Family Survival Guide Family Survival Guide Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 6 Why Prep? ................................................................................................................................................. 6 The First 5 Minutes Of A Crisis ...................................................................................................................... 7 Terrorist Lockdown ....................................................................................................................................... 8 What It Is .................................................................................................................................................. 8 What To Do In The First Five Minutes....................................................................................................... 8 Suggested Supplies & Preps ...................................................................................................................... 9 What’s Coming .......................................................................................................................................... 9 Winter Storm .............................................................................................................................................. 10 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 10 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 10 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 11 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 11 Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) ...................................................................................................................... 12 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 12 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 12 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 12 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 13 Volcano ....................................................................................................................................................... 14 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 14 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 14 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 14 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 14 Blackout/Power Outage .............................................................................................................................. 12 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 12 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 12 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 12 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 13 Martial Law ................................................................................................................................................. 14 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 14 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 14 2 Family Survival Guide Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 14 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 15 Riot, Flash Mob, or Demonstration ............................................................................................................ 16 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 16 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 16 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 16 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 17 Water Contamination ................................................................................................................................. 18 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 18 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 18 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 18 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 18 Tropical Storm/Hurricane ........................................................................................................................... 19 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 19 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 19 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 19 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 19 Tornado ....................................................................................................................................................... 20 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 20 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 20 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 20 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 20 Severe Thunderstorm (Lightning, Hail, Wind) ............................................................................................ 21 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 21 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 21 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 21 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 21 Pandemic Disease Outbreak ....................................................................................................................... 22 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 22 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 22 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 22 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 22 3 Family Survival Guide Financial Collapse........................................................................................................................................ 23 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 23 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 23 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 23 Nuclear Disaster .......................................................................................................................................... 24 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 24 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 24 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 24 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 24 Earthquake .................................................................................................................................................. 25 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 25 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 25 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 25 Fire (Wildfire, House Fire) ........................................................................................................................... 26 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 26 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 26 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 26 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 26 Flood ........................................................................................................................................................... 27 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 27 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 27 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 27 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 27 Food Shortage (Supply Interruption) .......................................................................................................... 28 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 28 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 28 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 28 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 28 Chemical Spill (Truck, Train Or Nearby Plant) ............................................................................................. 29 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 29 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 29 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 29 4 Family Survival Guide What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 29 Looting ........................................................................................................................................................ 30 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 30 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 30 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 30 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 31 Forced Evacuation....................................................................................................................................... 32 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 32 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 32 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 32 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 32 Stranded (Vehicle Breakdown/Lost) ........................................................................................................... 