How to Survive the Apocalypse on $20

http://hsta.pen.io/

by feint • 15 years ago

85 57 15 years ago

hsta.pen.io

sigzero• 15 years ago

If there is one...$20 would be worthless.

ceejayoz• 15 years ago

You're supposed to spend the $20 before the earthquake.

secretasiandan• 15 years ago

I'm not sure that the cisterns he speaks of are meant for drinking, I think they're meant for fighting fires.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Fire_Department_A...

If they were used for drinking in the case of an emergency, I think you'd have to treat it a little bit unless they flush them regularly.

electromagnetic7• 15 years ago

After any disaster you should boil any water you're going to drink. It seems excessive, but without a supply of clean water you really don't want to get diarrhoea. You really don't want to get diarrhoea if you're idiotic enough to be sodium-conscious with your disaster kit as then you're really risking death due to electrolyte imbalance.

JoeAltmaier4• 15 years ago

There are many water-purification techiniques superior to boiling. heating water takes time, fuel, equipment, a stable clean environment.

Iodine tablets take a water bottle, plus water.

ck23• 15 years ago

Hmm, if you are in San Francisco and you are in an "apocalyptic event" you are now likely floating in the Pacific ocean. Your $20 kit does nothing for this predicament.

Perhaps spend that $20 to research moving to a new location that is not on a major fault line with guaranteed major earthquakes? I mean Japan only has so much room and they built for surviving all but the worst, but what is the excuse with all the land in the USA?

We have hurricanes here but no-one is going to be "surprised" by a hurricane (unless you live next to a levee I guess).

electromagnetic7• 15 years ago

Pfft, buy a self-inflatable air mattress and a couple of tie down straps. You'll get a few days floating in the pacific ocean... just make sure you're not dumb enough to buy a blue air mattress otherwise no helicopter will ever find you. Go red or orange.

nostromo• 15 years ago

The Pacific Coast from Northern California on up into Canada is probably one of the most human-friendly environments on earth. My apartment in SF has a heater I almost never use and no air conditioner at all. The same was true in my Seattle house. A huge portion of the energy here is created by dams, not coal or nuclear, which keeps the air pristine. There's plenty of sustainable fresh water in most areas, and some amazing natural habitats nearby, like Yosemite, Mt Rainier, and Mount Hood.

I'll happily deal with volcanoes and earthquakes to live here.

geuis• 15 years ago

I'll second that. I basically grew up in Florida and have been through my fair share of hurricanes. I love California and SF in particular and more than happily will deal with the occasional earthquake.

ck23• 15 years ago

I'm all for a great life experience but since earthquakes can't be predicted yet, and there is almost a guarantee of experiencing one, it can end your enjoyment entirely of those other nice attributes way too soon.

jarek2• 15 years ago

> Hmm, if you are in San Francisco and you are in an "apocalyptic event" you are now likely floating in the Pacific ocean.

Er, yeah, no. California isn't going to sink into the ocean and unless you're in the Outer Sunset you're not getting washed out either.

aaronblohowiak• 15 years ago

Outer sunset, mission bay, parts of fidi, foster city...

ck23• 15 years ago

Note they said "apocalypse" not just "natural disaster".

So I'm scaling for the ultimate earthquake/tsunami.

So west of the fault line, you are now swimming.

sliverstorm• 15 years ago

There are few places on earth that are devoid of natural disasters.

timerickson• 15 years ago

Quick! Someone set up shop to sell this as a kit for $30.

davidw• 15 years ago

"Survivalist" stuff was probably a decent niche business in the 80ies.

icey• 15 years ago

It's a huge market now.

ja27• 15 years ago

Second 'muse' on this blog post:

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2011/03/04/engineering-...

argv_empty• 15 years ago

You may take a loss selling the whole kit for that much. Keep in mind that the $20 figure assumes the reader has almost all of this stuff lying around already.

guylhem• 15 years ago

Excellent read - but all that won't fit in a backpack :-) Extract from another site I follow : "Remember, you must be able to RUN with this bag (therefore I suggest a backpack)". Good thinking ferfal!

