Thread: "Prepping": What's the idea?

Originally Posted by gugi

It makes huge difference. For example you are absolutely unprepared for an asteroid just barely big enough to strike near your house. If it happens to hit it when you're there, you are dead; if it hits close you may just bleed to death because you are incapacitated to reach your medical bag.
To prepare for such asteroid you need to build a bunker that withstands that type of hit, as well as a detection and notification system to give you time to react.
Think of something like the one in Russia from early 2013, perhaps with a slightly deeper penetration angle and during the night or when you're honing razors inside the house - energy of few dozen Hiroshima nuclear bombs deposited close to your house could do a lot of very serious damage very quickly.

The big stuff is simple and cheap to detect, the small stuff isn't, so there are no big government bucks spent on it - you are on your own.

Or what happens if a disaster happens while you're in a building somewhere - restaurant/movies/shopping/frinds house/etc. - do you have sufficient supplies to treat wounds of various seriousness and survive prolonged period.
Stockpiled resources at another location are only good if you can reach that location in the first place - anybody who builds a bunker and then doesn't spend 24/7 inside has vastly diminished their chances for survival.

There is a big difference between predictable and unpredictable scenarios but that distinction seems to be completely overlooked.

Not really, Food is food, Water is water, and Skills are skills (Knowledge) doesn't much matter if they are being used to survive after a snowstorm, a hurricane, or the Zombie Apocalypse...
If the Nuke or Asteroid lands on your head I guess all the prepping in the world is a moot point...

Since I live in earthquake country....
There is an old blanket in the car.
There is extra tuna in the pantry.
There is some extra bottled water in the store room.

Camping kit is not as handy as it might be
but think of the first couple days after a
quake as a camping opportunity.

Regional disasters worry me a bit because to bugout
I need to go more than one tank of gas away,
over crowded, clogged and full of crazy idiots and abandoned
car full roads.

Then I need to find a place to stay there where ever there is.
A little cash might help... but a lot is a hazard in need of
protection. Weapons are not welcome in emergency housing
and shelters.

Winter -- think cold weather camping, think real hard about
this if you live in serious winter country like Wyoming, Montana,,,
like I did for a number of years.

Summer,,,, water, water, water.

Rain and floods... sanitation is difficult.

I know I can help myself for the first 48 hours
and then I will know that I should have done.

Originally Posted by gssixgun

Not really, Food is food, Water is water, and Skills are skills (Knowledge) doesn't much matter if they are being used to survive after a snowstorm, a hurricane, or the Zombie Apocalypse...
If the Nuke or Asteroid lands on your head I guess all the prepping in the world is a moot point...

The point of this thread is that certain people put a lot of effort stockpiling resources to survive hurricane/earthquake and completely ignore that their lifestyle could making that impossible regardless of any resources they have. Not having diabetes, or failing kidneys/liver/gallbladder does increase one's chances quite a bit.

I'm pretty sure the tractor plow, heater and fuel that could help you after a snowstorm aren't going to as much if you are trying to survive a heat wave in the dessert. In that scenario a big tank of water would go far longer than a big tank of fuel. In flood your priorities are completely different too.

There is common sense and there is looney, and having a generator in a power-outage prone area may be quite sensible, but keeping one in your upper east side apartment (if your building doesn't already have it) is the second.

Originally Posted by gugi

The point of this thread is that certain people put a lot of effort stockpiling resources to survive hurricane/earthquake and completely ignore that their lifestyle could making that impossible regardless of any resources they have. Not having diabetes, or failing kidneys/liver/gallbladder does increase one's chances quite a bit.

I'm pretty sure the tractor plow, heater and fuel that could help you after a snowstorm aren't going to as much if you are trying to survive a heat wave in the dessert. In that scenario a big tank of water would go far longer than a big tank of fuel. In flood your priorities are completely different too.