33 What It Is ................................................................................................................................................. 33 What To Do In The First Five Minutes..................................................................................................... 33 Suggested Supplies & Preps .................................................................................................................... 33 What’s Coming ........................................................................................................................................ 33 5 Family Survival Guide Introduction When you think of “prepping” or “preppers”, do crazy images of bunkers, tin foil hats, and insane armories pop into your mind? Although certain parts of the prepping (aka self-reliance) community has that element, there are millions of other people, just like you and me who should be classified as preppers. In reality, prepping simply means making plans and preparations to care of yourself and your family in the event of a disaster. Similar to a business continuity plan for companies and institutions, prepping is a “business continuity plan” for you and your family. Why Prep? The government preps, big and small businesses prep, yet most families couldn’t survive longer than 2 days without outside assistance. Think about it. What if a big storm, like were to hit your area? How would you and your family fare without power? Do you have at least 1.5 gallons of water a day per person? How would you cook your food? If you get your water from a well how would you get it without electricity? Does this effect your ability to flush your toilets? We are not talking about a zombie apocalypse, or some unlikely Solar Flare/EMP thing which knocks out the power to the entire world. We are simply talking about a storm. My guess is that most Americans could not last without some form of outside assistance, or a trip to the supermarket for 2 days. How about the people effected by the Don Pedro Dam collapse in Northern California in 2017? Or the wildfires which happen every year across the country? What would you do if you got the warning alert to evacuate and only had 1 hour to pack up. What would you bring? Where would you go? Prepping is not just for those tinfoil hat wearing crazies (no offence if your reading this). It’s about giving you peace of mind that you and your family will be OK. It doesn’t matter what the emergency is, or what caused it, providing for you and your family simply makes sense. Why wait until a catastrophic event until you think about how you will protect your family? 6 Family Survival Guide The First 5 Minutes Of A Crisis If you’re like me, you worry. You worry about a LOT of things. A lot of people out there worry about all the dangers we all seem to face in this world. Those problems, those threats, sometimes seem overwhelming... but there is some good news. The good news is that you don’t have to be some kind of “doomsday prepper,” or spend a ton of time and money, to be prepared for ANY threat. The fact is, the first five minutes of any crisis is the most critical period of any emergency. That’s because the decisions you make during those first five minutes are what have the most effect on your chances of survival. If you have the right gear, and you read this guide, you will have everything you need to be prepared for those first five minutes. I’ve packed this little guide with a ton of “do this now” checklists that tell you EXACTLY what you should be doing during the first five minutes of any disaster. You don’t have to train like a prepper to survive each threat. You don’t have to go live in a faraway mountain survival retreat. You don’t have to let it affect your life much at all, really. You just need this guide, the checklists I’m going to provide you with, and a high-level overview of the threats you’ll face. 7 Family Survival Guide Terrorist Lockdown your city, a lockdown is likely to occur, even if suspects are not at large, as the authorities attempt to reestablish order. Free movement is, for those in charge, chaos. They lock down the area in an attempt to reduce variables and assert control. That control is area-wide. It is no guarantee of safety for your individual family. If you are not prepared for a terrorist lockdown, you face three main threats: 1. The terrorist suspects could come to your home if it is not secured. What It Is 2. You could catch a stray bullet or be During a lockdown, the authorities take total fired on mistakenly by the authorities control of the streets. Citizens must remain 3. You could be caught without enough indoors wherever they happen to be. They can’t supplies and your family could go go out for milk or bread and the stores wouldn’t hungry or thirsty while the lockdown is be open if they did. The populace in a lockdown under way. is at the mercy of whatever the authorities dictate. What To Do In The First Five Minutes The entire city of Boston was locked down Lock your doors and secure your home, when the authorities sought one of the two drawing all shades and window blinds. Boston Marathon bombers. The suspect was Stay away from the windows and do believed to be heavily armed and very not silhouette yourself in them. dangerous. Citizens were ordered to stay in Secure family members in the center of their homes while militarized police with assault the house, where the most number of weapons and armored vehicles patrolled the walls exists to absorb bullets (which will city searching for the fugitive. pass through at least one exterior and interior wall. There were reports of police pointing their Stay quiet so you can listen for the weapons at civilians watching from windows. sounds of intrusion. Monitor the radio This was one of the most powerful examples of and the news to stay up on the latest a terrorist lockdown ever to occur in the United developments until the lockdown States. passes. Check your property when the If you think it can’t happen to you, think again. lockdown ends. (The Boston Bomber Terrorist attacks are not a question of if, but a who caused the lockdown in that city question of when. There have been major was found hiding in a man’s boat in his attacks in the United States before, and there back yard by the owner himself, after will be another attack in your lifetime (and the lockdown was lifted.) possibly several). Our enemies have made it very clear that they intend to visit as much destruction on us as they can, by whatever means necessary. If a terrorist attack occurs in 8 Family Survival Guide Suggested Supplies & Preps Install secure locks/quick release Consider stockpiling the following items to be burglary bars on doors and windows better prepared for a lockdown: Guns and ammo (because if you want What’s Coming to be armed in a crisis, you won’t be Either the lockdown will be lifted and life will able to buy a gun or ammo to put in it return to some semblance of normalcy, or the when the lockdown happens) lockdown will drag on (in which case what Long-term storable food and water we’re dealing with is martial law). Living under Batteries, Flashlights, and Lanterns martial law presents its own challenges. A portable AM/FM and/or emergency band radio 9 Family Survival Guide Winter Storm What It Is suffer or even die from the cold if you lose A winter storm is a crippling weather event power and have no heat. If you don’t have that dumps snow, ice, or just sheer cold on enough to eat to sustain you for a few days, an area, making travel difficult or even life- the storm will hit and leave you going threatening. A blizzard can snow you in to hungry because you can’t go out to get your home or your place of work, and a cold more. (That’s why, before major snap can make going outside very snowstorms, the grocery stores always get dangerous, especially for children and older cleaned out for milk, bread, and beer.) people. We usually live our lives as if we’re immune to the weather. We complain about winter storms and shoveling snow, but we never really think of the weather as something that can seriously interfere with our lives. That’s when accidents happen. Every winter, there are horror stories about people who get stranded in their cars. A couple of winters back, a man stranded in his car in a major snow storm near Buffalo, NY, died of exposure while waiting for help What To Do In The First Five Minutes to arrive. In another horrifying scenario, a If you are safe indoors, assess the risk of man left his family with their stranded car travel and the likelihood you will get and struggled through the snow to get help. where you might