Emergency Preparedness

I usually spend a couple bucks a week playing Powerball. I figure there’s little harm in it and who knows, I could get lucky. In the last five years or so, I’d estimate my grand total in winnings to be about thirty bucks. With the MegaMillions lottery jackpot up around $640 million for tonight’s drawing, I couldn’t pass up buying a couple tickets.

My Dad refers to buying lottery tickets as “paying to dream.” You almost can’t help fantasizing at least a little bit about what you could do with all that money. Now granted, assuming you’re not the only jackpot winner and figuring in taxes and such, you might walk away with “only” $100 million if you were to take the cash option rather than the annual payments.

What would YOU do with $100 million?

First thing I’d do is pay off any and all debts for my family. Pay off the houses and cars, that sort of stuff. Then, I’d start shopping for property. I’d probably concentrate my search on central and northern Wisconsin, which locally we refer to as either “Up North” or “God’s Country.” If I could find it in a suitable area, 75-100 acres, with some sort of year round water feature like a stream or river. Most of it wooded, but with plenty of field for crops and animals. Raise chickens, rabbits, goats, and possibly some beekeeping. Set up a good shooting range on the property as well.

Of course, a substantial portion of the winnings would go to a few select charities. While I hold a fairly low opinion of most major charitable organizations, there are a few I believe are truly doing good things and are being operated in the right way.

I’d also probably stop buying Powerball tickets. Let other folks have a chance, y’know?

One of the things we as preppers constantly have to consider is maintaining OPSEC (operations security). This is something that can be worrisome when shopping. Essentially, there are three elements to this we should consider.

1) Buying large quantities of items at local stores. Rolling up a cart filled with a couple cases of canned goods, several large bags of rice, a case of bottled water, and 20lbs of flour is probably going to raise an eyebrow or two at the checkouts. I can remember as a teenager, I worked for a small restaurant that had a Sunday brunch. On a pretty regular basis, we’d run out of one thing or another so I’d have to make a quick trip to the grocery store, where we had a charge account. This would result in me taking a cart and filling it to brim with loaves of bread and taking it up to the checkouts. I’d always get a funny look from customers and I’d often reply, “What can I say? I really like bread!” If you find yourself attracting attention, either from customers or the cashier, think ahead and have a reasonable sounding excuse ready to go. “I try to stock up when prices are low.” Or, “Watching my nephews over Spring Break and they’re about to eat me out of house and home!” Also consider spreading your shopping around a bit and either visit several different stores to make smaller purchases or make several smaller purchases throughout the week at the one store with the good prices.

2) Unloading mass quantities of supplies at home. Unless you are fortunate enough to live way out in the sticks, odds are you have neighbors who pay at least a bit of attention to what goes on in your neighborhood. Hell, don’t most of us watch what folks are doing around us? If you regularly come home with a trunk load of groceries a few times a week, someone is bound to remember that and maybe come calling when the balloon has gone up and they’re looking for a handout. If you have a garage, make a habit of pulling the car in, closing the door, and unload from there. Or unload later at night when you can’t be seen as well.

3) Receiving deliveries of online purchases. A few years ago, we had a neighbor who I would swear was singularly responsible for keeping eBay in business. He would receive multiple packages almost every day. Naturally, this was noticed since he wasn’t home during the day so the parcels would sit on his porch in a pile until he got home. If you have the means to do so, consider having at least some of your online purchases delivered to you at work. Doing so will obviously cut down on the number of packages you’re getting at home. Another idea is to have stuff delivered to trusted friends or family members. Some companies do also offer the option of not listing the company name on the package so at least nosy neighbors won’t see boxes coming to you from “PREPPERS R US” or wherever.

OPSEC is something you need to consider at all times. Look at your actions and behavior from the outside in and think about the information possibly being shared without your knowledge or consent.

Over the weekend, I received an email from a friend whom I’d not heard from in years. We used to attend the same church and while we got to know each other a little bit, we never learned that each of us was involved in survivalism. Recently, he’d happened across a copy of Survivalist Magazine in a bookstore and found out I was a regular contributor, where I write a column entitled The Frugal Prepper. Seeing this prompted him to shoot me an email.

Turns out, he and his wife were full-fledged survivalists during the 70s and 80s, at the height of the Cold War. While they no longer are quite as involved in the “movement” as they once were, it sounds like they are getting back into it. That’s always great to hear, as far as I’m concerned. I love it when I find out folks I know are continuing to learn new skills and get involved with prepping.

