When talking about disaster scenarios this kind of thing is often ignored because the assumption is if things fall apart it’s not a good idea to count on something that requires power and a cell or internet connection. Those will likely be the first things to fail, right? Maybe not. The problem with this thought process you are only planning for worst case, when in fact you are far more likely to be in a situation somewhere between total chaos and normal every day bliss.

For a perfect example of this one doesn’t need to look any further than what has been happening recently in Iran. By all accounts shit is hitting the fan there. If any of us were in that situation I think it’s a safe guess that we would have kicked into survival mode and started putting some of this training and preparation to good use. This is the kind of thing that could happen in any city around the world, political chaos spilling out onto the streets on a scale large enough that the entire world takes note. Riots, protests, lock downs and martial law, and in the middle of that the web is still working. In fact, sites like the ones I mentioned above have become the primary way for people outside of Iran to find out what is actually happening there. But that’s not all, people inside Iran are using them to coordinate with friends, warn and confirm the safety of family and pass on tips and tricks for staying safe while protesting.

20 years ago this never would have happened. Borders would have been closed and there would have been a media blackout to the point that no one outside of the situation would know what was going on. People on one side of the city would have been totally cut off from those on the other. But today, thanks to the web and these networks, information isn’t as easily stopped. I doubt I need to explain to anyone reading this how these sites allow you to be connected to millions of people through friends of friends of friends. These connections have become invaluable for the people in Iran by giving them an avenue to both tell the world what is happening, and to see that the rest of the world is watching and concerns about what is taking place. Sometimes just knowing that others are aware of your situation will help you feel less alone, it could also be the link you need to get the help or info you need to survive.

This is worth noting because for people coming to this from the web community it’s painfully obvious, however for many others it’s still new and somewhat scary territory. Many “survivalists” for example tend to be more reclusive and private which in this particular situation could work against them. Someone who doesn’t use these sites is certainly at a disadvantage if they become a primary source of communication, whereas someone who had been using them for years and had thousands of personal connections would likely default to using them without missing a beat. I’m not suggesting that everyone reading this should instantly join twitter and make as many connections as possible, I’m simply pointing out that social networking sites have the potential to be incredibly important. Anyone making a habit of considering emergency options and back up plans might want to consider how these tools could be used for more than simply wasting time during work.

I taste tested the vodka this morning which you can see in the accompanying video after the jump and it wasn’t too too bad. If you used it as a mixer and not straight up it would be totally passable at any cocktail party. The form factor is just amusingly awesome but I don’t think I’d really keep one in my back pocket. It seems like that could really be a recipe for disaster especially if you’re out and about and don’t want to smell like a homeless alcoholic all day. I’m going to keep my eye out for the other “flavors” and see if they stand up to the quality of the vodka. What would only make this thing better is if they licensed real brand name hooch. I’ve got a bottle of Lagavulin in my survival kit for “emergencies” but it would be great to be able to keep a smaller and lighter load in my BoB for cross country GTFOOD hikes. And yes, I wrote this review AFTER I did the taste test

When Sean and I took the Urban Escape and Evasion class handcuffs were an integral part of the class and we spent a lot of time practicing various methods of escape. Sean did a quick video that shows how easy it is to get out of those things. That is if they aren’t very good at cuffing you. A properly trained person can cuff you in a way that’s nearly impossible to get out of. Which is exactly how I was cuffed in the van during our field test and required a little help from my friends to get out. And one very important thing that we learned in class is that even if you can escape from your cuffs the cops don’t think it’s very funny at all when you hand them back to them…

Check out the videos after the jump!

This got me thinking about how often in an urban environment the walls themselves can give us as much if not more information than a local newspaper about what is going on in an area, if we know what to look for. Unfortunately most people don’t, so I think when talking about urban survival brushing up on some of these languages and codes can be very useful. That said, there are a very few universal codes blended together with a near endless amount of specialized local ones but knowing a few things can help out a lot.

One thing to note is I’m not exclusively talking about gang tags, though in most cities they are the most common thing you will see. While not so frequent these days, for much of the last 100 or so years hobo code was used by “travelers” to tip off others about things they had found. Knowing a few of these ahead of time could mean the difference between warm food and a place to sleep or abuse and hunger. Before Wi-Fi became omnipresent in most cities, those in the know were using warchalking to let others know about open wireless nodes. New codes are often suggested though not many are actually in use nationally or globally.