There is common sense and there is looney, and having a generator in a power-outage prone area may be quite sensible, but keeping one in your upper east side apartment (if your building doesn't already have it) is the second.

Using the dumb TV terms which I hate

You seem to be combining "Doomsday Preppers" and "Practical Preppers" into one group and although there is some bleed over they tend to be different in their thinking..

Everything you are saying pertains to a Practical prepper which is where most people hang out, can I practically survive for 3-5-7- days without resources until somebody comes to help me.. They tend to focus on their immediate and most likely scenarios, ie: being prepared for a flood with sand bags living in a flood plane, having a shelter if they live in the midwest, having extra heat sources if they live in snow country...

The "Doomsday Preppers" that go for the extreme setups and resources are a completely different type of person and has a different goal in mind, they are also the one most likely to be on TV and Youtube.. Or as you put it "Loony"


The book I linked explains the die offs in a "Doomsday" scenario pretty well when it comes to medical issues, but basically after 90 days we will thank most of their corpses for stockpiling supplies for us to find.. That is just the harsh reality.. This has little bearing on the Practical Prepper side of the coin, since they are simply trying to get through the next week or thereabouts.

There is tons of info about the stats of this but most Survival Experts do think the same thing in the end for both groups..

The people most likely to survive either on a Practical basis or a Doomsday basis are the people that are living a lifestyle that allows a switch over to no outside resources the easiest..


What I said using these terms was that it doesn't much matter whether you are a Practical prepper or a Doomsday prepper you are still better equipped to handle any scenario then the average person... or it doesn't much matter what you are prepping for

Originally Posted by gssixgun

You seem to be combining "Doomsday Preppers" and "Practical Preppers" into one group and although there is some bleed over they tend to be different in their thinking..

...

What I said using these terms was that it doesn't much matter whether you are a Practical prepper or a Doomsday prepper you are still better equipped to handle any scenario then the average person... or it doesn't much matter what you are prepping for

I think you've been muddying the water by turning a thread about an apparent irrational behavior into "it doesn't matter what you're prepping for", or reinstating your old thread as this one.

As you noted having medical issues puts one at great disadvantage, so back to the original point - logically it makes absolutely no sense for somebody to prepare for disaster/doomsday by stockpiling resources while at the same time they do not address a far bigger obstacle to their survival.



I am pretty sure that one's chances of survival increase dramatically the closer they get to the top of the socioeconomic/financial/political pyramid. The government of the US will pretty much survive any disaster that leaves human life possible, even though the president may be unable to change a flat tire. Of course, there are very few people in this high survivability group.

Store some food and water to last say a couple weeks,enough to get you over the hump.
After that animals come out and will take all you have,(the guys with more firepower than you Have)
Hoarding huge stores of guns an ammo is ludicris,sort of like the alamo.10 thousand mexicans and 30 americans

Hurricane Katrina was one that folks here in the US should really look at as things got ugly. Cops seized weapons from folks trying to protect what was theirs (I learned to have more than one weapon & not all your eggs in one basket) and you may need to fend for yourself for up to 30 days. I live in the central US, so as far as natural disasters it would be a tornado & those are localized. I read that book that Glen mentioned "One Second After". Knowing what I do about nuclear weapons, that one spooked me a bit as it's a story that "could" happen. If it does, God help us. Man is so VERY dependent on electricity. My family and I can make it for somewhere around 30 days, looting would begin somewhere around 7-10 days.

Ask yourself, honestly, how far would you go to ensure your and your family's survival? Ponder on it a bit...it would get ugly wouldn't it?

One second after is a great read and a true reality.Some pissant country(like N.Korea) could do that to us in a heartbeat.
Your weapons will not save you nor your 10k rnds of ammo.
People that stockpile guns and ammo,IMO are fools.
30 days food and water,meds as needed,hope for the best,after that, say a prayer and kiss your Azz good bye.Because there will be 10s of thousands coming to take what you have,you cannot win