But, hearing about how things were “back in the day” made me think about the differences between what I’d call old school survivalism versus contemporary prepping. While I’ve been interested and involved with disaster readiness for about thirty years now, I was pretty much doing it all on my own back then. Sure, I had my copy of Life After Doomsday by Dr. Bruce Clayton and I’d pick up the occasional copy of American Survival Guide, but I was in my early teens then. While I was enamored with things like firearms and such, I was more interested in those things I could actually try out on my own (and without much money) like primitive living skills. I never really had much interest in the tax movement or The Posse Comitatus, both of which seemed to be at the forefront of many discussions about survivalists.

Instead, what I’d do is find books at the library that described the things American Indians did back in the day and try to duplicate those skills. I’d build forts (also known as expedient emergency shelters). I’d track animals in the woods near my house. I built many spears, bows, and atlatls. I couldn’t even tell you how many different survival kits I put together.

Of course, as I got older, I learned more about food storage, water purification, and other prepping essentials. This was right before Y2K and that learning that information was all the rage. And while public interest waned for a while, it certainly has come back with a vengeance, right?

I guess the point I’m slowly getting around to is, despite three decades of learning and being involved with this stuff, I never really went through those “dark ages” when many survivalists were either fumbling around in the proverbial dark, trying to figure this stuff out on their own, or they were having somewhat clandestine meetings to discuss how to best deal with a potentially oppressive government.

I’d love to hear from some old school survivalists. I’m interested in learning how prepping today differs from back then, both in theory and in practice. Obviously things are generally more expensive today, if nothing else than just due to inflation and such. I would also guess that information is more readily available, of course. But I am curious to find out more about how things were done back then. How you networked with each other, that sort of thing.

Don’t be shy. Take this opportunity to share a little real world history with us.

Once again today, an email arrived in my inbox talking about the “Triangle of Life.” This is a theory about how to best survive an earthquake, developed by Doug Copp.

Taken from the Wikipedia entry, here is a description of the theory:

According to Copp’s theory, when buildings collapse, the weight of the ceilings falling upon the objects or furniture inside tends to crush them, but the height of the object that remains acts as a kind of roof beam over the space or void next to it, which will tend to end up with a sloping roof over it. Copp terms this space for survival as the triangle of life. The larger and stronger the object, the less it will compact; the less it compacts, the larger the void next to it will be. Such triangles are the most common shape to be found in a collapsed building.

Sounds pretty good, right? Seems to make sense?

The problem is it doesn’t hold up to reality checks. First, the theory is predicated upon buildings “pancaking” during an earthquake. While this does happen in some areas, building codes here in the United States are such that buildings don’t really do it all that often here. Further, the theory assumes these objects and furniture won’t be sliding around during an earthquake, which of course is not true.

Most injuries and deaths in an earthquake here in the US are the result of falling objects, not building collapse. If you are caught in a quake, you should “Drop, cover, and hold on.” Hit the floor, get under something sturdy, and hold on. Experts used to advocate getting into a doorway however that also has been proven to be a fallacy. In modern structures, doorways are really no stronger than any other part of the dwelling. You’re better off getting under a table to keep debris from hitting you. You’re at greater risk of injury trying to get TO a doorway or find one of these potential “triangles of life.”

Rice is often a staple in a long-term food storage plan. Wheat and other grains are usually included as well. Beans, while not a grain of course, sort of fall into this same category too. The problem with almost any type of long-term dry food storage is eliminating pests both from within and without.

Quite often, there are tiny mites and other insects that can make their way into the bags of rice and such before they are sealed up at the factory. Appetizing, ain’t it? What you should do when you first bring the items home is toss them into a freezer. This will kill off any bugs and their eggs. How long should you keep the bags in the freezer? While a week is probably overkill, no pun intended, I’d rather err on the side of caution.

(Image courtesy of FreezeDriedSurvivalFood.com.)

After freezing, you’ll want to store the rice and such in air-tight containers if at all possible. The popular five gallon buckets you can score from bakeries and delis work well. You can either pound the original lids back on or use Gamma Seal lids, which are a lot easier to remove but cost a few bucks.

Some people take the added measure of tossing in oxygen absorbers or filling the buckets with nitrogen.

There are two main schools of thought on what to put in the buckets. On one side are the people who put “like with like,” for example putting only rice in one bucket, wheat in another, flour in a third, etc.. On the other side are those who advocate using a mix of items, usually things that will probably run low at near the same time, such as sugar, rice, flour, and beans. Use whichever method makes sense for your particular situation. Personally, I like to keep the items in their original packaging in the buckets if possible as that makes it easier to rotate the food through normal usage.

Once the buckets are filled and sealed, make sure you label them clearly with the contents as well as the date. Always use the oldest product first. Store the buckets in a cool, dry location.