Although Largs and the surrounding area have a significant population and most of the key services required, it is still fairly rural and geographically remote with essentially one main road and one train service in and out.

In winter, severe weather can affect those links and cause flooding along the coastline. In recent years and looking back in history, Largs has also suffered from fairly severe snow and that’s before you consider any of the other types of incidents that can happen within a community. We are lucky that we have such good emergency services which are a mix of full-time, part-time and a large number of volunteers.

In November, a new group of volunteers started to provide cover in the shape of the Largs Community Resilience Team (LCRT) which is part of Largs Community Council. The role of LCRT is to provide an extra dimension in terms of resilience planning and to provide assistance at the scene of a serious incident to support other emergency services. The team meets monthly to train and to receive inputs from other responders.

The resilience team was formed as part of a nationwide project led by Scottish Government to get local communities more involved in helping themselves and many towns across the country are now doing the same, very successfully. Resilience isn’t just important at a team level, it’s important at a personal and organisational level. Planning and thinking ahead could save a life, save your home, your business and in turn your job.

Over the next few months, and through this column, the Largs Community Resilience Team hopes to be able to pass on some tips about “resilience” to you in the hope that together we can make things better.

First of all, this month the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency has launched a video to encourage families to have their own flood kit within their home. The video outlines the basic important facts, like keeping the equipment within a watertight plastic box and keeping it in a safe, dry location. As a Resilience Team our thought would be, why a flood kit? Every family should consider their individual needs and have some emergency equipment stored in a sensible place. It can be far more than just for flooding and would be really useful when there is a power cut or if you have to leave your home for another reason.

Scottish Government has launched a Ready Scotland app for your smartphone. This state of the art application allows you to create and store a household emergency plan along with important contents on your phone. It also allows you to tick items off as you complete them in a crisis situation, making things much easier. There is also a list of the local radio stations and frequencies that you should listen to for advice during an emergency.

Details of both the flood kit and the Scottish Government app can be found at the Largs Community Resilience Facebook Page.

The page is constantly updated in terms of Met Office severe weather warnings and SEPA flood advisories. It’s an essential link, so please take time to like our page, which can be found at the following address. www.facebook.com/LargsCommunityResilienceTeam