To trim it up, check ferfal.blogspot.com for some real life experience. The bag is just step #1.

drinian• 15 years ago

I carry just about all that stuff (no chainsaw) in my round-the-world backpack, with space to spare for everyday items. Definitely not overkill.

tomp2• 15 years ago

I wish there were some instructions on what to do with all those items... I would love to know why a bandana, aluminium foil and a bleach are used for in an emergency.

JoeAltmaier4• 15 years ago

Its ok, you will find out during the emergency - "hey! I have to sterilize this sewing kit before I sew up Jimmy! Anybody got some bleach?"

tomp2• 15 years ago

Thanks, that's exactly what I meant. The problem is that if you lack experience (most of people in the west have little experience taking care for themselves on their own) it's easy to forget such things.

Btw, you can also sterilize a needle using a lighter.

cracki• 15 years ago

care to speculate?

bandana: if it's large enough, it can be a sling for an injured arm

aluminium foil: it's reflective, it's a heat isolator, you can wrap stuff in it

bleach: to disinfect utensils

sixspeed• 15 years ago

What's the chewing gum for? To keep the kids quiet?

billswift2• 15 years ago

Chewing gum stimulates the production of saliva which temporarily eases your thirst. This can buy you time to find drinkable water, and to help you to wait for water to be treated - you DO NOT want to risk diarrhea in a survival situation.

billswift2• 15 years ago

Bandanna - you need something to blow your nose on, do you think you can still buy Kleenex afterwards; also makes decent bandage - I have had to wrap injuries with them occasionally when camping or working at landscaping.

Aluminum foil - you can cook in it; you can wrap stuff in it, but you can do that with plastic; save the foil for stuff where other things won't work.

Chlorine bleach can disinfect first aid stuff that gets dirty, but more importantly it can disinfect water supplies - it isn't as good as iodine, but it is good enough, cheaper, and if you buy much iodine suitable for disinfecting water, nowadays you are liable to have a midnight interview with some vicious twits looking for your meth lab.

kragen3• 15 years ago

With regard to the bandanna, one of the things I learned repeatedly through hard experience at Burning Man is that you never leave your dust mask behind. In the last few years, I've had a number of times when I wished I'd not forgotten that lesson: when I was in Riobamba when Tungurahua erupted, when the irritating smoke from the burning fields enveloped Buenos Aires, and an occasion while traveling in December when I was subjected to an involuntary mosquito-fogging. I imagine the protestors and bystanders in Cairo wished they had dust masks, too.

Obviously in most of these cases there are still particles too small to be stopped by a dust mask (or, especially, a bandanna), and of course many fires produce gaseous poisons much worse than mere particulates, but it still makes a real difference.

electromagnetic7• 15 years ago

> We also put out a chainsaw, because you don’t want to go through a 2x4 with a hand tool.

I don't think buying a chainsaw is practical, buy a proper carpenters saw (AKA cross-cut saw) and you'll be able to get through a 2x4 in less time than it takes to even start a chainsaw. It's easy to maintain (about once a month a spray down with WD40 will keep it from rusting, which rust will only become a pain in the ass if you've left it in direct contact with water or after about a decade hung up in your average garage). A 24" (full-draw, why full-draw? Because you'll have to work 3 times as hard with a 15" half-draw as you're spending 1/2 your cut moving slowly and keeping alignment) carpenters saw will run you around $30 for a top-notch brand.

If you're going to buy a chainsaw don't. You can get a battery operated sawzall (reciprocating saw) for a similar or lesser price. It would likely be cheaper and safer to buy a miniature generator and a sawzall. The sawzall also has the nice ability to be used for precision and with a metal-cut blade can be used for other things (IE cut open a jammed lock). You can get a hackzall (one handed reciprocating saw) for around $130 MSRP and sawzalls for around $200 MSRP both often include two batteries and a charger.

If you're going to have a generator, you can go as low as $70 for a 9A sawzall.

