As Hurricane Lane nears the Hawaiian Islands, the American Logistics Aid Network (ALAN) is urging industry professionals to be prepared – and asking those who aren’t located in the path of the storm to be ready to help.

ALAN is a philanthropic organization, founded in 2005 in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, that provides free logistics assistance to disaster relief organizations before, during and after catastrophic events.

ALAN has launched a Hurricane Lane web page that allows organizations to view and offer support for urgent logistics needs, monitor the path of the storm, and get updates about road, port and other area conditions.

“This site will help us relay important safety messages and get the word out about Lane-related needs more quickly,” said Kathy Fulton, ALAN’s Executive Director, who added that, “few things are more challenging than figuring out how to get critical items like food, water, medicine and temporary shelter to impacted areas immediately after disasters strike – which is exactly what ALAN and its members are here to do.”

“After closely monitoring Hurricane Lane for the past several days, we believe it has the potential to be a powerful and damaging event,” said Fulton. “As a result, we could be facing a substantial need for donated transportation, space, services and equipment.  And we are mobilizing accordingly.”

While ALAN won’t know exactly what kinds of logistics support will be needed until after Lane hits, logistics professionals can begin to help now by pre-offering equipment, space or services and by passing along links to ALAN’s web site and social media channels to other logistics professionals and businesses that might be interested in helping.

“Business also can make sure they’re watching out for their employees in potentially impacted areas,” Fulton said.  “It’s important to give people ample time to prepare their homes and/or evacuate as needed – and essential that they understand human safety comes first.”

As always, Fulton said that ALAN hopes these measures and pieces of advice will prove to be merely precautionary.

“Over the years we’ve seen some potentially catastrophic hurricanes that have turned into relatively minor events while others have morphed into far more major events than originally anticipated,” she said.  “Obviously, we hope Lane will turn out to be the former.  However if it isn’t, we want people to remember that we are here to help – and that when it comes to these storms, there’s no such thing as too ready.”