Readiness

I’ve been thinking about readiness a lot more recently. It’s easy to get complacent, especially when you “feel” ready, but the fact is even the best prepared among us are never as ready as we think we are.

One of the themes that play out in the readiness world is an obsessive focus on “getting out of dodge” when things go south, but the fact is that’s only a limited part of the story. Sure, in the case of some disasters, bugging out may be the only option, and if you have a plan and a destination, that is an important part of planning. What many people don’t think about, though, is how to get home when something goes south and that’s where you need to be.

For me, there are a limited number of unlikely circumstances that would force me to leave home. In fact, while thinking about it, I’ve realized there are a far larger number of circumstances where my necessary goal would be to get home rather than away from it. While getting home in a disaster situation looks a lot like getting out, there are some critical differences.

Often, when I am away from home, I am also not following my usual routine. That means I’m not wearing my usual readiness friendly clothing, especially footwear, and I’m often not near my readiness gear. Realizing that, I’ve also realized I need to rethink how I do things when I’m away from home so I have a better chance of getting back in one piece.

I’m just at the very beginnings of thinking about how all that works, but I will share my insights here once I have them.

In the meantime, what’s your get home plan for yourself and your family. Think on it.

DLH

Are you ready yet? If not, why not?

Be ready now.

Immediate Readiness 

DLH

Be ready now is a weekly post about things you can do right now to get ready for whatever might come next courtesy of Dennis L Hitzeman’s Readiness Weblog. You can find other posts in this series in the “Be ready now” category.

This week’s theme: Immediate Readiness Response Checklist

Many things may need to happen at the moment a disaster occurs, but it is important to keep track of your immediate readiness plan:

• Where is everyone involved in your plan? Is someone missing? Does anyone know why? Where was the missing person last known to be?
• Is anyone present injured? How badly? Does the injury require first aid? Can you or someone nearby perform that aid? Does someone need to call or go for assistance?
• Is the place you are safe? If not, can you get to someplace safe? If you can’t get to someplace safe, can something be done to make where you are safe?
• Once everyone involved in your plan is cared for and safe, are others in need of immediate assistance?

Several things to consider in the wake of a disaster:

• If possible, shelter in place.
• If sheltering in place is not possible, evacuate to your predetermined rallying point.
• If evacuating to your rallying point is not possible, follow your contingency plan.
• Be sure that you have as many of your immediate readiness supplies as possible given the circumstances.

Do you find this information informative and helpful? Feel free to contact me and let me know. You can also contact meabout ways you can support this effort.

DLH

Be ready now is a weekly post about things you can do right now to get ready for whatever might come next courtesy of Dennis L Hitzeman’s Readiness Weblog. You can find other posts in this series in the “Be ready now” category.

This week’s theme: Transportation

• Immediate: Maintain a fuel reserve for every vehicle you own. Optimally, your reserve should include enough fuel to refill each vehicle’s tank once. Take care to store fuel in proper containers and in safe areas. Keep each vehicle’s tank filled to at least a quarter tank, with a half tank being better.
• Intermediate: How will you transport yourself if fuel or vehicles are not available? If you intend to walk or bike, are you physically fit enough to make the trip?
• Long-term: Consider owning alternative forms of transportation, such as bicycles, quad-cycles, or ridable animals.

Do you find this information informative and helpful? Feel free to contact me and let me know. You can also contact me about ways you can support this effort.

DLH

Be ready now is a weekly post about things you can do right now to get ready for whatever might come next courtesy of Dennis L Hitzeman’s Readiness Weblog. You can find other posts in this series in the “Be ready now” category.

If you have been following these posts for the past five weeks, you will have noticed that, if you followed the suggested plan, you will have the following things on hand for immediate readiness:

• A plan for what to do in the case of a disaster or unrest.
• 2.5 gallons of water for every person involved in your plan.
• A case lot of ready to eat food.
• A clothing kit for everyone involved in your plan.
• A tent (or tents) big enough for everyone involved in your plan.