Chainsaws are dangerous for even trained users. Sawzalls are hardly dangerous when operated by idiots. A fullsize sawzall can be operated with one hand. A hackzall is easily operated with one hand (I'm talking an electric knife level of easy).

Carpenters saws are the safest you can get. Aren't effected by power and last a solid decade in a good location with zero maintenance. WD40 it once a month and it'll last your lifetime if you're keeping it solely for emergency use.

zach• 15 years ago

This is excellent advice, but I note that you ignore the advantages a chainsaw has in defending against brain-hungry zombies.

electromagnetic7• 15 years ago

Sawzall is good for it too, plus you won't damage your blades cutting up bone in case it was actually a neighbour who'd contracted rabies shortly after being scalded by falling into a deep fryer during the earth quake.

Plus, you could spend the difference on a battery powered nail gun, which if you tape up the guard you'd be able to use as a make-shift rifle.

That way you've got a nailgun for range and could have an easily used hackzall for melee (just make sure you use a nailed-wood blade so it'll cut flesh and bone adequately). Plus both easily store in a tote bag.

cpeterso• 15 years ago

The (excellent) "Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead" reminds us: "You don't need to reload a machete." A chainsaw will run out of gas and a gun will run out of bullets, but a machete will never let you down.

Zak3• 15 years ago

A chainsaw is more of a tool for long-term survival in the woods than for waiting out a brief disruption of civil infrastructure. It's a pretty important thing to have if you are going to be spending months in the woods though.

electromagnetic7• 15 years ago

Only if you have the fuel to spend months in the woods using a chainsaw.

You'd be better off packing a crosscut saw and a rip saw (used for making planks) and save significant weight.

reneherse• 15 years ago

Agreed! The utility of a chainsaw is greatly limited by the fact that it can only be safely used by a trained operator. No way I'm going to hand over my (small sized) chainsaw to just any helper at a campsite. In an emergency scenario, it's important to have tools that can be used safely by most anyone, lest your skilled and experienced operator is injured.

If you want something with good cutting ability that is safe and self contained (i.e. no generator required) consider the several variants of saws that "cut on the pull". The advantage of a pull saw is that the blade is kept in tension during the cutting stroke, and therefor will not buckle no matter how thin its steel. Also, typically the pull stroke of your arm is stronger than your push (back and biceps vs chest and triceps).

There are aggressively toothed folding camp saws and non-folding tree trimming saws that would be great additions to a survival kit. As the parent commenter suggests, get a larger one and avoid the frustration of short strokes!

My all time favorite kind of pull saw is the Japanese style carpenter's saw. Shaped kind of like a long (unbent) spatula, it's capable of incredible speed and accuracy, well beyond that of a western hand saw in my experience. You can get a decent one at Home Depot or Sears with alternate edges for cutting wood (across the grain) or ripping it (with the grain). I'd recommend one of these for every home repair toolkit, but unless you're going to repel zombies with finely mitered woodwork, get the other kind of saw for your survival kit.

JoeAltmaier4• 15 years ago

Nobody mentions a gun. I know its not civilized or public-spirited, but after "the apocalypse" very few people are going to act civilized.

JoachimSchipper• 15 years ago

I don't think that that's borne out by the data - sure, New Orleans saw some looting, but how many people do you think actually needed to protect themselves? We're not talking the zombie apocalypse here, just the regular flavour.

mathgladiator• 15 years ago

I'm preparing for a zombie apocalype in two ways. If I'm still human, then I'll kick ass. If I'm a zombie, then I'll be a boss-fight for the survivors.

kgo• 15 years ago

The article headline is misleading, it's talking about a three-day survival kit. But if we're talking a real-world, full-out, Mad Max apocalypse, one where society as we know it will never recover, yeah, I'd want a gun.

preek• 15 years ago

Especially not if some of them carry the means to "persuade" the rest.

