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An observation on prepping in 2022
Bill Masen - December 3, 2022 Two years of Covid 19 and the shortages of everything from food to lumber, people basically locked down for months on end, economic chaos that followed, Everything more expensive etc.
That event alone seriously stifled the mocking voices who laughed at those of us who were wise enough to get involving with prepping.
Then just as Covid 19 started to fade from the news along comes the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the mad panic to rearm by NATO, The conflict itself and the growing wave of sanctions plunged the world back into a situation once again of shortages of energy, food, fuel and raw materials, massive price rises, security threats and risks.
OPEN threats of nuclear weapons being used, mass migration from the east have followed. The global economy taking yet another pounding, tax rises are inevitable, already wheat, animal feed, diesel, fertiliser, nickel, titanium etc prices are rocketing and shortages announced.
In my country energy prices have risen FOURTEEN times faster than wages already, the combined gas and electricity bill for the average British house has gone up from around £1200 to £1900 and is forecast to get as high as £4500 by October. Petrol has rocketed up in days from £1.45 a litre to £1.70 a litre.
All rather grim reading I’m sorry to say, BUT The mocking of preppers has stopped all together, and people enquiring about how to get started in prepping / off gridding and homesteading is increasing every day.
Sales of Heritage seeds is UP, people getting Allotments (small food growing plots of land) is UP, people installing WOOD BURNING stoves UP, People caching and stock piling UP, People buying Micro wind turbines and PV panels UP, People selling up and relocating OUT OF TOWN up over 30% according to some UK media sources etc
So my oberservation is this
” Why does it take TWO global crises to make people wake to to the vulnerability of society to disruption, and for them to see the benefits of prepping”.
A report I read about two years ago estimated that 30 million of you folks in the Americas are into prepping in one form or another. I think that number is likely to rise now.
Read MoreTeach me about life insurance
Robert LarsonContributor - December 3, 2022 I don’t feel any immediate need to get life insurance because I am relatively healthy, but accidents happen. In addition, with things costing more lately than they have been in previous years, I am seeing how hard keeping up with the bills and cost of living would be for my wife if I were to pass away.
I know nothing about life insurance, but might want to consider it. Can you all tell me if you have it, do you know of anyone who has had to cash it in, how do you shop for it, what kinds are there, things like that.
Read MoreA prepper’s perspective on gratitude this November
Debby Jenkins - December 1, 2022 Hello! I’ve spent the past few days browsing this site since seeing it on 60 Minutes and have to say that so far it’s exactly what I needed in my life right now. Who knew there were AA batteries with a USB port in the side to charge them with!? Well apparently this site!
Something that is always on my mind this time of year and something I want to personally work on is gratitude. To make it relevant to this forum though, I want to share my thoughts about how being grateful is important for your mental health and for preparing in general. I have been prepping for the past 4-5 years, so I’m in no way an expert, but can say I have a basic knowledge that hopefully applies.
I find it ironic that on Thanksgiving day we sit down and with our loved ones and talk about all the things we are thankful for and then head out the next day and fight people over a coffee maker that is $20 off and we already have one that works.
Gratitude is overcoming discontentment of wanting more things. And not necessarily just things, but also wanting more experiences, more success, more recognition, a better job, a better marriage, and more more more more.
While those AA batteries that I saw and are so fascinated with are now definitely things I want, I took a moment to realize that I have about 30 disposables still and a handful of rechargeable ones that you plug into a brick to charge. I don’t need any more and need to be content and grateful for what I have. The cool batteries though will be on my mind when it does come time to replace the older rechargeables and if you didn’t have any rechargeable batteries before then that could be a good investment. Take a minute to analyze if you really need something versus just being a want.
Look at your unfulfilled desires and be okay with not having everything. “I’ll be happy when I buy that new car.” or “That new camp stove sure will make life easier” There’s always something to strive for and want isn’t there? Take the richest man in the entire world for example. He is still trying to obtain more things, the company Twitter being the latest example. It’s only in our nature to want more things and there is always one more thing you could have, even if you are the richest person in the world. Gratitude is being content with whatever you have, be it only the clothes on your back, what you currently have, or even if you are filthy rich.
It is hard to not compare yourself with others. Hearing about that person who just won over 2 billion dollars in the lottery, or someone driving by in their nice sports car, you think about what it would be like to be like that person don’t you? I do. Something that can help you though is to consider that if you are reading this right now, you probably are in the top 5% of wealth in the entire world. There are so many people who have so much less than you. People who may have no home, no food, no job, no legs, no sight, no family, no friends, no hope. There’s always someone above you who has more than you, but there is most likely a lot more people who would do anything to have what you have. Your life might just be that sports car envy of someone else. And just how I think about how I wish all those super wealthy people would just walk up to me and pay off my house, what do I do with my wealth and helping those around me?
