Most of us know to stay low to the floor if we're caught in a fire, or head to the basement if a tornado's coming, or board up the windows in a hurricane. But, because relatively few of us live along fault lines, the massive earthquake that hit Haiti this month was a reminder that we're far less versed on what to do when the ground below us convulses. If we're in a house or building, for example, our first impulse might be to run outside - but, counterintuitive as it might sound, experts warn against that since people are too often killed by falling or fallen debris as they try to escape.

    Given how many us travel in quake-prone regions today - including, tragically, the four students and two professors from Lynn University in Florida who perished in the Haiti quake - even folks who don't reside in California should know how to survive a temblor. But there are two different, and at times competing, schools of thought on the matter - both of which are considered valid but perhaps not always in the same situations.

    The first, and most conventional and widely accepted by the disaster-response community, is the "drop, cover and hold on" approach, which urges people to take cover beneath something like a heavy table to avoid falling objects. The second, newer method is known as "the triangle of life." It recommends lying down in a fetal position not under but next to furniture; as roofs and walls collapse atop those sofas and desks, buffer spaces are created that protect people from being crushed.

    Over the past decade, a consensus has been building that "drop, cover and hold on" is a more appropriate method for developed countries like the U.S., where improved construction has greatly reduced the likelihood of structures imploding. The triangle of life is thought to be more pertinent in developing nations like Haiti, where shoddy building codes make finding a "survivable void" inside collapsed buildings more important than shielding yourself from falling chandeliers. "You have to think about the hazard level of the area you're in," says Gary Patterson, a geologist and director of education and outreach at the Center for Earthquake Research & Information at the University of Memphis in Tennessee. "If you're going to play the odds, drop-and-cover may be the best way to go, but a lot of emergency responders might say triangle-of-life because they're the ones who see the fatalities in buildings that do collapse."

    One such responder is Doug Copp, who heads up a private California-based organization called American Rescue Team International, which aids rescue efforts during disasters like the Haiti quake. Copp, a leading triangle-of-life proponent, began his work amid the epic 1985 earthquake in Mexico City. Inside that vast rubble he says he kept finding that schoolchildren who had dived under their desks were still crushed to death, but that kids who had curled up on the floor between desks survived, thanks to the falling tonnage above them being cushioned by the desks themselves. Since then, Copp, 58, insists he's seen much the same thing play out in all the quakes he and his team have rushed to, be it in the First or Third World.

    As a result, he's become an outspoken and controversial opponent of drop-and-cover in any earthquake scenario, even where buildings are likely to withstand the seismic shock. "To me, [drop-and-cover] is not an applicable or safe thing to do in any building in any part of the world," says Copp. "There is nothing built by man that nature can't destroy in a flash."

    Many disaster experts call that a gratuitous if not irresponsible position - especially since triangle-of-life, while it may leave pockets of survivability in collapsed structures, can still expose people to deadly falling debris. Government bureaus like the Federal Emergency Management Agency （FEMA） and major non-governmental organizations like the American Red Cross still favor drop-and-cover as the best quake survival technique in the U.S. - and a 2004 Red Cross report called Copp's blanket assertions "inappropriate and misleading."

    Copp argues they're too wedded to a drop-and-cover culture embedded in U.S. thinking since the 1950s, when school kids were taught to scramble under their desks during nuclear attack drills. But the Red Cross points to research, much of it developed by the California Emergency Management Agency （Cal EMA）, that reports that lives were saved during U.S. quakes in recent decades because people exercised drop-and-cover. "We don't discount either earthquake survival approach, but drop, cover and hold on is simpler for people, like drop and roll if you're on fire," says Cal EMA spokesman Jay Alan. That's important, he adds, given that people have only a matter of seconds to react to an earthquake.

    Organizations like the Red Cross also deny they're clinging to old mindsets. For much of the last century, for example, the public was taught that standing in a doorway was smart during an earthquake; but the Red Cross has since discarded that recommendation since it's more recognized today that "many doorways are not built into the structural integrity of a building." What's as important as knowing what to do during an earthquake is what to do before it, says Alan, whose agency urges preparedness steps such as securing bookshelves to walls and knowing where to turn off gas lines.

    Meanwhile, U.N. security experts this week sent out a triangle-of-life Power Point presentation to staff in Latin America who are still shaken by the more than 100 U.N. workers killed in the organization's Port-au-Prince headquarters this month, including the head of the mission there. Drop-and-cover may be the way to react in the U.S. and the developed world, but people in the developing world still need as many reliable ways to stay alive as they can get their hands on.

