system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: When earthquake / tsunami hits a region, how are inmates / patients handled in prisons / mental institutions?

I read the news that 300 female inmates escaped during the earthquake in Chile. That made me wonder how are such situations handled in such institutions where people are being held? Do they go "Form a line and evacuate in orderly fashion" when everything is shaking around them or just open the cell gates and "everyone run for your life" within prison ground?
gpt
Involuntary commitment facilities should have disaster preparedness plans already in place, so it's not like they'll just be winging it.

There are two kinds of natural disasters, relative to your question: sudden and unpredictable ones, and ones you can see coming.

If it's something you can see coming (like a hurricane), someone with the relevant authority (like the warden) will make a risk assessment, and if necessary, conduct an orderly evacuation of the facility according to the disaster plan, until such time as the inmates can be moved back in.

If it's not something you can see coming (earthquake, tsunami), there will still be a plan in a three-ring binder on somebody's shelf, but it will go roughly like this:

* Ahh! What's going on! Freak out!
* As soon as the immediate event has passed (the ground stops shaking), the facility staff will respond.
* If the facility has survived relatively intact or with only minor damage, they'll probably just cope as is, leaving the detainees where they are.
* If the facility is damaged enough to be unsafe, to pose an escape risk, et cetera, but the staff are still able to do their jobs, they will first work to assert control and then, again, conduct an orderly evacuation.
* If the facility is heavily damaged, staff are injured or dead, et cetera, then whoever's able to is most likely going to report the situation to higher authority (state/regional/national government), do whatever they can to protect and secure the detainees, and wait for help to arrive.

It's basically common sense stuff, based on priorities of safety and continued performance of the facility's primary function.