I don’t want to go too long with this, but just want to remind people that it is important to be grateful for what you have. When we were born, we came into this world with absolutely nothing. You have much more than what you started off with right? Even if you lose it all in an earthquake tomorrow, you have so many past experiences and even the ability to read my ramblings right now. We have so much!
Survival is about being resourceful with what you have and making the best out of your current situation. Replacing the old generator with a new one would be nice, but you have a functioning one now that you can tune up and get more life out of and even if you didn’t have that, you probably could get by like so many people did before the generator was even invented.
Gratefully yours,
Debby
Read MoreCheck your gasoline supply
Steve Martin - December 1, 2022 Rail strike is a remote possibility on December 9th. I doubt it will be allowed to go that far but if the commenting Im hearing from railroaders is to be believed, they’re ready to force the issue….and that could make for a gas shortage in some areas of the country.
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/28/freight-rail-shutdown-fuel-supply-00070980
Read MoreFavorite brand of insulated coveralls?
Hardened - November 30, 2022 UPDATE: The coveralls on Amazon are counterfeits—I confirmed with Carhartt that they don’t use plastic zippers.
I recently learned about the existence of insulated coveralls from the extreme cold weather gear article and I’m enchanted. It links to a Carhartt brand model which is no longer available. I looked at current Carhatt models and they get mixed reviews; some people don’t like the cheap zippers and the fact that the new models don’t allow access to inside pants pockets.
Does anyone have a favorite brand of insulated coveralls you’d recommend?
Read MoreWhat to attach to a Plate Carrier
JB - November 30, 2022 I’m thinking of getting a plate carrier and some level III+ body armor, but want to plan out what gear I will attach to my plate carrier because that will heavily influense which one I get.
I want to have a small ham radio, at least two AR15 mags, and two glock mags attached.
What do you have attached to your plate carrier? What does your ideal setup look like?
I’d love to see pictures of your setup if you could snap a quick pic.
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Illumination during a power outage
Barb LeeContributor - November 28, 2022 We were enjoying the wood stove and the warm glow of the Aladdin lamps last night, rather absorbed in talking about the lamps, when I suddenly realized I had no idea of the state of our preps for dispelling the darkness in an extended power outage. I’m a kindergarten prepper compared to others on this list. My goal is to prepare for three months of independence. So I’ve been trying to take stock all day of emergency light sources and things can be improved.
I learned that the Aladdin lamps are good for roughly 10 hours of lighting (probably on low) on a 1 quart fill of kerosene. (I love these fussy little prima donnas!) It seems that my approximately five gallons of kerosene (all designated lamp fuel) would net about 50 days of light, burning four hours a day. Seems we need another five gallons to slightly exceed three months. (My primary concern is earthquakes.)
Battery powered lanterns: We have assorted Coleman battery powered lanterns. Each takes eight D-cells. D-cells are over $2 each now. I looked at the Amazon page for our newest LED lantern and was hurtfully misled by the main advertisement for run time. Scrolling through the specs revealed the actual run time to be about 1/3 what they were claiming in the ad. I think it actually worked out to about $1 for every hour the lantern is used, compared to the Aladdin’s roughly $0.28/hour.
But, once you light an Aladdin, you don’t want to move it. The lantern is good for going out to the barn. D-cells are also necessary for flashlights. I carry a heavy Maglite to the barn every morning and night, partly for illumination, partly because I’m skeered of mountain lions! LOL! Just in case I need to clock a mountain lion in the head (as if I’d get a chance!)
Candles: Pfft.
Solar: I read and very much appreciate the recent review of several solar light sources. Here in the maritime Pacific Northwest, it is estimated we get about 26% of available sunlight during the winter. Hubby is extremely resistant to anything solar. We just don’t get any sun.
Generator: As long as the gas and/or propane last, it is possible to run some 120V lights in the house. That would be kerosene-sparing, since a generator HAS to be run to access the deep well pump, and run the septic pump and freezers. The generator was actually the cheapest “lighting” source, but gasoline storage is a problem.
Since I’m the chief cook and bottle washer, I tend to focus on food supplies and redundant cooking resources. Warmth is stored in piles of cordwood. “Power” is stored to the extent possible in gas cans and propane tanks. But plain old LIGHT. Seems I’ve taken it a little less seriously than I should.
Read MoreLiving off a Datrex ration block for 2 days
Debby Jenkins - November 28, 2022 Before investing the Datrex lifeboat ration block to my bug out bag, I wanted to see if I could even stomach the taste and if my body would do well on it. Putting my body out there for science, I only ate these rations for two days. Well, I’m proud to announce that I survived and am writing this now.
The ration block was easy to tear open using the ‘Tear Here’ line at the top. Inside you could see that the packaging is a foil material which looks to be airtight. Cookies are individually wrapped in tight plastic wrap and two are the same length and width as a playing card and are about ¾ of the height.