Personally one of the first things I do when in a new city is start looking at the walls for patterns, when I see something showing up repeatedly I go to the web and start researching it. Often a collection of letters combined with the city name will give you exactly the info you are looking for. Going back to the impetus of this post, this is especially true of gangs. Since gangs are numbering in the millions now and individual offshoots and cliques make knowing everything about all of them near impossible, but luckily you don’t need to. Because of their territoriality, chances are wherever you live there are only a small handful of gangs and with a little research you can find out who they are, and just as importantly who they like and who they don’t. This is info that came come in handy if you find yourself lost, seeking shelter, or getting caught in a dark alley with the wrong people. Respect is an important part of gang culture, and knowing who to respect in what areas can go a very very long way.

If you live in Los Angeles or Southern California the book Wallbangin’ by Susan A. Phillips is chock full of info about the history and culture of gang graffiti in the area and picking it up will open your eyes to a whole new language that certainly surrounds you. If you don’t live in SoCal, it’s still worth reading because while the specific gangs she talks about may be different near you, much of the culture probably overlaps. Streetgangs.com is also a fantastic collection of gang information. Something as simple as seeing a 6 pointed star or a word with the letter “C” with an X through it can tell you a great deal about who lives in an area.

One of the most valuable things you can learn from neighborhood graffiti is what the neighborhood is called by the locals. Often it’s not the same thing that is on a map, or it’s a tweek on the official name. Knowing that one piece of info can go a long way when asking for help or info from neighborhood shops if you need to. As I mentioned in the start of this post, this post tells a lot about the gangs hanging out on my block. Who lives near you and what are they up to?

When I first looked into it honestly I was confused by the schedule on the local site but luckily I had some more patient friends who figured out when a class nearby was starting. You can find something near you on the national site and then try to decipher their scheduling on your own. If you aren’t familiar with CERT it’s short for Community Emergency Response Training and is basically a 7 week course that covers a wide range of disasters that might occur in your area and things you can do to help out. The initial set up is that in any given disaster official services are going to be overextended in minutes and most people will be on their own, so if you have a basic level of training and can team up with others in your neighborhood there is a lot of work you can do on your own before real rescue teams ever show up. This seemed like worthwhile info to have.

Last night was the 6th class so assuming all goes well I’ll graduate next week. Obviously my comments only apply to the specific class I’m taking, and the make up of that class has a lot to do with that but as it’s a standardized course on a national level I’m guessing much of this probably applies across the board. On the first day of class the instructor went around the room and asked everyone who they were and why they were there. About half the class expressed similar feelings as the ones I mentioned above. The other half were applying for a job at a local outreach program that required all applicants to have passed CERT. This created a weird dynamic to some extent because about half the class really didn’t want to be there. I think if there was a way to prescreen students and put those with interest in the topic in one class and those taking it out of requirement in another it might have helped things move along at a much different pace.

The info covered is actually really detailed and useful. I detest straight slide presentations which is 90% of what the class it built on, but the information is actually well organized in my opinion. And the videos, while being a good 30 years old are at least amusing. I think the most valuable classwork has been the interactive hands on work and the scenario based Q&A. With some of the classes hitting the 3 hour mark, being engaged and actually doing things makes the info sink in much better and I’ve found those to be actually pretty fun.

What hasn’t been so fun is the near endless assault of stupid questions from the class, many from the aforementioned % that didn’t want to be there in the first place. To his credit our instructor has been very patient and thoughtfully answered everything that has been asked. Unfortunately some of the class feels that because this one guy they knew one time told them they read something somewhere that they know more about some of these topics than a trained firefighter who deals with them on a professional basis. In a way that’s kind of education in itself though, because you get to see how locked into an idea or behavior some people can be without any idea of how factual it might be. They’d rather not be wrong than have better information.

Where some folks might have found that all annoying, and I admit I did a bit too, it actually hammers home the need for this kind of training on an individual level. There’s no guarantee that emergency services will be there, and it’s a pretty good guarantee that the volunteer aid workers who hopefully will be there might not have any idea what they are doing so better to learn it for yourself.

Because of all this I think the class might have actually worked better as a weekend long course but I understand that when developing a plan like this they need to create a format that works for the most people at once. I’ll be interested to see what the advanced levels have to offer which I’ll be looking into after next weeks graduation. We’ve been told we’ll be given the coveted green CERT vest and helmets then as well, but there still seems to be confusion about if we’ll get CERT Backpacks or not. The CERT Spokesman I talked to in Venice the other day said the city of LA had tons of these and all current graduates would be getting them, but our instructor said the city has been out of them for a long time. Such is life with volunteer federally funded organizations.

