuation orders often come with little warning. In the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California, residents were caught in their cars trying to leave. In the 2025 Palisades Fire in Los Angeles, some neighborhoods had minutes, not hours, to get out. None of those families thought it would unfold the way it did. Most assumed they would have more time.

The families who come through evacuations safest aren't the ones with the most gear. They're the ones who decided, ahead of time, exactly what they'd do with whatever warning they got.

That's what this guide builds: a plan that works at every time scale, five minutes, fifteen minutes, and one hour, so your family knows exactly what to do no matter when the word comes. Read it once. Practice it together. Then keep it somewhere every member of your household can find it.

A go-bag without a plan is just a bag. A plan without a go-bag is just a wish.

Why You Need Three Plans, Not One

Have you and your family actually decided, in advance, at what point you would leave? Not when you're certain. When you would go early?

Wildfire evacuations don't follow one script. Sometimes a fire is spotted miles away and you have an hour to pack methodically and leave in good order. Sometimes you wake to smoke and an emergency alert and have fifteen minutes before roads jam. And sometimes, as Los Angeles families experienced in January 2025, you look out your window and the hillside is already burning.

Each scenario calls for a different response. Trying to run an hour-long checklist in five minutes costs time you don't have. Having three distinct plans removes the decision-making from the moment and puts it here, now, while there's time to think clearly.

First, Learn Your Community's Alert Levels

Before the three plans, one piece of vocabulary that makes all of them work. Most wildfire-prone communities, including here in Colorado, use the nationally recognized Ready, Set, Go! framework to communicate evacuation timing. Knowing what each stage means, before you ever hear it, is one of the most valuable things a family in a fire region can do.

• Ready - Prepare Early. A fire exists in the area. Get your go-bag, load your car, know your route. Don't wait for the next stage to start preparing.
• Set - Be Alert. Conditions are changing and the threat is significant. Be ready to leave at a moment's notice. Families with children, pets, older adults, or anyone who needs more time to mobilize should leave now, don't wait for "Go."
• Go - Evacuate Now. Leave immediately. Don't stop for belongings. Roads can become impassable quickly, and early action saves lives.

The most important decision a family in a wildfire zone can make is this: decide in advance at what stage you will leave. Families who wait for "Go" often find the roads already congested. For most households with children, pets, or anyone who needs extra time, the right answer is to leave at "Set," or earlier.

What the First 15 Minutes Really Look Like

An evacuation order arrives. What happens next in your household? If the answer isn't immediate and clear, that's the gap this guide is here to close. Here's the difference preparation makes, minute by minute:

Time	A Prepared Family
0:00	Order received. Everyone knows the plan. No debate about whether to go.
0:02	Go-bag grabbed from its designated spot. Already packed. Nothing to assemble.
0:05	Pets loaded with their carrier and supplies. Documents already in the bag.
0:08	Car loaded. Primary route confirmed, alternate route identified as backup.
0:12	Out the door. Out-of-town contact notified.
0:15	On the road and moving, ahead of the main evacuation traffic.

At minute fifteen, the unprepared family is still looking for medications, debating what to take, and discovering the pet carrier is buried in the garage. The difference isn't courage or intelligence. It's preparation done in advance. Everything below is how you become the family in that table.

The 5-Minute Plan: Fire Is Here. Leave Now.

This is the plan for when there is no time. Fire is visible, an alert just sounded, and the word is evacuate immediately. You have five minutes, maybe less. In this scenario, your only job is to get every living thing out of the house and into the car. Nothing else matters.

The 5-Minute List: In This Order

• Grab your go-bag: it should already be packed and near your door
• Account for every person: call out names, don't search room by room
• Grab pets: carrier if available, leash if not
• Get in the car: windows up, air on recirculate to block smoke
• Drive away: don't stop to gather anything else

The 5-minute plan only works if your go-bag is already packed, always accessible, and never buried. Position it near your front door or in your car during wildfire season.

What Your Go-Bag Must Contain

• Water: minimum one day's supply per person
• Non-perishable food for 72 hours per person
• All prescription medications for every household member
• Copies of critical documents: IDs, insurance, medical records
• Phone charger and portable power bank, fully charged
• Cash in small bills
• NIOSH-marked N95 or P100 respirators, two-strap rather than ear loop
• A change of clothes per person, in heavy cotton or wool rather than synthetic fabric, which melts
• Leather gloves, sturdy closed boots, and sealed goggles. County wildfire checklists list these consistently and almost no retail kit includes them. The RapidShield is the exception on goggles, with a pair for each person
• Eye drops. Smoke and ash irritate eyes for days after a fire
• First aid kit
• Flashlight or headlamp

Everything on this list should be in your bag right now, not assembled when fire season starts, not put together when you see smoke. Now.