The cookies were extremely crumbly, so make sure to collect all those crumbs and not waste them. The flavor was very subtle which I liked and if I had an upset stomach I could probably still eat these. To me, they tasted like a soft, crumbly, powdery, dry, graham cracker. They were very dry in texture and taste, but surprisingly not thirst promoting like you would normally think with dry foods.
The instructions on the packaging say that if you were on a lifeboat at sea, to eat one bar every 6 hours, which equals out to 800 calories a day. There are also instructions for an emergency on land and it says to eat one bar every 4 hours which equals out to 1200 calories a day. That makes sense because you most likely are burning more calories on land than if you were sitting in a lifeboat.
For my experiment, I wasn’t going to wake up every four hours though to eat a cookie, and I wanted to maintain my about 1700 calorie per day diet as to not stress out my system too much. Here are the options I thought about running:
S o every four hours that I am awake, I need to eat 2 cookies to get 1600 calories a day. This is an example of crunching the numbers and trying the product before you need to rely on it. Depending on the situation, you may just want those few calories to survive, and if you were not in a dire circumstance then you probably could splurge a little more like me and maintain the amount of calories you are used to.
It felt I was in a futuristic sci-fi movie where they get their nutrient pill ration. I enjoyed these past two days though, no cooking, cleaning, or time spent eating. It took me about a minute to eat two cookies and I was done. The ingredients and nutritional value is very low so this isn’t going to be a regular meal, but it was nice for two days.
About 30 minutes after each of my little meals I would get a sudden burst of energy that would last for for about 3 hours. The 30 minutes before my next meal would seem like a drag. This implies to me that these are fast burning carbs and give you a lot of energy for a short period of time. Probably another reason why they space them out every 4 hours.
I was craving some homemade potato fries cooked in the oven coated in coconut oil. I don’t know what that means, but I think these Datrex cookies are fast burning and my body needs more slower burning fuel from fat. These cookies were great for breakfast and lunch, but come dinner time I wanted some real food. I probably will store a few multivitamin pills along with future Datrex ration blocks to even out the nutrients.
I was glad to have this experiment over and to go back to normal food. I could go more days on just Datrex, but I just feel better with more variety. That gives me a thought to not only have these ration blocks in a bug out bag but also include some variety granola bars to vary things up. I am glad that I did this experiment and have more confidence in my future preps.
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Flood Barriers: alternatives to sandbags
Bigwig - November 28, 2022 With more and more flooding situations happening, and having grown up in a costal area, I’ve been thinking about alternatives to sandbags. They don’t seem very practical, as you have to have access to a lot of sand or dirt, they are a lot of work to fill, and they are heavy.
One option I found was water-activated flood barriers. You lay them out and the flood waters activate the material inside and soak up the water to create a barrier. They are relatively compact, lightweight, can be ready to go in minutes, are stackable, and do not need to be pre-filled. The downside is they take months to dry out, but I’d rather have that problem versus water damage. An example is at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0085S2DEU. I was able to buy some in 2020 at half priced.
You could also go commando like this guy did. He saved his home from over $100,000 in repairs. Reminds me of someone else long ago who did something a little different before a flood. https://www.wideopencountry.com/houston-man-uses-massive-inflatable-dam-save-house/
Read MoreA reminder to check the expiration dates on your IDs
Robert LarsonContributor - November 27, 2022 Today I had a head smacking moment when I was looking through my wallet and realized that my concealed carry permit expired back in February! 9 months expired!
This could have been really bad if I had used my weapon in self defense and then had to show the officers an expired permit, because I have been carrying constantly during that entire time.
I am going to have to pay for my mistake now because since I passed the 6 months of having my permit expired I can’t just pay the renewal fee online but have to attend an entirely new class, go through the background check and fingerprinting again, and pay the full new permit holder price. Yikes! It’s going to be a multiple month long process to get going again and cost three times as much.
I have definitely learned my lesson and am making calendar reminders for the expiration dates on all my IDs in my wallet and will help my wife do the same.
Check your expiration dates!
Read MoreWinnerwell Nomad camp stove
Seasons4 - November 27, 2022 One of the gaps in my prepping was that I never learned how to start a fire, keep it lit, use its warmth, put it out, and manage the ashes. Someone here mentioned the Winnerwell Nomad camp stove (thank you), so I bought it and recently used it for the first time. I bought the small version, along with a fireproof mat and the “water tank” that nestles against the chimney.
It’s compact and easy to assemble. I liked the three eyelets on the spark arrestor for attaching guy lines to tent stakes to keep the chimney steady in the wind. I used my own cords and tent stakes, not ones from the company.
Its small size meant that the only wood able to fit in it was kindling that I chopped in half or dried stems of a shrub. I need to figure out how to shorten standard size split fireweed. I tried using my Sawzall, but the firewood bounced around, so I quit.