I’ve said it before, gear comes and goes and breaks or is unreliable where as training sticks with you and can be the thing that makes the survival difference for you. I’m already making my wish list of courses to take after this, anything you think I should be considering?

Terrorism is generally thought of in the blood and guts variety. When thinking of terrorism, people imagine 9/11, Oklahoma City, The Unabomber and Israel. From a terrorist’s standpoint, this type of blood and guts terrorism loses its effectiveness as it happens more often. In other words, blood and guts terrorism suffers from diminishing returns. Over the past five years, some terrorists groups have moved away from blood and guts terrorism towards systems disruption which becomes more effective as more attacks occur.

In today’s modern world, many of the systems we rely upon are tightly coupled and highly efficient. However, these systems aren’t very robust and are easily disrupted. In a non-terrorist related example, this past week a hospital in Indianapolis had their computer system go down and had to turn away patients. It is from this example that the real risks highlighted in Brave New War are made apparent for those of us not in a high risk area for terrorism, and why a book on warfare and terrorism is important when thinking about urban survival.

Whether it’s food or widgets on the store shelves, nearly everything we purchase is delivered through a just-in-time system. It is the disruption of this just-in-time delivery system that poses the biggest and most likely threat to society. Just-in-time systems rely upon a number of other networks including the transportation system, communications network and the international monetary exchange. A disruption in any one of these systems can lead to a disruption in the delivery of just-in-time goods. This is a cascading system failure, where a failure in one place leads to failures in another. This not only happens between systems, but within a network itself. The Northeast Blackout of 2003 is an example of a small localized disruption in one part of a network spreading throughout a network and affecting a much larger part of the network than the initial disruption should have been able to.

The solution that John Robb has come up with to combat these system disruptions are resilient communities. Resilient communities create “a set of new services that allow the smallest viable subset of social systems, the community (however you define it), to enjoy the fruits of globalization without being completely vulnerable to its excesses.”

While Brave New War is not a book about survival, it does illuminate a whole host of threats that do face urbanites. When analyzing threats to survival in an urban environment, this is a necessary point to understand, and this book does an excellent job examining these threats and how they have been changing over the past several years and decades.

We all have this to some extent, mostly on an informal level. We know where our friends and family live and if you were driving one day and got a flat tire and knew your friend lived half a block away it would be natural to go there for help rather than sitting on the side of the road. In the scope of a larger disaster those connections become even more important, as does a little bit of forethought. Everyone has a different skill set and if you know someone with medical training or something who is a really good mechanic, these are people that it would be beneficial to be near should something terrible happen.

On a small scale local level, just knowing where your friends live around town can be helpful. Another step would be making sure you know a few friendly spots in cities you visit frequently. If you are out of the country and the government of the country you are in falls apart, simply going back to your hotel might not be the best idea. Even further along would be having a plan ahead of time with a circle of friends that if something ever happens, everyone knows where to meet and what to bring. Or better what to stock up on ahead of time. Trying to create a fully stocked survival compound becomes a lot more realistic when several people are splitting the tasks and costs.

I’m currently reading Patriots and while the book has plenty of issues on it’s own (which I’ll cover in a review soon enough) a core part of the story is friends who thought and planned ahead to work together which is a very valuable thing to have.

Traveling for Metblogs has helped me realize that quite a bit. I’ve been able to visit cities I’ve never been to before and have friendly faces waiting to greet me and show me around. This always makes me realize how important having those connections are, and makes me think about what I should be doing in regards to future planning. I’m curious how much other folks have though about these issues and what arrangements others have already made. Do you have a group of friends already organized? Do you have friends not so organized but like minded enough that you know you could count on them if need be?

Every preparedness article you will ever read will have something about how much food to have on hand, and most 2-3 day kits on the market come with some kind of ration bar. In my experience this is something that everyone just knows, but no one really thinks about too much. Being someone who likes food, it’s something I may have given more thought to and I wanted to share some of what I’ve figured out with you.

If I’m going to assume that for a unknown number of days I’m going to have to live off one single thing, there are a few things I want to know ahead of time. How does it taste? Because if it tastes like complete ass I’d rather just die then try to live off it for a week. How do I feel after eating it? What kind of reaction do my guts have to it? For example that last thing I want to have in my emergency kit is something that’s going to give me a stomach ache or the squirts. You know what I’m talking about. Gross. So this kind of thing is worth thinking about. Perhaps I’m the only one thinking about it because when looking at the stuff that comes in most kits or is branded as survival rations, the only thing people seem to talk about is the shelf life.