    大多數人都知道火災發生時我們應貼近地面，龍卷風來時應躲在地下室里，臺風來時釘緊窗戶。但相對而言，人們日常生活中不常面對這些狀況，所以本月發生在海地的強烈地震讓我們意識到自己對于地震時如何自救知之甚少。地震時當我們身處室內或建筑物中，想到的第一個念頭就是往外跑---但是，與我們的直覺正好相反，專家警告說人們常常是在逃跑時被倒下或落下的碎片擊中身亡。

    現在人們常會在地震多發區旅行，就象佛羅里達林恩大學的四名學生和兩名教授在海地地震中喪生那樣，所以就算不在加利福尼亞居住的人也應知道如何在地震中求生。不過在和時間賽跑的同時，人們對于地震自救提出了兩種不同的應對措施，兩者都被視為有效，不過針對的情況并不一定相同。

    最常見并且被應災機構廣泛接受的辦法是"蹲下，掩護和抓牢",這個辦法建議人們躲在諸如結實的桌子等物之下以避過墜落的物體。第二種更為新式的辦法被人們稱之為"生命三角",它建議人們以嬰兒（在母體）中的姿勢蜷縮在家具旁邊而不是下面，因為屋頂和墻面倒下來時常砸在沙發和凳子上，這樣中間就形成夾角，留出的空間可讓人們免遭滅頂之災。

    過去10年里，人們一致認為"蹲下，掩護和抓牢"的辦法在美國等發達國家更為適用，因為這些國家經過加強的建筑結構有效降低了建筑物爆聚的可能性。"生命三角"之法則被認為更適用于海地這樣的發展中國家，因其建筑物并不牢固，所以在倒塌的房屋內找到"救生空間"比躲避墜落的燈具更為重要。田納西孟菲斯大學地震研究和信息中心創計劃主任，同時也是一名地質學家的加里。帕特森說："你得考慮所處區域的危險程度，如果你想抓住一線生機，那么蹲下并掩護的辦法可能是最好的，但是許多應災人員可能會選擇生命三角的辦法，因為他們親眼見證過建筑物倒塌產生的悲劇。"

    Doug Copp 就是一位應災人員，他領導著加州一個叫做"美國國際救援隊"的私營隊伍，該組織的目的就是在類似海地地震這樣的災難中進行援救。Copp 是倡導生命三角的帶頭人之一，他自1985年墨西哥城大地震時開始救援生涯。當年他在巨大的碎石堆中一直尋找躲在桌子下面的學生，但發現他們還是被壓死了，而那些蜷縮在桌子之間地面上的學生卻活了下來，這完全是因為他們頭頂墜落的物體被桌子給擋住了。從那以后，現年58歲的Copp一直強調在他和隊伍奔赴的所有地震災區都看到許多類似情景上演， 無論是第一世界還是第三世界（國家）均是如此。

    由此，Copp成了一位直言相諫而又頗具爭議的人物，他反對人們在任何地震中都采用"蹲下、掩護"的辦法，即使建筑物能承受地震沖擊。Copp說："我認為在世界任何一個地方的任何建筑物中（蹲下并掩護）都是不可取也是不安全的，因為世界上沒有任何一棟人造建筑物能經得起大自然的瞬間摧毀。"

    許多應災專家認為Copp的觀點不是不負責任就是毫無根據，他們尤其認為"生命三角"即便能讓人們在倒塌建筑物中尋得一線生機，但也很可能讓人們被下落物體擊中而致命。象聯邦應急管理署等政府部門以及美國紅十字會等一些重要的非政府組織仍視 "蹲下、掩護"為美國最佳地震求生技巧。一份2004年紅十字會的報告將Copp 坦白的論斷稱之為"不合時宜且誤導群眾。"

    Copp爭辯說上述人士過分依賴自19世紀50年代以來就植根于美國人思維當中的"蹲下、掩護"文化，當時的學生在核武攻擊演習時就被教導要躲在桌子底下。但是紅十字會指出加利福尼亞應急管理署（簡稱加州應急署）進行的大量研究表明在近幾十年美國發生的地震中人們之所以能逃生就得益于平時演練了"蹲下、掩護"的技巧。加州應急署發言人杰伊。阿倫說："我們并不排斥其他地震逃生技巧，但蹲下、掩護和抓牢這一辦法就象火災中趴下、打滾一樣簡單易行，"他還補充說："這點很重要，因為地震中人們只有區區幾秒的時間作出反應。"

    紅十字會等組織也認為他們并沒受老辦法桎梏，例如，上世紀很長一段時間里，公眾就被告知地震時站在門廊處是明智之舉，但紅十字會現已摒棄這一建議，因為現在人們公認"門廊不是建筑物一體式結構的一部分。"阿倫說："在地震前做好準備和知道地震時該如何做同樣重要。"他的組織建議人們提前做好準備工作，例如墻邊擺放結實的書架，知道在哪兒關閉燃氣管道。

    與此同時，聯合國安全專家本周給拉美的工作人員發送了一個關于"生命三角"的PPT（幻燈片）文件，這些工作人員仍沉浸在本月太子港總部包括負責人在內的100多名同事遇難的驚嚇中。"蹲下、掩護"可能仍是美國和發達國家應對地震的求生辦法，但發展中世界的人們仍需要可行性與可靠性兼備的措施來自我拯救。