I got interrupted and had to stop the process the first time and start it later. The water in the tank didn’t get super hot during the time I spent with the stove, but it was hot enough to make tea.
I made the mistake of apparently touching the chimney while wearing synthetic fiber gloves and burned holes in the fingertips. I have a melted mess on the back of the chimney. It’s broken in now! I did not burn myself. I learned these are not the gloves to wear while using a wood stove.
I think that I will like the stove. I need more practice lighting fires and keeping them lit. I need to figure out how to reduce the size of standard firewood to fit in the stove. I need to figure out how long it takes to heat water, maybe cook an egg, or heat soup. I need to obtain more wood. I need to figure out how to anchor the guy lines if the ground is frozen. Maybe retaining wall pavers? Then I need to keep three of them where they don’t freeze and get covered by snow. I need to figure out what to do with the ashes.
Once I get more comfortable with this controlled fire, I plan to practice making a campfire in a portable metal fire pit. One step at a time.
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An idea for another safety tool at the drive-up ATM?
Bigwig - November 24, 2022 I was getting money from the drive-up ATM one Saturday morning. The bank was open but there wasn’t anyone else at either machine. It’s in a low-crime area but I always keep my head on a swivel and take as little time as possible. I overshot the machine, so I had to back up. After getting into a better position, I glanced at my rear camera. Just then it hit me that if I keep my vehicle in reverse (and foot on the brake), I have a really good rear view of what is going on behind me. Of course, if anyone is behind me it might freak them out, and if something were to go down I would likely back into the car behind me. No, I don’t have any aftermarket front or rear security cameras and realize that would work better.
Just wanted some thoughts from the community.
Read MoreA little holiday treat that’s shelf stable
Steve Martin - November 23, 2022 https://www.npr.org/2022/11/21/1138270381/spam-figgy-pudding-why
Read MorePublic safety power shutoffs – Dress rehearsal for the real thing
hikermor - November 21, 2022 In SoCal, we now routinely experience PSPS when high winds prevail. While inconvenient, they are preferable to wildfires sparked by down power lines. They also offer a chance to test at least some of your preps and experiment with procedures. We just had a two hour PSPS, and last year we had one that lasted for three days.
With internet down, keeping phones charged was a top priority. Camping gear came into use, especially for cooking. Our headlamps and portable lanterns proved useful. Batteries recharged by portable solar panels were great. We learned to minimize opening and closing the fridge.
On balance, not exactly fun, but a good learning experience for more difficult episodes…..
Read MoreEmotional support group – Lay your burdens down
J.Swain - November 20, 2022 I just bought two of the water filter systems recommended by TP (the virus water bottle is out of stock). I’m going through waves of shaking and crying. It’s such an emotional process to be doing this. I go through it each time I take the next step in preparing. It’s really hard, but better the emotion now than later, eh?
Read MorePrepper demographics updated with 2020 FEMA survey data: over 20M people in the US alone!
Dr. Chris Ellis - November 19, 2022 Editor’s note: Colonel Chris Ellis, PhD, directs a disaster cell for the US military at India-Pacific Command. In part via his fellowship as a Goodpaster Scholar at Cornell University, he’s spent years analyzing data about the preparedness community.
The last time we analyzed FEMA survey data, it caused a bit of a splash, becoming #1 on google for “prepper demographics” and leading to a wave of mainstream press coverage about how this community has grown and moved into the mainstream. (Such as today’s 60 Minutes episode about the market growth!)
But that was using 2018 pre-Covid data (which is released years later), and we’ve since been anxious to get hands on the data FEMA collected after the pandemic changed everything. Everyone’s been expecting that Covid — and everything else that’s made ’20-22 so much fun — did nothing but continue to pour fuel on the fire of this growing community.
I’ve finished crunching the numbers using FEMA phone surveys collected in the first half of 2020, comparing it with annual data from the National Household Survey (NHS) going back through 2017.
So this does capture the Covid effect, but perhaps may have been too soon to really reflect the long-term changes, as people were still caught in the chaos the first months of 2020, just trying to figure out how to get toilet paper or not be a cat on their courtroom Zoom. The future batch of data that covers ‘20-21 should be more telling.