After some serious scientific tinkering and mass research I’ve come to the following conclusion: The longer something will last the worse it tastes. Twinkies are the sole exception to this rule, but I wouldn’t advise trying to live off nothing but Twinkies for more than a week or two. So for the topic of conversation here I’m going to break this into two specific categories – the stuff that lasts a long time and the stuff that tastes good.

For starters lets talk about the eternal storage pure ration options. In the photo above I’ve got a package of Mayday 2400 Calorie Food Bars which are the kind of thing you find in most pre-packed kits. These also come in 3600 Calorie
and 1200 Calorie versions but it seems like the 2400 is what most kits come with. Well how may calories do you actually need in a day? As far as I can tell there’s no real agreement on this and it varies from person to person, however this calculator can probably give you a good ballpark idea. So these Mayday bars are everywhere, the problem is they are really not good. Like, yuk. I suppose if you were starving they would be welcomed, but they really aren’t something I can see anyone looking forward to eating. The only reason they are so popular is that they have a 5 year shelf life.

Also with a 5 year shelf life and much much tastier are the food bars by Datrex. They tend to be a little more expensive but if you do a taste test between these and the Mayday bars you will know where that extra few cents went. The higher end kits made by the folks at Mother Eagle use these and I think they are a pretty good choice if you are only focusing on shelf life. Another thing to consider are the near endless options in the world of M.R.E. but that would be a whole post on it’s own so I’ll leave it for another time. If you are a fan then go for it.

One thing worth noting is that both the Mayday and Datrex bars are vegan.

Here’s my argument against worrying about shelf life – if you are going to buy a chunk for disaster prep there are only two options of what will happen: Either there will be a situation where you need it before it expires, or there won’t. So what happens if at the end of 5 years you haven’t had a need for the 2 week supply of these bars you have, what are you going to do with them all? Throwing them out is kind of a waste, but no one really wants to eat them by choice so you are stuck trying to decide what to do. It’s for this reason that I tend to lean towards options that don’t last quite as long but taste really good and I probably eat them on my own anyway. This works for me because as long as I keep a general idea in my mind (or written down somewhere) about when I bought them then I always have something fairly good on hand.

For years Clif Bars were my main choice and I still tend to have one or two in just about all my bags and bust them out anytime I’m on the road and a little hungry. My single reservation with them is that they are not designed to be meal replacements and at around 250 calories they work much better for for short periods of time or quick energy bursts. If you know you are going to have a real meal for dinner but not sure about the rest of the day, these are a great option. Depending on where you buy them, they usually have a “best before” date that is about a year out, though given their all vegan and organic content I’m sure a little longer wouldn’t hurt you.

A better option that I’ve come across recently are the Probar Whole Food Nutrition Bars. A sales guy at REI actually turned me onto them and I’m really glad he did. These also have about a year shelf life, are all natural and packed with fruits and nuts. Super good ingredients means they actually taste really good and unlike Clif Bars, these have the added bonus of being designed as meal replacements. They are close to 400 calories each and come in a variety of flavors. Again the added quality ups the price a little, but I’ve figured out about the cheapest way to get them I think. In stores they are around $3.50 each, however Amazon now has a subscription option were you can opt to have a box of 12 sent to you on the 1st of every month and it’s about $24 which drops the price down to $2 each. That’s still more expensive than some other options, but the trade off is you get something that tastes really good, is good for you, and if you don’t need for an emergency you will be happy to eat anyway.

In fact I recommend the subscription option simply because you will want some around for yourself in the meantime. I’m opting for it myself because I keep buying them and eating them before I get a chance to put them into my bags. Again, this is a perfect example why shelf life isn’t of the utmost importance to me. I’d rather have plenty of something I eat all the time then excess of things I don’t want to eat ever.

Duration

Disasters, and their resulting disruptions, can last anywhere from a few minutes through weeks, months or even be indefinite.  The shorter a disaster, the less amount of preparation is required.  For example, if the power goes out for a few hours, it might be inconvenient, but for most people it wouldn’t lead to a survival situation.  However, if the same thing happens for a few days, especially in cold climates where people need electricity to run their heaters, a simple power outage could easily turn into a survival situation.

The shorter the disruption, the more common they are.  Disasters like Hurricane Katrina, the Seattle WTO Riots, or the Northridge Earthquake are very rare events, but they cause disruption for days and weeks, even years for some people.  Somewhere in between these extremes there are likely enough disasters where it would be helpful to be prepared for.