want to go. If it’s too He never came dangerous, STAY PUT. back. If you are trapped in your car, DO NOT run the engine when the tailpipe is Winter storms are not just dangerous to covered in snow. You will die of carbon travelers. An ice storm can knock out power monoxide poisoning. and leave you helpless as your home If you are in your vehicle and stranded, DO NOT LEAVE THE CAR. Help will come continues to get colder. If your heating eventually when the roadway is source depends on electricity, losing power cleared. Stay with your vehicle to be during a blizzard or ice-storm can be life found. threatening even if you never leave your If you are weathering the storm with home. someone, remember that shared body heat helps everyone. If you’re not prepared for a winter storm, It’s better for two people to huddle you could find yourself stranded and in under one blanket than for them to sit danger of dying from exposure. If you are with two blankets separately. home when you get snowed in, you could Section of a part of your vehicle or still room with plastic sheeting or reflective 10 Family Survival Guide emergency “space” blankets to create a Emergency AM/FM radio smaller space needed to heat. Listen to the radio or the news, if you What’s Coming have power, and stay abreast of the It will take time to clear the snow and restore breaking news so you can assess the power and normal transportation. Ride out the status of the weather and the cleanup storm and wait for these incremental steps. If for the snow or ice you live on a side street, it’s going to take longer to clear that than if you live on a major Suggested Supplies & Preps highway or arterial. Remember that Consider stockpiling the following items to be this is also true if you are stranded in your car. If better prepared for a winter you are stuck on a major roadway, help will weather event: come to you a lot faster than if you are stuck on Blankets (Emergency “space blankets” a side road. are ideal) Emergency food, water, boots, gloves, In most cases, beating a snow storm is a simple and (for your car) flares matter of staying warm and staying fed and Hand warmers and fire-starting supplies hydrated while waiting for the snow to storm to Flashlights and batteries (ice storms pass and the roads to be cleared. In most cases, often cause power outages) this takes a few days at most, but in very Shovels (you would be surprised how serious events, it can take a week or more many people don’t have them!) 11 Family Survival Guide Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) power or electrical devices in a world that is falling apart around you. The sudden loss of modern life as we know it is sure to generate riots, looting, and other societal problems. What To Do In The First Five Minutes If you have advance warning that an EMP is coming, such as from a solar flare, unplug all your electronic devices (cell phones; tablets, etc.), and shield the ones you can by putting them inside a microwave oven, which is a good, quick substitute Faraday Cage. What It Is Make sure family and friends are An electromagnetic pulse is caused by the located centrally where you can protect detonation of a nuclear device at high altitude them. While you can, make over the target area. An EMP can also be caused arrangements to bring them home, by a solar storm. The electromagnetic pulse because civil unrest is very unlikely. generated by such an attack or event can Lock your doors and secure your home. destroy electrical power infrastructure and Be watchful for looters. electronic devices, knocking out the power for Keep an eye out for fires. EMP may hundreds of miles. cause certain support infrastructure to collapse, causing small fires to develop An EMP attack is not like one of those television that go unchecked and become bigger shows or novels where all electricity fires. During a widespread power grid everywhere stops working. outage, the danger of runaway fire is very real. Some electronic devices will be destroyed, but If you have a functioning portable others will not. Power will be out in some areas AM/FM radio, listen to the news and but may remain on in others. Some experts say stay abreast of what is happening. vehicles won’t be affected, while others say they could be. Small electronic devices not Suggested Supplies & Preps switched on and not connected to the power Consider stockpiling the following items to be grid may not be affected. better prepared for an EMP attack: Batteries, flashlights, candles, and other It’s very likely that widespread power outages power outage items that take a long time to repair will result from an EMP. Many of the modern devices we take Faraday bags that insulate electronics for granted, including Internet access, will be from EMP unavailable. The wireless phone network will Backup electronic devices stored in almost certainly be rendered inoperable. Faraday bags Firearms and ammo (for self-defense If you’re not prepared for an EMP attack, you against looting) could find yourself without access to electrical 12 Family Survival Guide Cooking supplies that do not require During that time, martial law might be put into electrical power, including food, and effect. Chaos may well reign on the streets. You storable water must be prepared for an extended period of civil unrest during which you protect your home What’s Coming and your family from looters and other threats before order is restored. It will take time to restore electrical infrastructure and electric power after an EMP. 13 Family Survival Guide Volcano What It Is If you’re not prepared for a volcanic eruption, you could find yourself choking and blind in a cloud of volcanic ash... or entombed in a vehicle that is coated in the stuff. What To Do In The First Five Minutes If you have advance notice that an eruption is happening, get out of the A volcanic eruption is one in which a large area if you can do so safely. volume of ash is ejected into the atmosphere Take shelter from the blast. Close the from an active volcano. There may also be flows windows of your home. of lava in the nearby area, but in survival terms, Your car is not sufficient shelter. Get it’s the ash that is the major threat. indoors if you can. If you see the ash cloud descending, tie In May of 1980, Mount St. Helens in a cloth or bandanna over your mouth Washington State erupted, creating a column of and nose, and protect your eyes if you ash that was fifteen miles high and which came can. down across eleven different US states. Fifty- seven people were killed and billions of dollars Suggested Supplies & Preps of damage was done as the choking ash coated Consider stockpiling the following items to be the countryside. better prepared for a volcanic eruption: Emergency food and water No doubt the residents living near Mount St. Candles, flashlights, and batteries Helens never thought they would be subjected Tarps to a volcanic eruption, but these can and do Emergency AM/FM radio happen. There are maybe 169 active volcanoes A shovel or entrenching tool in the United States alone, although many of Goggles and face masks/respirators these are in Alaska (where there are eruptions almost every year). And those geysers in Yellowstone? What’s Coming When Mount St. Helens erupted, the area They may indicate future eruptions. A volcanic directly affected by the blast was devastated. blast could produce falling rocks the size of Be prepared for a long recover effort followed automobiles and hundreds of cubic miles of ash by considerable disaster-relief efforts to restore and pumice that will rain down on the life to “normal” in those areas saturated by the countryside, laying waste to it, choking and ash. clogging anyone caught underneath it. 14 Family Survival Guide Blackout/Power Outage What To Do In The First Five Minutes Secure your home and make sure you and your family are safe. If some family members are not yet with you, make whatever arrangements you can to see them safely home. Lock your doors, hunker down, and prepare to wait out the blackout. Stay home and off the streets. Monitor conditions outside as best you can, but don’t expose yourself. What It Is Duct-tape your freezer and refrigerator A widespread blackout or power outage is just shut in an attempt to keep them as that: It is a loss of electrical power as the insulated as possible while reminding electrical grid fails over a large area. Our power you not to open them. Your freezer can grid is held together with duct tape and hope. keep food from spoiling for several There have already been terrorist attacks on hours during a blackout as long as you electrical substations in the United States. aren’t opening it and exposing it to These have not made nearly the news they warmer air. should