Key takeaways:
The number of people who can handle >31 days of self-reliance grew 50% over the 2017-20 period. The 20 million US preppers mark has solidly been crossed. If you use the broader definition of a prepper as someone who can handle at least two weeks of disruption, the number gets even higher. That means around 7% of all US households were actively working on self-reliance in ’19-20, solidly increasing from 2% to 3% then 5% in recent years. 10% is only a matter of time. While the “basic preppers” segment was consistently growing year over year before Covid, the “advanced preppers” segment had been flat or even shrank a little — but that trend reversed in 2020, showing that many people saw the need to go beyond the basics in response to world events. Nothing major changed around geography: the same states that prep a lot (eg. Montana) and those that don’t (eg. Washington D.C.) stayed in their relative rankings. Islanders, such as people in Hawaii and Puerto Rico, continue to prep at rates 50% higher than mainlanders. Rural households are still more likely than urbanites to prep, but we continue to see strong growth among city dwellers. Asians disproportionately embraced prepping in ’20, which perhaps makes sense given what they may have been hearing from friends and family back in Asia during early Covid combined with some of the anti-Asian racism that grew in the US in ’20. Perhaps most surprising: the trend in recent years was that preppers were getting younger. But that trend reversed in 2020, with the average age actually increasing a little to 52.6. The number of younger preppers still grew — 25-34 year olds are still the largest segment on The Prepared — but there was even more growth among the older crowd during this period. There’s some weird results in this data, though, which show there’s still a disconnect between reality and how a typical household thinks about risk. But we’ve started getting a peek at the ’21 data, where FEMA changed some of the survey questions to be clearer, and I think it will result in better data going forward.While the term “prepper” is ill-defined quantitatively, in my research I use a simple heuristic from the NHS: how long can you survive at home without publicly provided water, power, or transportation? I quantify anyone with 31 days or more of self-reported preparedness as a Resilient Citizen. Those with 30 days or less are Regulars. Highly Resilient Citizens (HRCs) have 90 days or more and Ultra-High Resilient Citizens (UHRCs) are at 97 or more days (the maximum allowed response in FEMA’s survey).
Preparedness trends
Americans collectively have increased their levels of disaster preparedness from 2017 to 2020. For Regulars, the effect is small – an average of seven days in 2017 to just over eight days in 2020 – but still measurable. For this group, each year saw a slight increase. When including Resilient Citizens and averaging all Americans, the mean jumped from just under 10 days of resilience in 2017 to 12.4 days in 2020.
The overall number of Resilient Citizens in America has also increased every year. In 2017, approximately four out of every 100 people was a Resilient Citizen. In 2020 it had increased 50% to nearly six per 100. In sheer numbers this means 14.9 million Americans had 31 days or more of at-home preparedness in 2020. Ultra-Highly Resilient Citizens (97 days or more of preparedness) jumped from four million people in 2017 to 6.7 million in 2020. There is still a heavy stereotype against “preppers,” but as more people prepare from across the political spectrum – and in various ways – the stigma appears to be slowly eroding.
Geography
Where do these households reside? I analyzed the data in two different ways. First was by US state or territory. Generally speaking, lower population, rural states have the highest rates of preparedness. Montana, Idaho, Alaska, New Hampshire, Maine, Utah, Wyoming, West Virginia, Delaware, and Hawaii make up the top ten, in descending order (i.e. Montana had the highest average). The lowest average states were, with the exception of Texas and Illinois, all east coast states or the District of Columbia (Washington, DC was the lowest, followed by Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Rhode Island, New York, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and North Carolina). A cursory look at yearly changes, by state, yielded no discernable pattern. California and Florida saw annual increases in Resilient Citizens all four years, but Texas and New York saw random fluctuation.
Another pattern that held from my previous research was that of higher aggregate rates of preparedness in US islands (Hawaii, Guam, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands). The four-year average of residents of island locales indicates preparedness rates ~50% higher than those on the mainland (15.7 days versus 10.8 days respectively). I maintain my original conjecture that primary drivers of this disparate finding are a “fear of state failure” coupled with an inability to easily flee larger disasters for island residents.
A second way to geographically analyze the data is by an urban-rural delineation. The US Department of Agriculture bins zip codes into one of ten population density categories (1 = an urban area with 50,000 people or more, 10 = rural at less than 2,500 people). There is a positive correlation between ruralness and higher levels of preparedness across all Americans. 80% of Regulars surveyed lived in an urban area. However, a sizable two-thirds of all self-identified Resilient Citizens and 56% of UHRCs lived in an urban area as well.
Race
In regard to race, the four-year aggregates of all Americans yields that the category “Alaskan or Native American” had the highest average at 14 days of preparedness. After this was Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders, then Whites, Hispanics, Blacks/African Americans, and Asians, in that order. Whites and Blacks saw yearly increases while the other races had fluctuations. Asians were very stable from 2017-2019 but saw a major jump in 2020. Several possibilities explain this latter finding: increased discrimination, higher cultural or social transmission of preparedness, news consumption patterns, or affinity to stories emanating from China and Asia writ large at the beginning of COVID.
The story among Resilient Citizens is slightly different. For four-year aggregates, Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders topped the list at 92 days, followed by Alaskans/Native Americans (79 days), then Hispanics (77), Whites (76), Blacks (71), and Asians (65). A large word of caution is in order here though, with all races other than Whites, the number of minority resilient citizens is quite low in any given year. There are not enough respondents in these categories for me to confidently depict any racial patterns among Resilient Citizens on a yearly basis. Relatedly, when conducting multi-variate analysis and controlling for things such as income, education, and an urban vs. rural home location, the variable of race was a poor indicator of being a Resilient Citizen or not. The maximum observed impact across numerous calculations was only 2%.
