Some emergencies become smaller once everyone stops emotionally enlarging them.

Emergencies get amplified by the people in them, each person’s alarm raising everyone else’s, until the collective response is much larger than the event requires. Take that amplification away and a good number of crises turn out to be significant problems rather than disasters. The size was partly manufactured by the reaction to it.

In a heated situation, try being the person whose voice does not rise. It has a disproportionate effect on the room. Then ask plainly what has actually happened, which often shrinks the thing considerably for everyone.