have. But as we saw during the Fill your bathtub and other receptacles Northeast Blackout of 2003, it doesn’t have to with clean drinking water. In an be a terrorist attack that knocks out electrical extended blackout, there will be no power to huge portions of the United States. power to run water treatment, which means water may become unsafe to In 2003, power was out for two days to a lot of drink. You need as much drinking water the affected area, and it took nearly a week to on hand as possible if the blackout get everybody’s power back on. The blackout persists. has been blamed on a software issue at a Formulate a plan for what you will do control room in Ohio, which triggered a “race for food, water, and light if the blackout condition” that overwhelmed the power grid. A persists. manageable local blackout instead became a massive, cascade failure of the grid across Suggested Supplies & Preps multiple states. Consider stockpiling the following items to be better prepared for a blackout or power outage: If you are not prepared for a power outage, you Emergency food and water and your family could find yourself in the dark Candles, flashlights, lanterns, and without support services and without adequate batteries food or water. Worse, widespread civil unrest Emergency portable AM/FM radio could develop during a sustained blackout, A means of boiling/treating water support services could become unavailable, and Firearms and ammo (to fend off looters) looting and wilding crimes could run rampant as law enforcement and emergency services struggle to keep up with demand. 12 Family Survival Guide What’s Coming chaos. In most cases, though, the blackout, and The longer a blackout persists, the worse the dangers associated with it, will last for a conditions outside will get. Civil unrest could couple of days before power is restored and life devolve into martial law or, worse, complete returns to normal. 13 Family Survival Guide Martial Law order. Different martial laws scenarios are more or less intense, too. Locking down a city because of a terrorist attack, and imposing temporary martial law to quell a race riot, are different things and will have different durations. If you are not prepared to cope with martial law, you could find yourself on the wrong end of that “law,” herded into a government camp or otherwise detained. You could even end up shot dead by the very military that is supposed to be protecting you, because they can’t tell the What It Is difference between you and a rioter or terrorist. Martial law is the imposition of military authority to control an area. The rights of What To Do In The First Five Minutes citizens are suspended and armed troops Get off the street. If you’re not home, control the streets, often imposing curfews and go there. otherwise constraining the movement of the populace. Lock your doors and secure your home, drawing all shades and window blinds. There’s a lot of speculation about what martial Stay away from the windows and do law would actually look like. There’s really no not silhouette yourself in them. clear-cut answer to it. There are 800,000 law Focusing on keeping the household enforcement officers in the United States. quiet and still. You don’t want to attract During an emergency, it’s not uncommon for attention. The authorities will focus on law enforcement personnel to leave their posts areas where their attention is needed in droves. most urgently. If you must go out, play the part of the They have families to protect too. To restore “gray man” and be as unobtrusive and order, the government may well send in the non-confrontational as possible. military, who are trained to deal with all other Avoid checkpoints and soldiers forces as hostiles, not as citizens being served enforcing martial law at all costs, and protected. especially if a riot occurs. You can’t afford to get caught in a demonstration In the United States, martial law usually or be confused for one of the enemy. indicates that control has been lost and someone in a political position of power is Suggested Supplies & Preps trying to do damage control and protect their Consider stockpiling the following items to be career. What they then do is impose martial law better prepared for martial law: and curfews until they can restore order. There Guns and ammo, including “sacrifice are cases where this may even be the correct guns” to turn over if the authorities thing to do, from a practical standpoint. Martial come to confiscate personal arms law is the quickest way and the least painful Long-term storable food and water way to get from a time of chaos to a time of Batteries, Flashlights, and Lanterns 14 Family Survival Guide A portable AM/FM and/or emergency What’s Coming band radio Either the martial law will be lifted and life will Any supplies that will prevent you from return to some semblance of normalcy, or it will having to leave the house and take to drag on. Living under martial law for extended the streets. periods of time can be extremely challenging. 15 Family Survival Guide Riot, Flash Mob, or Demonstration after the riot, too, which can have long-term legal consequences. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Get away from the mob. Move in the opposite direction. If you cannot immediately get out of the crowd, play along, chanting the same way the mob is chanting so they will think you are one of them. If you’re caught in the mob, move at a What It Is 45-degree angle to get out of the A riot or flash mob is any group demonstration, crowd, always working toward the edge protest, or act of violence that takes place as a of the crowd (never the middle). mass of people. A riot represents the worst- Avoid storefronts and never try to move case scenario for social order. When a group of directly against the flow of the crowd. people become violent, they engage in behavior Never move toward the police, who they might never consider engaging in don’t know you’re not one of the individually. rioters. You could get hit with a rubber bullet or worse. During rioting in England, one of the minor Avoid the urge to preemptively shield actors in the “Harry Potter” series was caught your face from tear gas unless it’s on video breaking the law as part of the mob. present. Masked protestors draw police From all accounts, he simply got carried away. attention quickly and are seen as willing He’s a good example of how some people will agitators. lose their minds during a mass demonstration Use buildings and other structures to or riot, becoming criminals from within the shelter in. safety of a crowd’s anonymity. Consider dumpsters or other obstacles to separate yourself from the mob. Any political protest or gathering has the potential to turn violent. Riots also break out Suggested Supplies & Preps during emergencies when the normal rule of Consider stockpiling the following items to be law breaks down and emergency services/law better prepared for a riot or mob: enforcement personnel are overwhelmed with Emergency food and water (so you calls. don’t have to go out while a riot or civil unrest is ongoing) If you get caught up in a riot, you could be Emergency AM/FM radio (to monitor injured by the rioters. You could also be injured the news) by the police or military responding to the riot, Gas mask (for tear gas) who have no way of knowing, when you’re in the crowd, that you’re not just another rioter. If A nondescript hoodie (for concealing you let yourself get drawn into the mob’s your identity) violence, you risk getting arrested during or 16 Family Survival Guide What’s Coming relatively quickly (riots rarely go on for several As long as you can get clear of the mob or the days, although that can and does happen). As riot, things will eventually get back to normal long as you avoid getting enmeshed in the mob or its behavior, you’ll be fine. 17 Family Survival Guide Water Contamination unsafe for use? Or is it biological (such as bacterial contamination), which means simply boiling the water will make it safe? Determine what methods, if any, can be made to treat the water to render it safe for drinking. Make arrangements to purchase bottled water in quantity, even if you have to buy it online. Bottled water will quickly sell out, so if you’re not making arrangements to buy What It Is as much as you can in the first five Water contamination can take many forms. For minutes, you will be out of luck. our purposes, it is any time the water coming out of your tap becomes unsafe to drink. There Suggested Supplies & Preps have been several high-profile cases of water contamination recently. The EPA accidentally Consider stockpiling the following items to be turned an entire river orange when they caused better prepared for contaminated water: mining