Age
Resilient Citizens are slightly older (52.6 years old) overall than Regulars (51.7), but this difference is less than a year. Interestingly though, the steady growth in Resilient Citizens is NOT among the young. The 35 and under crowd make up a much smaller percentage of Resilient Citizens in 2020 (14.4%) than they did in 2017 (20.6%). Comparatively, growth in those aged 36-49 is nearly 50% and for those 50+ it is 62% from 2017 to 2020. Isolating those 60 and over saw a near doubling; the increase was 92%! Some of this differentiation between young and old could be due to income levels and overall net worth.
Other variables
In all of the data analyzed, the most shocking finding to me was the reported rates of experiencing a disaster. FEMA asked, “Have you or your family ever experienced the impacts of a disaster?” Among all respondents, the 2020 data – in the midst of COVID – was slightly down as compared to 2017. Among all Resilient Citizens, it was down nine full percentage points. The 2020 survey was conducted in the summer of 2020, at the height of the first lockdown and several months before any vaccines were developed and available.
A higher percentage of women reported being Resilient Citizens in 2020 than in 2017, but the numbers were too small for any statistical significance. Another interesting jump was in the number of Resilient Citizens with a disability. There was a 50% increase from 2017 to 2020. Of note, the FEMA data indicated, at best, only a 3% rise in disabilities in the overall population during the same timeframe.
Among preparedness circles is the concept of “bugging out”. That is, quickly leaving your home at – or just prior to – disaster onset with an already assembled bag of emergency supplies. Among Regulars, even though they reported higher rates of at home preparedness, their reported ready-to-go rates saw no discernable patterns among the four years studied. By contrast, Resilient Citizens reported a 35% jump in bug-out readiness in 2019 and maintained that new high in 2020.
Homeowner’s insurance levels increased in both groups slightly, however there were just three years of data, so this could be observed randomness. Money saved for an emergency increased among Regulars but decreased among Resilient Citizens. My hunch is that Resilient Citizens converted cash into preps.
What didn’t change? Education levels between Regulars and Resilient Citizens continues to be nearly equal across all four years. Income levels were relatively stable with Resilient Citizens on average earning a few thousand dollars more per year than Regulars. Resilient Citizens still report higher levels of confidence in their ability to take the steps necessary to prepare for a disaster than Regulars. Resilient Citizens also maintain they are far more likely to have had a disaster plan for at least a year.
Looking forward to 2021 data
FEMA has just released the 2021 National Household Survey raw data. The survey instrument has undergone some substantial changes. First of all, it’s a larger query of America. 2021’s sample size is around 7,200 people versus the roughly 5,000 per year in each of the 2017-2020 datasets. Secondly, some of the key questions have been modified. For example, people are no longer asked their monthly income, but rather their annual income. I personally think this will yield clearer results.
Another question modification that will have significant impact on comparing 2021 to previous years is my key variable of days of total survival at home. 2021’s new survey instrument no longer asks about how long one could last at home without power, water, or transportation. It now breaks these down into separate questions. For example: “How long could you live in your home without power?” And, the answers are no longer discrete numbers, but rather chronological heuristics such as “More than one week” or “More than three months.” If you assume that those who answered at more than one month and more than three months, combined, for both the power question and the running water question are analogous to Resilient Citizens, then the percentage of Americans in 2021 at this higher level is now 8.3%, or roughly 21.5 million Americans. Analysis is ongoing and I hope to release findings in 2023.
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How to prepare with pets
Mariette Feeney - November 19, 2022 I’m fairly new to prepping (I’d been thinking about it for a good while, but the pandemic combined with world events really kicked things into gear for me) and while I have a solid go bag and a plan in case I need to leave the city with my two kids – I’m at a complete loss with regards to how to prepare for travelling with my cat. I don’t drive, and even though my partner does, I don’t want to rely on that necessarily, so all of my plans are based on walking to my folks’ house in the country, a journey that could potentially take 2 days. Anyone in a similar situation? What do I need to keep my cat safe and warm in an emergency situation that could involve camping overnight?
Read MoreShould I get a natural gas home generator or one that runs off propane or diesel?
Steve Martin - November 19, 2022 Have been thinking about a Generac home generator for the essentials. Most of them in our area are natural gas powered, a few in rural areas I’ve seen with a propane tank nearby and today even saw one with a diesel tank attached. My property has nat gas service….but if the SHTF, how long will the gas flow? Am I better off with a propane or diesel powered version? Enquiring minds wanna know! Opinions? Either way, eventually when the fuel stops, obviously the generator dies too, just wondering which would last the longest.
Read MorePhilosophies for good mental health
Ant0kneeguy - November 18, 2022 Prepping can really take a mental toll on preppers. I find myself paralysed by thoughts of the worst, and am interested in learning about philosophies that can combat this.