If your go-bag isn't built yet, our Wildfire Emergency Kits come pre-assembled with the foundation of this list: 72 hours of food, drinking water plus a way to treat more, first aid, light, emergency shelter, and a weather radio, with room built in for the personal layer only you can add. Pack those in once, and your bag is genuinely ready.

The 15-Minute Plan: Warning Issued. Move Deliberately.

An evacuation warning, the "Set" stage, called a pre-evacuation notice in much of Colorado, means fire is in your area and you should be prepared to leave immediately. It's not an order yet, but treat it like one. The families who come through wildfires in the best shape are the ones who left on the warning, not the order.

Fifteen minutes is enough time to do the 5-minute plan plus a small number of additional items. Don't try to do more than that.

The 15-Minute List: After You Have the Go-Bag and People

• Grab any prescription medications not already in the go-bag
• Add one small bag of irreplaceable personal items: a hard drive, family photos, heirloom jewelry
• Load pets with their carriers, food, water, and medications
• Close all windows and doors. Leave them unlocked for firefighters
• Remove flammable doormats, outdoor cushions, and patio items. Move them inside or to a pool
• Leave exterior lights on. It helps firefighters locate your home in smoke
• Shut off propane tanks at the valve if you can do it in under two minutes
• Get in the car and go

Don't stop to load valuables, furniture, or items not on your list. Every extra minute inside is a minute the roads outside are filling with traffic.

Families With Children at School

• Know your school's evacuation policy before wildfire season. Most schools shelter children until a parent arrives; don't assume automatic release
• Assign one adult to leave for school pickup the moment a warning is issued
• Have a backup pickup person designated in advance

Families With Older Adults or Members With Mobility Needs

• Activate your plan on the warning, not the order. The 15-minute window becomes 30 minutes for households with additional needs
• Know in advance how to safely move any medical equipment, and how long its battery lasts away from wall power
• Pack spare eyeglasses and hearing aid batteries or a charger. Both appear on every official older-adult checklist, and both are easy to leave on a nightstand
• For older adults specifically, the Red Cross recommends keeping at least a 30-day supply of each prescription, which is longer than the one-week figure for households generally
• Call your county emergency management office before wildfire season and ask whether they keep an evacuation assistance registry. Many do, often still listed under the older "special needs" name. Ask what they can and cannot promise, and write the answer down

The 1-Hour Plan: Fire Is in Your Area. Leave in Good Order.

An hour is a gift during a wildfire evacuation. It doesn't always come. When it does, use it systematically, not to gather more things, but to leave more safely and protect your home as best you can before you go.

First 20 Minutes: People, Pets, and Go-Bags

• Complete the 15-minute plan. Bag packed, people and pets loaded, home closed
• Add additional medications, medical supplies, and comfort items for children
• Load a second bag with several days of clothes per person
• Ensure every pet has vaccination records and vet contact stored with their kit
• Keep a current photo of yourself together with each animal. If you are separated at a shelter, that photo settles ownership faster than anything else you could carry

Minutes 20-40: Secure the Home

• Close all interior doors. This slows fire spread significantly
• Remove flammable window treatments. Curtains and blinds can ignite from radiant heat
• Shut off gas at the meter if you know how to do it safely
• Turn off HVAC systems. This prevents smoke from being drawn inside
• Move outdoor furniture, BBQ grills, and propane tanks away from the home or into the garage
• Leave a note on the door with your name, where you went, and when you left

Minutes 40-60: Load and Leave

• Back your vehicle into the driveway. Facing out means faster departure and easier loading
• Keep at least a half tank of fuel during wildfire season. Gas stations may be closed or overwhelmed
• Notify your out-of-town contact that you are leaving and where you are going
• Know at least two routes out of your neighborhood. Take your primary evacuation route
• Keep car windows up and air conditioning on recirculate the entire drive

The "6 P's": A Memory Trick for the Moment

When there's no time to think, a simple checklist you already know by heart is worth more than a perfect one you have to read. The Colorado Springs Fire Department teaches the 6 P's, a phonetic list of what to grab on your way out the door:

• People and pets - everyone accounted for before you pull away
• Papers - phone numbers and important documents
• Prescriptions - medications, vitamins, and eyeglasses
• Pictures - and irreplaceable keepsakes
• Personal computer - hard drive or storage
• Plastic - credit and ATM cards, plus cash

Most of these live permanently in a well-built go-bag. The 6 P's are simply the way to make sure nothing personal gets left behind in the rush.