waste products to be released into the Bottled water river. In Flint, Michigan, a series of bureaucratic A bathtub water storage container missteps resulted in the piping infrastructure Water treatment tablets releasing dangerous lead contamination into Water filters/straws the city’s water. There are studies claiming that A means of boiling water the water supplies of many major metropolitan areas are dangerously unsafe. What’s Coming Depending on the nature of the water If you aren’t prepared for a water contamination, the problem could be over contamination incident, you and your family quickly and the “boil water advisory lifted”... or could be left with no source of drinking water the problem could persist for weeks, months, or for an indefinite period of time. years, as it probably will in Flint while they get their water crisis sorted out. Pay close attention What To Do In The First Five Minutes to whether your water supply is safe to drink. If you have advance warning that there Whenever there is any doubt, there is no doubt: will be a disruption in the water supply, drink bottled water instead of tap water. fill your bathtub and any other containers on hand with water so you Don’t forget that if a water problem persists for have as much drinkable water as a long period of time, traveling to buy bottled possible. water out of town (where the supply has not Determine the nature of the water yet sold out) may be an option. Lay in as large a contamination. Is it chemical, in which supply as you can. Collecting rain water may be case your tap water is completely one way to supplement your stores. 18 Family Survival Guide Tropical Storm/Hurricane Secure your family members and your pets inside your home. Stay away from windows. If possible, tape to windows with an “x” of duct tape to help make them less susceptible to shattering. Windows can also be braced with plastic sheeting or plywood, if you have it handy. If your home is located at a low point, take shelter on an upper floor. If your home starts to flood and there is nowhere for you to go, don’t go into an What It Is attic where you can be trapped. Even A tropical storm or hurricane is an ocean storm the roof is a better option to be saved that moves inland, bringing floods, high tides, and powerful winds to shore. One of the best Suggested Supplies & Preps modern-day examples of a storm wreaking Consider stockpiling the following items to be havoc in the United States is “Superstorm better prepared for a tropical storm or Sandy.” This was the worst hurricane of the hurricane: 2012 season. It did damage in 24 states and Emergency food and water flooded parts of New Jersey and New York. The Candles, flashlights, and batteries storm surge flooded New York city tunnels and LED strobe light to signal rescue subway lines, cutting power in the city. It did responders more than 70 billion dollars of damage in the Tarps, Duct tape and Plastic sheets US alone. Emergency AM/FM radio If you’re not prepared for a hurricane, you or Plywood sheets (and hammer/nails) your family could be hurt or killed in the A solar or heat-driven charger for immediate storm surge, flooding, dangerous electronics winds, and rains of the storm itself. You could also be left to suffer through an extended What’s Coming power outage in an area whose law Depending on how bad the storm is, it could enforcement and emergency services are take weeks or even months for the damage to overburdened and overwhelmed. be repaired. Arguably, the New Orleans area never did recover from Hurricane Katrina. Be What To Do In The First Five Minutes prepared to endure months of rebuilding. In the If you can evacuate the affected area absolute worst-case scenario, you might even before the storm, do so. need to relocate permanently. If you are in your car, get off the street and get to shelter. 19 Family Survival Guide Tornado What It Is If you are in your car, get off the street and get to shelter. A car is absolutely no defense against a tornado. Secure your family members and your pets inside your home. Stay away from windows. If possible, tape the windows with an “x” of duct tape to help make them less susceptible to shattering. Windows can also be braced with plastic sheeting or plywood, if you have it handy. A tornado is a violently rotating column of air Stay sheltered until the tornado passes. that makes contact with the Earth’s surface. The Suggested Supplies & Preps majority of tornados happen in the United Consider stockpiling the following items to be States’ “Tornado Alley” region, but they also better prepared for a tornado: occur throughout North American and the Emergency food and water world. The worst tornado ever recorded Candles, flashlights, and batteries happened in Indiana in Tarps 1925. It went on for 3.5 hours (a record) and Emergency AM/FM radio left a recordbreaking destructive path 219 miles Duct tape long. In Bangladesh in 1989, 1,300 people were Plastic sheets killed by a single tornado. 2011 holds the record Plywood sheets (and hammer/nails) for the most tornados ever spawned -- 363 in A solar or heat-driven charger for the southeastern United States, 218 of those in electronics a single day. If you’re not prepared for a tornado you or your What’s Coming family could be hurt or killed devastating Tornadoes are usually over quickly, but the column of the swath of destruction they leave can devastate tornado’s destructive force. You could also be entire towns. Houses can be picked up and left to suffer through an extended power shattered. The tornado will leave some outage in a devastated area whose law structures untouched and completely level enforcement and emergency services are others. Rebuilding, and returning to normal, overburdened and overwhelmed. may take some time, during which you’ll have to live with reduced services. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Get immediately to shelter, preferably a storm shelter or basement. 20 Family Survival Guide Severe Thunderstorm (Lightning, Hail, Wind) vulnerable to hail damage. It may due as shelter if you cannot get anywhere else. Secure your family members and your pets inside your home. Stay away from windows. If possible, tape the windows with an “x” of duct tape to help make them less susceptible to shattering. Windows can also be braced with plastic sheeting or plywood, if you have it handy. What It Is Be aware of the risk of electrocution from lightning strikes. Avoid using Severe thunderstorms are weather events that landlines, taking baths, or going outside include high winds, driving rain, lightning, and while the lightning storm occurs. hail. In some cases, the hail can do significant damage to structures and vehicles. Severe thunderstorms may also be warning signs of Suggested Supplies & Preps developing tornados. If you’re not prepared for Consider stockpiling the following items to be a thunderstorm, you could be forced to endure better prepared for a tornado: a sustained power outage. You might also be at Emergency food and water risk of electrocution from lightning strikes, or Candles, flashlights, and batteries even property and personal injury from large Tarps hail. We tend to think of thunderstorms as no Emergency AM/FM radio big deal, but they are actually quite deadly Duct tape when conditions are just right. Plastic sheets Plywood sheets (and hammer/nails) What To Do In The First Five Minutes A solar or heat-driven charger for Get to shelter and monitor weather electronics conditions closely. A tornado could develop in the wake of the What’s Coming thunderstorm and you’ll need to know Storms of this type usually pass quickly, about that as soon as possible. assuming a tornado does not develop. Hail If you are in your car, the rubber of the damage to your car or home could take some tires may insulate you from lightning time to repair and rebuild. strikes, although the car itself is 21 Family Survival Guide Pandemic Disease Outbreak What It Is What To Do In The First Five Minutes A pandemic is Go home and STAY THERE. The single any disease best way to avoid a pandemic is to outbreak that avoid other people. This is called “social is prevalent distancing” and it works. over an entire Whatever you do, do NOT go to the geographic hospital. The primary vector for area, such as transmission of any pandemic is the a state, a nation, or the world. Pandemics don’t medical professionals treating it. have to be deadly to cripple society, but Tell yourself that for the duration of the typically they carry at least the threat of pandemic, you’re going to have to stay widespread death. extra clean at all times. Good hygiene is a must to prevent unnecessary The Ebola scare was a great example of the infections. potential of pandemic to destabilize society. If