What philosophies have you lived by or come across that you’d recommend to other preppers? Are there books or resources you think make a good starting point?
I notice that there are plenty of medical books in the prepper book list, but none on mental health or the philosophies needed to get through disaster.
Read MoreExperiments with home dehydrated strawberries
Barb LeeContributor - November 18, 2022 Hi folks, thought you might enjoy the results of “playing with my food” experiments this week. Definitely falls into the “Using only shelf stable foods” category.
I decided to dehydrate a four pound bag of (grocery store) frozen strawberries yesterday, thinking they might be good to snack on. Actually, I didn’t like them too much. Commercial strawberries are usually tasteless and dehydrating them didn’t improve them. However, there’s more!
Preliminary information:
16 oz of fresh, hulled, sliced strawberries yielded 1.5 ounces, or about 3/4 cup, dehydrated berry slices. (Not freeze dried.)
Four pounds of dehydrated strawberry slices fit snugly in a quart mason jar.
What I decided to do with them was make some sort of jam or spread. The problem being, it would be hard to figure out the exact amount of water and sugar to add to get them fully hydrated and the correct sweetness without using excessive water. I decided to treat them like reconstituting dehydrated tomato paste, to make a spread.
The first task was to powder the berries in a coffee grinder. I have learned that powdering veggies (and now berries) works best if the dehydrated produce is first very cold, otherwise it’s leathery and tends to gum up the grinder. A short spell in the freezer did the trick. Something to do before the power goes out.
I used a recipe for medium syrup for canning/freezing fruit, which was approximately 1 cup water to 1/2 cup sugar. I brought this to a boil on the stove, which took the briefest time. Hot tap water would probably do to dissolve the sugar.
I powdered 1/2 cup dehydrated berry slices, which produced about 1/4 cup berry powder.
To the powder I added about 3 Tablespoons of the syrup. (Might have been 1/4 cup, start conservatively).
The resulting berry sauce was at first taste, a little too thin and had a “wet powder” mouth feel. HOWEVER, after allowing to stand a few minutes for the powder to absorb the liquid, the mixture thickened to perfect spreading consistency. Spread on buttered toast, it delivered a HUGE strawberry flavor that wasn’t boiled to death and full of commercial pectin.
This amount made enough strawberry spread to smear on 3-4 pieces of toast! No refrigerating a partially used jar of jam!
You could go with a little higher amount of sugar in the syrup if you like your “jam” sweeter. Or, you could add enough extra syrup to make a berry syrup for pancakes etc.
If you were going to powder berries (or tomatoes) BEFORE the power ever goes out, I’d strongly suggest storing the powder in vac sealed Mason jars with a silica gel pack, which I don’t have, but am going to order right now. The stuff will cake.
Maybe a person could make individual packets of pre-measured dehydrated berry powder and sugar, then “just add water”. Needless to say, that’s the next experiment!
And of course there’s always just making leather out of pureed berries.
Read MoreHow to prevent and survive a home invasion
Robert LarsonContributor - November 18, 2022 There are 8,000 home invasions in North America every day. Your home is probably the place you spend most of your time, followed by work or perhaps school. It is also where you let your guard down and feel most safe. A home invasion not only is devastating, with the possible physical damage to yourself and possessions, but can also leave you with horrible mental and emotional trauma. After a home invasion, you may never feel completely comfortable or safe in your home again, and have many sleepless nights of anxiety long after the initial crime was committed. Don’t let this ever happen. Take the steps now to protect yourself and your loved ones from this horrible event that does happen.
While the elite crew of trained mercenaries cutting phone lines and executing a months-long plan to invade and hold you ransom does happen (and I’ll talk about that), most home invasions are from burglaries. 1 out of 5 homes will experience a home burglary. Every 30 seconds, a burglary takes place in the US. That’s 2.5 million per year. The majority of those occur during the day, and 25% are when someone is home. SCARY!
I have enjoyed reading, learning from, and taking steps based on the home-hardening articles on this site. They offer many solutions that are affordable, easy to install, and offer a lot more protection than your standard-built home. That is my first recommendation, harden your home using those guides to prepare against the most common form of home invasion, burglary.
But let’s say a burglary does happen when you are at home, here’s a possible scenario and what to do about it:
Scenario #1 – A break in or burglary in progress.
In this first scenario, you are either in your bedroom asleep or in the living room with your feet up watching a movie with your family to wind down for the evening. Let’s say you are watching the movie National Treasure with America’s national treasure Nicolas Cage. Both are situations where you are relaxed and feel safe and comfortable in your home. You hear a noise coming from across the house or in the garage.