Area of Effect

On the second axis there is a similar situation.  There are very localized disruptions that are quite common, while other disasters that have a much larger area of effect are quite a bit more rare.

The more localized a disruption, the smaller the impact on our daily lives.  If there is a street closure for a block, it’s easy to route around it.  However, when the I-5/SR-14 interchange collapsed in the Northridge Earthquake or when the Bay Bridge collapsed in the Loma Prieta earthquake, those disruptions where much harder to route around.

Just as with the shorter disruptions, the localized ones don’t need much preparation and the disruptions that affect many are fairly rare.  Again, it is between these two extremes where we have events that are likely enough to affect us, and where preparation would be helpful, that it makes sense to spend the time, effort and money to prepare.

Intensity

On the final axis, intensity, again we find a similar pattern.  Take a political protest for example, it can range anywhere from a peaceful gathering that might block a street for a couple hours, all the way up to a multi-day riot where people are clashing with police and burning down buildings.  Clearly, the more intense situation is the riot, but it’s also much more rare.  And intensity isn’t necessarily tied to a longer duration.  A slow speed car accident wouldn’t be intense but it would be over quickly.  A high speed car crash would be just as quick, but also a lot more intense.

Just as with the other two axis, the level of disruption needs to be weighted against the likelihood of occurrence.  The most intense disasters are also the most rare.  It’s not that likely that any individual will be caught in the middle of a riot, or an 8.0 earthquake, or a hurricane’s storm surge.  But when these things do happen, they can be ruinous to the individual.

Putting it all together

When these axis are combined, we are left with a band of disruptive and common enough events that are worth preparing for.  While an event like the one described in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road is possible, an even that destroys modern society as we know it, one that would be in the far upper-right corner of the graph to the right, is highly unlikely.

You’ll notice two things in the graph above: first, it only shows two of the three axis; second, there are no units on either axis.  This graph is intended to give you a visual idea of what this article is talking about.  Unfortunately, I don’t have the skill or ability to make a 3D graph, but this one should suffice for giving you the idea.  As for the lack of units, judging those risks and the associated cost-benefit analysis of preparation is one each person needs to make for themselves.  The risk, needs and costs of preparation will be different for each person.  However, communities often times face similar threats, and it is possible for a community to come together collectively to address these threats and reduce the cost of preparation.  The goal here would be to build a resilient community.

It is with this framework that each of us can start addressing reasonable threats and building the most effective plans possible to address them.

When I first started reading up on Survivalist boards and forums almost everyone was recommending a Medium sized “A.L.I.C.E” backpack to carry your goods. I’d never heard of them so did a little more research and discovered there is a serious rift in the communities over these bags. It seems you either totally love it or completely loathe it. I decided to find out for myself what all the hullabaloo was over so I broke down and bought a black one with an external frame.

Previously I was using a cheap European style rucksack for my general BoB. It was durable, fit everything I wanted to carry (albeit with very little room for expansion) and most importantly was pretty comfortable to schlep. All in all I was happy with it but in the name of science I gave it up. The Alice w/frame when empty wasn’t too heavy at all and stored pretty flat. When I transferred all of my BoB gear to it there was a lot of extra room which was a plus because I had some new stuff to add thanks to the comments on my first post and the forum discussions. (Thanks guys!) The new bag weighs in at 25.5 lbs and is a bit unwieldy to handle. The bottom is apparently designed to have a bedroll which I don’t currently have so it won’t stand up on it’s own which is pretty annoying and I have to lean it up against a wall to store it conveniently.

The next step was to do actual field trials. I found a nice 2.5 mile circuit by my house that had hills, dirt and street walking and for the next 5 days I wore it and walked this circuit. The first thing I noticed is that it takes a lot of tweaking to get it to sit comfortably. Once I got it dialed in though it was incredibly comfortable. Since it’s got an external frame there are only 2 points of contact on my back which I was dubious about but after my first walk I was sold on it. The open back design kept me cool even when I was hauling my ass up a giant hill. Even with it’s weight it was incredibly comfortable even after day 5. It has a waist belt to keep it firmly attached to you but I found it to be more uncomfortable so I leave it unbuckled to no ill effect. After the full field test the only complaint I have is the lack of padding on the straps and they definitely started to bite into me after repeated use. It’s a good bag and carry’s a LOT of stuff but I can see how some people may not care for it since it is a pain to get dialed in to your particular physique. That said I’m going to be keeping it as my primary BoB as well as taking it for a walk every day as part of the physical side of my personal training. I’ve got a post up on the forums to discuss more baggy goodness.