you have time to get to the store in None of the Americans who contracted Ebola the first few minutes of awareness of on US soil died from it, but we were so terrified an outbreak, obtain as many medical of the threat of Ebola there were Americans supplies as you can. They’ll be sold out clamoring for martial law, rounding up affected if you go back for them later. citizens in camps, and closing the borders. Were If you have to go outside at all, wear a we scared? Yeah, we were scared... and it could mask. happen again. Ebola had never come to US soil until recently. Suggested Supplies & Preps Now, the speed with which human beings can Consider stockpiling the following items to be travel all over the world guarantees that a better prepared for a pandemic disease pandemic will spread globally... and very outbreak: quickly. If you’re not prepared for pandemic, Emergency food and water the worst could happen: You, or your family, Medical and First Aid supplies could get sick. It’s as simple as that. Preparing Emergency AM/FM radio to cope with a pandemic means preparing to Surgical mask/N95 respirator avoid getting sick. If you contract the illness, Antibiotics and other medications chances are it’s already too late for you. Even if the disease won’t necessarily kill you, medical What’s Coming services and infrastructure will be so The longer a pandemic persists, the worse overloaded that you won’t be able to get the things will get. We’ve not yet seen a pandemic care you need. Our government knows that as bad as the 1918 flu pandemic, but we could. during a widespread, potentially deadly Be prepared for things to get worse before the pandemic, “palliative care” will be the word of infection finally burns itself out. For extreme the day. That means simply keeping patients as cases, it may be to your advantage to use plastic comfortable as possible while waiting for them sheeting and duct tape, together with a filtered to die. air evacuation system, to build a long-term “pandemic safety room.” 22 Family Survival Guide Financial Collapse goods and services may vanish overnight. You may be out of a job or, worse, your employer may simply not be able to pay you, or anyone, anymore. A financial collapse represents nothing short of a complete “reboot” of our nation. Such reboots are notoriously chaotic and violent. If you are not prepared for financial collapse, you may be stricken with poverty and left to starve and die. You might also fall victim to the predator class of your former neighbors, a class created by the collapse. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Don’t go to the bank and withdraw all What It Is your money. If the banking system is A financial collapse is the complete failure of collapsing, it’s worthless anyway. A run the monetary system we take for granted. It on the banks simply hastens the represents a fall-off in faith in the fiat currency collapse. our government prints. We are printing money Secure your home and family members. at such a rate, in fact, that a financial collapse is A collapse may trigger civil unrest and inevitable. Right now, the money in your wallet you want to make sure everyone is safe and in your electronic bank account is not and accounted for. backed by anything of value. It is backed by Monitor the news closely to stay faith – faith in the United States government. abreast of the state of the nation. Take a mental inventory of those items That is the nature of fiat currency, and our you possess that are of value and could government continues to print money (backed be used for trade/barter. by nothing) at an alarming rate. We’ve already Watch for looters and other external teetered on the brink of collapse a few times, threats. only for the government to delay the inevitable Remember that emergency services will by raising our debt ceiling, printing more money not be available to help you in a (in the form of “quantitative easing”), and collapse, as they will be overwhelmed. bailing out those private industries that are “too big to fail.” Government interference in the Suggested Supplies & Preps home loan industry already led to a cascade Consider stockpiling the following items to be failure of our financial system once. It’s going to better prepared for a financial collapse: happen again, and it’s going to be worse. And Emergency food and water then there’s the national debt. Candles, flashlights, and batteries Firearms and ammunition Sooner or later, it’s going to occur to us that we Emergency AM/FM radio can’t afford to pay off the astronomical sum Small-denomination silver coins (real that is our national debt, and when we default, silver coins are a great choice) for trade our currency will become worthless on the world stage. When financial collapse occurs, the Barter goods like alcohol and tobacco rule of law we take for granted will break down. Your ability to buy and sell 23 Family Survival Guide Nuclear Disaster Determine whether you and your family members should be taking KI tablets. These should not be taken unless there is a direct medical need to do so. Prepare your home to protect it from fallout. This involves using plastic sheeting, duct tape, and a HEPA-filtered vacuum pump. When fallout is coming, it isn’t unreasonable to think you could set up this sheeting to seal off your home in a few minutes. Your life, and the lives of your family, are on the line. Dig in and prepare to ride out the fallout. Monitor the news for updates, but don’t trust everything you hear. If you must go out, you must wear an N95 What It Is respirator and protective clothing. A nuclear disaster could take the form of a Anything that comes in contact with the nuclear weapon detonating on or over US soil, radioactive fallout will have to be but it doesn’t have to be a weapon. It’s much discarded before reentering your home. more likely that a nuclear power plant disaster could occur. The disaster in Fukushima had Suggested Supplies & Preps devastating effects on the local area; even now, Consider stockpiling the following items to be radioactive wild boars are running unchecked in better prepared for a nuclear disaster: the quarantine area, and the plant itself is still Emergency food and water spilling contaminants into the ocean. There are Candles, flashlights, and batteries nearly a hundred nuclear reactors in the United Potassium Iodide (KI) tablets States, any of which could be susceptible to an accident or even a terror attack that releases Emergency AM/FM radio radiation. Plastic sheeting, duct tape HEPA filter and vacuum system for air If you aren’t prepared for a nuclear disaster, exchange you run the risk of being killed by the blast radius of the explosion (if there is one) or, much What’s Coming more likely, being made sick by radiation Fallout usually ends in a week or two, but the poisoning. The threat of nuclear disaster did not devastating environmental effects of a nuclear end with the cessation of the cold war with the disaster will remain with the local area for years Soviet Union. The threat of nuclear disaster is to come. Surviving a nuclear disaster is just the no less real today. first step in a longterm survival scenario that is anything but pleasant. It is, however, entirely What To Do In The First Five Minutes possible. Nuclear disasters CAN be endured. Assess whether you should leave the They are not the world-ending catastrophes area or remain where you are. that 1980s disaster movies lead you to believe. 