It’s not wise to run out of the home every time you hear a noise and get spooked. Especially if you have pets or family members are not aware of their location, it most likely would be them accidentally dropping a glass or shuffling things around. If you think it through a little and come to the conclusion that it could be something dangerous, then dial 911 from a nearby phone and tell them you think someone might be in your house. It’s better to have the police aware and on the way than to be staring down the barrel of a gun by a home invader. You can always call back and apologize later that it was your cat if that was what it was. Calling a close neighbor is a backup if you really are hesitant to call 911, just do something to have another person come to assist you and be aware of the situation.
My first tip is to have some sort of weapon in every room to grab and respond to disturbances. Even if you carry a gun, you probably are not wearing that with your pajamas. Pepper spray is a good one that can be bought in bulk and easily distributed to hiding places throughout your home without taking up too much room. Improvise if you don’t have anything. A lamp or rolled-up newspaper is better than nothing. Take a couch pillow or jacket wrapped around your arm as an improvised form of body armor that could give some protection against a knife.
If you confront someone in your home, tell them to get out. If they stand there with a knife and act threatening attempt to talk them down, offer them cash from your wallet, or say “Take that then you can go free.”. A few bucks are worth deescalating the situation and avoiding an altercation. Be on guard though. Fight for your life if you need to.
My friend experienced a situation like this before when he was watching TV and a young burglar hopped up on drugs broke into his home. He used a commanding voice to tell the person to leave, but the burglar charged him, forcing my friend to at the assailant. He was justified but still lives with the guilt of taking a life. Again, harden your home to deter and reduce the risk of anything like this from ever happening.
While this next scenario is less likely to happen, it’s good to be aware of and at least think of.
Scenario #2 – A professional home invasion
If you hear a loud noise and try and call 911 like in the above scenario but are met with a cut phone line or even jammed cell phone then you could be facing a much greater threat than the teenage punk trying to steal some stuff to pawn. In this case, you have multiple points of evidence that you are facing a home invader. Get out and don’t investigate or confront them. Even if you have a gun and feel confident that you would be okay, they could have larger and more guns than you. And even if you were able to take them out, you now have to live with that for the rest of your life and now have a mountain of legal issues to worry about that probably will bankrupt you.
If you see people outside your home, they could attack as you try and flee, so even the get out advice isn’t a hard rule. Be smart about the situation you are in.
Most professional home invasions and kidnappings follow the following steps:
Stalking – they watch you, and know your routine Entry – they surround your house, cut off escape routes, and enter your home most likely fast, loud, and with a lot of guns to surprise and have the upper hand. Control – They will try and establish control over you and the situation by showing force or separating you from your children or spouse. Event – They will use you as their key to get what they want. Kill hostages – If they kill one of you or reveal their faces, they might show they have nothing left to lose and could easily kill the rest of you. Escape – The home invaders will try and escape after getting what they want.If this occurs at night, turn off the lights and stay away from windows that will silhouette you. You know your house and the layout, they don’t. Have the upper hand.
If you are out numbered, act passive and non-threatening. The kidnappers/home invaders have elevated adrenaline and want to maintain control, especially in the early stages of the event. During the control phase, don’t try and reason with them, talk with them, or even look at them. Follow their orders because if you fight, they will try and exert even more control and dominance. Use this time to gather as much information as you can. Remember any names they mention, look for tattoos, how many are there, etc. This intel will be valuable for when you escape.
During the control phase, they will likely hold your spouse or children separate from you as leverage. They know that we are less likely to make an escape or fight back if we know we will leave a loved one behind or in danger. If you are presented the opportunity to escape however, you should. The ability to get away, secure your safety and call the SWAT team will leave you in a better situation than being left alone with the home invaders and the guns.
One way to create a diversion is to hit the panic button on your car’s key fob if you have your keys on you. Once they leave to check out the disturbance, you can try and escape. Do not run, it creates too much noise, move swiftly and quietly.
If you can get out of the house, be aware that professional home invaders may have additional men outside to keep an eye on things like police or you escaping. If you are caught again, expect to be met with extreme violence as they try and regain control and show you who’s boss.
Watch for patterns your captors exhibit. Do they send a text message or call the other kidnappers who are holding your family every 10 minutes to let the other person know that everything is going to plan? If you need to attack and subdue them, know that if they don’t get that phone call at that prescribed time, your family might be at risk. You would want to attack right after they make that call so you have at least 10 minutes to locate your family before things go bad.
Thanks to Ubique for sparking the idea of this forum post. She had posted scenarios last year that I have saved and finally am getting around to thinking about more, researching, and sharing my viewpoint on the subject. Here’s her first post that details out a home invasion scenario, and then in a followup forum post goes over the various things that could have been done to prevent and change that situation from happening. Your homework is to read those two and think about what you would do.
Read MoreSome basic questions on water storage
Alice - November 17, 2022 This is a really basic question about water storage. Can I fill one of those storage containers and just leave it in the house indefinitely? Does the water need to be changed? If so, how often? TIA!
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