The One Thing Families Miss: Wildfire Smoke

Does your family know what to do if smoke is heavy outside but the fire is still miles away and evacuation isn't ordered yet?

You don't have to be near a wildfire for it to affect your family's health. Wildfire smoke travels hundreds, sometimes thousands, of miles: according to NASA, smoke from the 2023 Canadian wildfires blanketed much of the eastern United States and drifted all the way to Europe. Families breathed that smoke from fires they never saw.

Fine particles in wildfire smoke are invisible and harmful, especially for children, older adults, and anyone with asthma, heart disease, or respiratory conditions. Most wildfire prep guides mention masks briefly and move on. This deserves more, and we gave it a guide of its own: how to keep wildfire smoke out of your house covers the clean room, the box fan filter, and when it is safe to go outside again.

When You Cannot Evacuate but Smoke Is Heavy

• Keep all windows and doors closed, sealed with towels if needed
• Set HVAC systems to recirculate, not fresh-air intake
• Designate one room as a clean room and run a portable air purifier with a HEPA filter
• A NIOSH-marked N95 or P100 respirator gives meaningful protection outdoors. Look for two straps rather than ear loops, since ear-loop masks cannot seal well enough to filter smoke. Surgical masks, cloth masks, and bandannas do not work for fine particles. Here is how to tell whether a mask is genuine
• Respirators are not made in child sizes. An adult small usually fits a child around age seven or older; below that, the protection is filtered indoor air and leaving early
• A respirator filters particles, not gases. If you can still smell smoke through a sealed mask, that is the signal to cut your time outside
• Monitor air quality at AirNow.gov or your phone's weather app before going outside
• Keep children and older adults indoors until the Air Quality Index drops below 100

For families with asthma: keep a current asthma action plan on file and extra inhalers or nebulizer medication in your emergency kit. Wildfire smoke can trigger respiratory episodes with little warning.

After the Fire: Returning Safely

Evacuation doesn't end when the fire is contained. Returning to a fire-affected area too soon is genuinely dangerous, and for families with children it calls for extra care.

• Wait for official clearance from emergency management. Don't return until authorities say it's safe.
• Check your home for structural damage before entering.
• Avoid hot ash, smoldering debris, and standing water. All can be hazardous long after the fire.
• Wear a respirator during cleanup. An N95 is the minimum, but ash and soot in a burn scar carry gases and vapors that a particle mask cannot filter, so a P100 with multi-gas cartridges is the better choice if you can get one. Wildfire ash can contain harmful materials.
• Keep children and pets away from fire-affected areas until cleanup is complete.

Your Three-Plan Quick Reference

Print this and post it somewhere every family member can see it.

5 Minutes: Fire Is Here. Go Now.

• Grab your go-bag
• Get every person out
• Get every pet out
• Get in the car, windows up, recirculate
• Drive away, don't stop

15 Minutes: Warning Issued ("Set").

• Go-bag plus any medications not already packed
• One bag of irreplaceable personal items
• Pets with carriers, food, and medications
• Close all windows and doors, leave unlocked
• Exterior lights on, then leave

1 Hour: Fire Is in Your Area.

• Complete the 15-minute plan first
• Secure the home: interior doors, gas, HVAC, outdoor items
• Load the vehicle systematically, back it in, face it out
• Notify your out-of-town contact
• Take your evacuation route, know two options

One More Thing: Practice It

Reading this guide is step one. The families who execute their plans fastest under pressure are the ones who have practiced at least once. A family drill doesn't need to be formal or stressful: set a timer for five minutes before dinner one evening, and see if your household can locate the go-bag, account for every person, get the pets, and get to the car before the timer runs out.

You'll find the gaps. A medication that isn't in the bag. A pet carrier stored in the wrong place. A family member who doesn't know where the go-bag lives. Better to find those gaps on a quiet Tuesday evening than during an evacuation.

If the go-bag itself is the gap, that's the easiest one to close: our Wildfire Emergency Kits arrive packed and ready. Add your family's personal items once, store it by the door, and your 5-minute plan is real.

Peace of mind, packed and ready.

Sources: Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC (Australian bushfire fatalities study); NASA Earth Observatory (2023 Canadian wildfire smoke); Colorado Springs Fire Department, "Ready, Set, Go!" and the 6 P's of evacuation (ColoradoSprings.gov); Ready.gov, FEMA's preparedness campaign, wildfire guidance; American Red Cross, Older Adults Emergency Preparedness.