Zak3• 15 years ago

It depends a bit on what scenario you're preparing for. I don't think you're much more likely to need a gun during the 3-day disruption in civil infrastructure described in the article than you are in everyday life. If you're preparing for the end of society as we know it, then you probably want at least three guns: something for small game, a defensive sidearm and a large game/offensive rifle. In situations somewhere between these extremes, a defensive sidearm seems like a sensible precaution to me.

Whatever you do, don't get a gun just for disaster situations. If you're not going to put in the time to get proper training and regular practice, your gun could be more of a liability than an asset.

mark_l_watson• 15 years ago

Good article, but: I think that a family should plan for several weeks of total self-reliance, not days. Add: solar cooker, additional water, CO2 packed rice and lentils, extra vitamins. A gun, if you know how to use one, for hunting and self protection.

Another reason to have requirements for a longer time period: if there should ever be a fatal large scale flu epidemic (or some other pandemic), it would be really good to isolate the entire family.

johnohara• 15 years ago

You may want to save your $20 and read "Surviving in Argentina." http://ferfal.blogspot.com/

runjake• 15 years ago

Backstory: Ferfal is a rather well-known guy in the online preparedness community. He kept an online diary of his experiences during the Argentinian economic collapse & related chaos dealing with a collapsed infrastructure & gangs of thugs.

kragen3• 15 years ago

I think Ferfal often overstates things quite a bit.

ctdonath• 15 years ago

I did my own variant of this a few years back: http://www.neardeathexperiments.com/smf/index.php?topic=1966...

rsheridan6• 15 years ago

This isn't written by that Tom Price, is it?

http://www.survivorstvseries.com/Tom.htm

vlisivka• 15 years ago

It is funny to read these comments AFTER surviving of huge economic crisis, Chernobyl and few smaller disasters.

15 years ago, at practice lesson about radiation protection in University, I found that the most radioactive item in the class room is me. How to deal with that fact, when you have no money even to buy enough food to live? I had only one choice - buy ticket back to my radioactive home, grab our self-grown radioactive food and return back to University. Half of people in the country were is similar situation.

If we are talking about Apocalypse, and not about camping in the woods, then you must consider that you will need to live in contaminated environment and there will be no room in clean environment for you. You will stay for decades in areas with moderate chemical or radioactive contamination, like Japan today (if nuclear reactor will blow up).

Surviving in woods is much harder and expensive task than surviving in home. I mean, than you will need much more time and energy to solve your basic problems, like food, water, fuel, hygiene, etc., so you will have no enough time to play with camping, even when you are alone, without wife and children. Try that with pregnant woman, or injured man, or 1 year old child, etc.

For me, idea, that I should walk to radioactive woods to survive economic crisis, sounds crazy. I can die in about 15 minutes if I will go into woods unprepared with temperature of -30°C (-22°F) outdoor. Even when I will be equipped with saw.

My recommendations:

Always keep full cigarette lighter with LED, multi-tool pocket knife, and small candle (anti-mosquito, preferably: slice large candle into smaller slices) in your pocket AND in your outdoor clothing - you will use them much more often than any other survival tool. I use them few times every month.

Keep needle, thread, plaster, healthing balm and another multi-tool in your backpack. I use one of them 5-6 times every year.

TRAIN yourself - if you are injured, you can prepare wound with healthing balm, then boil water in paper bag or plastic bottle, disinfect thread in water and needle in flame, blend needle, and then sew up yourself. But will you do that properly and fast enough when you will do that for first time?

What you will do when you are wet and you will have only 15 minutes to build hut and make fire before you will die? Will be you are smart enough to use your wet clothing as material for hut and put candle inside your clothing? Can you make wood candle or torch using your multitool when your candle will be near to expire?

For long-time survival, good tools and instruments are very helpful. My parent has garage full of instruments - it helps a lot. But lack of some instruments and replacement parts made us mad some years ago - we just had no money to buy them (low market - high prices, we had 3-5 times less money, and they were about 5 times more expensive than today). Lack of replacement parts or tools to repair equipment forces you to drop your most used equipment. You use it often -> it wears out fast -> you cannot repair or replace it -> you lose it.

How to Survive the Apocalypse on $20

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