24 Family Survival Guide Earthquake buildings or power lines. If you’re with other people, don’t stampede for the exits or you’ll make everything worse. Don’t stand in doorways. Avoid exterior walls. If you’re trapped inside during a quake, getting under a table to shelter you from falling debris is your best bet. If you’re driving, park the car, et out, and get away. Stay away from bridges and overpasses, trees, light posts, and What It Is anything else that could fall on you or An earthquake is a shift within the Earth’s crust your car. that produces violent shaking the ground. If an Always move to higher ground if earthquake is powerful enough, it can destroy possible. buildings and other structures. Earthquakes also Be aware of fire hazards, especially if produce tsunamis, which produce devastating gas lines are ruptured. flooding and sudden surges of water. After the quake, check for problems like electrical shorts, structural cracks, or If you’re not prepared to survive an earthquake, developing flames. you could either be killed in the initial quake, or Shut off gas and electric at the control suffer through the resulting loss of box/main if necessary. infrastructure and services without adequate Monitor the news for further food, water, or electricity. information. An earthquake represents devastating property Suggested Supplies & Preps damage at first, but the long-term problems Consider stockpiling the following items to be revolve around the loss of power, the strain on better prepared for an earthquake: emergency services and law enforcement Emergency food and water personnel, and the degradation of infrastructure that inevitably leads to social Candles, flashlights, and batteries chaos, rioting, and looting. Emergency AM/FM radio A shovel or entrenching tool A gas turn-off tool What To Do In The First Five Minutes The safest place to be in an earthquake is an open field. Stay away from 25 Family Survival Guide Fire (Wildfire, House Fire) What It Is What To Do In The First Five Minutes Get down low and crawl on the floor if you are caught in a house fire. Toxic gas and smoke rises. Leave the house immediately and do not try to reenter. Test doors and doorknobs for heat before opening them. If you see smoke seeping in from under A fire is a structural conflagration that could the door, select an alternate route. destroy your home... with you in it. Wildfires Stop, drop, and roll if your clothes catch are fires that affect the surrounding area, too, fire. endangering multiple dwellings. The moment you are clear of the house, call 911. The danger of fire is not just flame. Fires produce toxic gas that can overwhelm you and Suggested Supplies & Preps kill you even if you aren’t actively being burned. Consider stockpiling the following items to be Many of the would-be heroes who rush into better prepared for a fire: burning buildings to rescue pets, family Emergency food and water members, or whomever end up dying, not Fire extinguisher because they were burned, but because they Emergency AM/FM radio were overcome with the toxic fumes. Goggles and face masks/respirators Install smoke and carbon monoxide A fire is not like in the movies, either. In real detectors throughout the house. Test house fire, you won’t be able to see a thing them annually. Consider also setting a from inside the dwelling. The smoke will make fire evacuation plan and practicing it everything black and impenetrable. Homes are with your family ahead of time. destroyed by fire every day in the United States and around the world. The threat of fire is very What’s Coming real. If you are not prepared for the reality of a If your home survives the fire, things will get fire, either within your home or external to it, back to normal pretty quickly. If it doesn’t, it you run the risk of losing all your possessions in will take months, if not years, for your family to addition to your life. No responsible parent achieve some sense of the “normal” after all should fail to consider the possibility of a fire, as their possessions are destroyed. Follow the many of the victims of serious house fires are instructions of your insurance company and children who don’t make it out in time. remind yourself that possessions can always be replaced, but people can’t. You may wish to get counseling for the trauma of the fire. 26 Family Survival Guide Flood Stay home unless your home is flooded and untenable. Do not drive unless absolutely necessary (it may be physically impossible to drive anyway). Avoid flooded areas and leave the area if possible when the flood warnings start. If you are in your car and water starts to rise around it, abandon your vehicle immediately and flee. Never ignore or circumvent flood What It Is barricades. Disaster almost always A flood is any ingress of large amounts of water results. that swamps a local area, destroying If you evacuate your home, shut off infrastructure and endangering lives. The water, gas, and electrical services danger of a flood is that the waters rise so high before locking up the home as securely that homes and other structures are swamped as possible. or submerged completely. Massive flooding during Hurricane Katrina devastated New Suggested Supplies & Preps Orleans as well as parts of Mississippi and other Consider stockpiling the following items to be areas. The resulting chaos and breakdown in better prepared for a flood: social order produced damage that affects the Emergency food and water area to this very day. Water treatment supplies (this is especially important) There are many other examples of floods Candles, flashlights, and batteries destroying property and endangering lives, too. Emergency AM/FM radio/NOAA In 2012, the worst hurricane of the season, Weather Radio Superstorm Sandy, flooded subway lines and A solar or heat-driven charger for cut off electrical power. Parts of New Jersey electronics were also flooded. If you’re not prepared for a flood, you or your family could be hurt or killed in the immediate surge and rise of water. You What’s Coming could also be left to suffer through an extended Depending on how bad the flooding is, it could power outage in an area whose law take weeks or even months for the damage to enforcement and emergency services are be repaired. Do not attempt to return until the overburdened and overwhelmed. authorities say it is safe to do so. If flooding has affected your home, check for signs of damage, What To Do In The First Five Minutes especially damage that could cause a wall or roof to collapse. Be aware that all manner of Monitor weather radio and your sewage, litter, and other invaders, including surroundings to gauge how fast the living creatures, might be borne on floodwaters water is rising and the threat it presents and left behind in and around your home after a to you. flood. 27 Family Survival Guide Food Shortage (Supply Interruption) prepared for a food shortage, you and your family will go hungry. It’s as simple as that. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Take an inventory of the stored food, perishables, and other food items you have on hand. Set up a schedule of rationing your available food supplies to stretch them for as long as is feasible. Monitor the news for clues as to the What It Is duration of the disruption in the food A food shortage is a disruption in the food supply lines supply caused by a disruption of the supply lines Be prepared to secure and defend your themselves, or by a rise in food prices that food stores from looters and thieves. makes buying food impossible for ordinary citizens. The danger of a food shortage is Suggested Supplies & Preps obvious: deprivation, vitamin deficiency, and Consider stockpiling the following items to be ultimately starvation. better prepared for a food shortage: Emergency food and water (long-term For some time now, food prices have been storage food is essential) rising. We’re poised to see massive jumps in the The means to boil and treat drinking price of food, and the demand for food is only water growing stronger throughout the world. Some in the agricultural world wonder if we aren’t Hunting and supplies for securing small close to reaching peak food production with our game current technology. Even if there’s plenty of Gardening supplies/seeds for growing food out there, civil unrest, a strike, a natural food disaster, or some other issue could disrupt supply lines. What’s Coming A food shortage that lasts for a very long time The average grocery store will run out of food in will force you to find other ways to get food. just days if it is not resupplied by trucks bearing You can scavenge and forage for it, of course, new goods for its shelves. That means that the but you’ll come up with less and less success average American, who tends to live more or over time. You must be prepared to grow your less hand to mouth when it comes to groceries, own food and hunt for your own small game if is just a long weekend away from going hungry you intend to survive a long-term food if the supply lines are disrupted. If you are not shortage. 28 Family Survival Guide Chemical Spill (Truck, Train Or Nearby Plant) What To Do In The First Five Minutes Evacuate immediately if this is feasible, especially if the authorities say you should. Flee the area if you are near the discharge point. Avoid that area at all costs. If you are fleeing the chemical spill, alert those you encounter that they should flee as well. What It Is Pay attention for local emergency management alerts. Monitor local news A chemical spill or release involves the for updates regarding the spill. discharge of hazardous chemicals into the air or Assess the nature of the chemical spill onto the ground of the local environment. based on the available information and Depending on the chemical released, the proceed accordingly. danger to human life can be extreme. In 1984, a pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, discharged a toxic cloud of methyl isocyanate gas and other chemicals into the air. nearly eight thousand people died over the course of two weeks. Half a million-people suffered permanently disabling injuries. The healthcare system was immediately overloaded. Mass funerals and cremations occurred. The chemical spill also killed thousands of animals, including goats and buffalos, which had to be collected an Suggested Supplies & Preps buried. Food and medical supplies became Consider stockpiling the following items to be scarce. Fishing was banned, which made the better prepared for a chemical spill: shortages worse. Emergency food and water Plastic sheeting, duct tape This is an extreme case, one of the worst on HEPA filter and vacuum air exchange record. Chemical spills, however, can endanger system anyone, anywhere. All it takes is a single tanker Goggles/face mask/N95 respirator truck hauling something toxic to overturn and discharge the gas into the local area. If you’re What’s Coming not prepared for a chemical leak, you could be poisoned. You might also have to suffer through If you’ve evacuated a chemical-spill affected the deprivation of a local area devastated by a area, don’t expect to return until the authorities major chemical disaster, which will overburden say it is safe. When you do, you may have to emergency services and law enforcement. contend with the long-term environmental effects of whatever chemical was released. 29 Family Survival Guide Looting preoccupied. Even if law enforcement is on the job, a sudden riot can break out and cause people to start looting simply because they are part of a mob. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Don’t give in to anger. You can’t afford to confront a mob of looters, no matter how much the chaos bothers you. Do your best to blend in among the What It Is looters. They will ignore you if they Looting is one of those things that happens think you are one of them. Shake your whenever there is a breakdown in law and fist and shout the same slogans they are order. Whenever social chaos reigns, looting is shouting. Make your expression one of never far behind. There are always people in happiness or excitement. Match the society who take advantage of a crisis, a natural people doing the looting. disaster, or some other tragedy to start looking Flee the area where the looting is for “free stuff.” occurred as long as you can sneak away unnoticed. Looting usually occurs because an emergency or Take shelter, preferably at home, and social chaos condition has left law enforcement stay there until the looting, and the overburdened and unable to respond to emergency, has passed. individual acts of theft. Then, too, the mob Avoid the streets at night at all costs. It mentality that usually holds sway when looting is at night when looters and rioters are happens tends to embolden individual thieves. boldest. They will walk off with things they would never Prepare yourself mentally to fight back think of stealing by themselves, because hey, viciously if set upon by a group of everybody’s doing it. looters. You’ll be fighting for your life. The danger of looting is that you could be Suggested Supplies & Preps caught up in it (and later arrested) or that you Consider stockpiling the following items to be could come into conflict with looters and end better prepared for looting: up beaten to death (or worse). Most of us value Emergency food and water (so you law and order, and the temptation to confront don’t have to go out while a riot or civil looters is strong. You might also have to defend unrest is ongoing) your home or your shop from looters, as was Emergency AM/FM radio (to monitor the case when Korean shop owners took to the the news) rooftops of their stores with rifles during the Gas mask (for tear gas) Rodney King riots in Los Angeles. A nondescript hoodie (for concealing your identity) Worse still, you have no control over where looting will occur. Looting could break out literally anywhere if some emergency condition precedes it and law enforcement is 30 Family Survival Guide What’s Coming emergency, whatever it was, has come to an In the aftermath of looting, don’t be surprised if end. Looting is one of those crimes of individual looters are arrested and brought to opportunity that accompanies an emergency justice once order is restored. The good news is but seldom persists beyond it. that looting typically stops once the original 31 Family Survival Guide Forced Evacuation live at the mercy of a government that does not have your best interests at heart. Your government wants to restore order in a crisis. The individual safety of you and your family is not of concern to the authorities. What To Do In The First Five Minutes Gather your pre-prepared kits of documents and bug out items, which are essentially to your response to an evacuation What It Is Designate “travel buddies” for every A forced evacuation is any government member of your family or party mandated flight from your home or survival Take a verbal inventory of everything retreat. It happens because the government you have with you so that all involved dictates that everyone in the area must leave. can hear (you’ll only have one This is most often done because a natural opportunity to inventory your disaster is approaching. belongings in a forced evacuation Follow the authorities’ instructions One of the biggest criticisms of government response to Hurricane Katrina is that many Suggested Supplies & Preps people stayed behind when they should have Consider stockpiling the following items to be left ahead of the storm. Buses that could have better prepared for a forced evacuation: been used to evacuate citizens were left to be Prepare a kit with your birth flooded, rather than used to facilitate certificates, medical records, insurance, evacuation. Those left behind suffered in titles, deeds, and other government deplorable conditions, such as at the documentation, which you’ll want to Superdome, where they were treated like have access to if you are evacuated animals by the very people who were supposed to be helping them. Flash drive containing scans of the same documents and any other information A forced evacuation is one in which the you want to carry with you government is determined not to repeat that Portable emergency AM/FM radio same mistake. Anyone found in the affected Bug out bag for extended travel away area will be forced to go. If you are not from home prepared for such a forced evacuation, you could be caught far from home with no What’s Coming supplies, none of your personal and essential The results of a forced evacuation are hard to government documents, and nothing to do but judge. Every situation will be different! 32 Family Survival Guide Stranded (Vehicle Breakdown/Lost) Deploy flares or cones from your car emergency kit Call for help if you can If you are stranded along a busy highway, do not get out of your vehicle (you could be struck and killed by a passing car or truck) Suggested Supplies & Preps What It Is Consider stockpiling the following items to be A stranded vehicle leaves you and your better prepared for a stranded vehicle or passengers stuck in a location where help is not breakdown: readily available. The danger of being stranded Emergency food and water is that you may not have any of the supplies you Car kit with emergency flares, blankets need to survive in a location you did not intend Spare “burner” prepaid cell phone to visit in the first place. A shovel or entrenching tool Gloves, hat, boots, and an extra coat People get stranded every day. Most of the Scarf or bandanna (for protecting your time, you’re just flagged trucker away from head/face) getting help from a cop along the highway. But Spare sunglasses if you’ve ever been stranded in the middle of nowhere, on a back road somewhere or even What’s Coming farther out in the wilderness, you could be very When you’re stranded, your job is to wait until far from help. help arrives. It may be necessary, however, for you to judge whether help is ever going to come The danger is amplified if the weather is poor to the location where you find yourself. It may and exposure becomes a real threat. Either be necessary for you to walk out simply because way, being stranded means being stuck you’ll have to wait too long to be found. somewhere without the supplies you need. You may not even be dressed for the weather That’s a potentially deadly decision, as people because you were counting on your car to keep often die when they leave their cars. Make you warm and dry. leaving your vehicle a last resort. Consider also joining a roadside assistance club, like AAA, so What To Do In The First Five Minutes you always know who to all if you are stranded. Stay with the vehicle, where you have the best chance of being discovered 33
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