At worst, depending on what you decided to buy, you might have spent several hundred dollars, but in fact, you could buy everything on this list for a couple of hundred dollars if you are savvy about how you spend. If you followed this plan, then you are probably now more ready than as many as 90 percent of the people in the United States are right now at the time of this writing.

If you did not follow these posts or the plan they suggest, consider doing so now. It’s never too early to be ready, but when disaster strikes, it is far too late.

Do you find this information informative and helpful? Feel free to contact me and let me know. You can also contact me about ways you can support this effort.

DLH

Be ready now is a weekly post about things you can do right now to get ready for whatever might come next courtesy of Dennis L Hitzeman’s Readiness Weblog. You can find other posts in this series in the “Be ready now” category.

This week’s theme: Clothing

• Immediate: Put together a clothing kit for each person who is part of your immediate readiness plan. The kit should include, but is not limited to, at least one change of underwear, at least one pair of good quality socks, a pair of work pants or jeans, a shirt, a sweat shirt, a pair of sweatpants or long underwear (That can be worn under the regular pants), a pair of work gloves, a pair of winter gloves, a stocking cap, a scarf, and a good pair of walking shoes. Other items to consider could be sunglasses, dust masks, simple tools (a Leatherman or equivalent would be a place to start), a winter coat, a rain coat, etc. Pack all of the clothing in a waterproof container or bag and store them in a central location that everyone involved in the plan knows about. If you wear dress clothes to work, consider packing a smaller version of this kit into your car or carry it with you in a backpack. If you carry nothing else, carry walking shoes.
• Intermediate: How much of your clothing is appropriate for an enduring emergency situation? Do you have the capacity to repair your clothing? How will you keep your clothing clean? Consider all of these factors for a period lasting as long as a year. Consider stockpiling extra clothing for everyone involved in your readiness plan.
• Long-term: Do you know someone who can make clothing? Do you know of a local, non-commercial source for fabric and supplies? Consider stockpiling raw materials.

Do you find this information informative and helpful? Feel free to contact me and let me know. You can also contact me about ways you can support this effort.

DLH

Readiness Watch is a weekly publication intended to provide current, relevant, and actionable readiness information to people determined to be ready for whatever comes next, and especially for those people who are just starting their journey down the road to readiness. Readiness Watch will include observations, commentary, advice, links to resources, and related news.

I always welcome input from my readers, especially tips on information or ways to make this publication better. Feel free to contact me with information, advice, or tips or for ways you can support this effort.

Readiness Watch for the week of 21 March 2011

Previous Readiness Watch posts.

DLH

Be ready now is a weekly post about things you can do right now to get ready for whatever might come next courtesy of Dennis L Hitzeman’s Readiness Weblog. You can find other posts in this series in the “Be ready now” category.

This week’s theme: Food

• Immediate: Buy at stockpile of ready to eat food. The fastest and (over time) cheapest way to stockpile ready to eat food is to buy case lots of MREs from one of the thousands of places that sell them. MREs, unlike most food you buy at the grocery, can last as long as ten years when stored in the proper environment. Here are some examples.
• Intermediate: Decide how long you need to have food on hand for in the case of an extended emergency. How soon will you be able to grow your own food or get it from another source?
• Long-term: Develop a plan for growing your own food or for procuring it from a source other than a grocery store. Can you grow it yourself? Can you trade skills or labor?

Do you find this information informative and helpful? Feel free to contact me and let me know. You can also contact me about ways you can support this effort.

DLH

UPDATE: For those who find the linked video too painful (that is badly done) to watch, if you browse away from it, then click “Stay on this page” from the resulting pop-up” it will take you to a transcript of the video.

I’m not much for investment research firms for the most part, so I am skeptical when they give advice for free or as part of a thinly veiled promo for a product or service they provide. It is with that skepticism that I viewed Porter Stansberry‘s apocalyptically titled “The End of America” video.

Most people find the subject of the video boring. Many people who actually watch it will see the video as a scare tactic designed to frighten them into using Stansberry’s products or services and will ignore its message.

I believe they will do so to their own detriment.

Whatever Stansberry might be selling, his analysis of the looming crisis with the American dollar and everything it could mean for our way of life is dead on. And, he only focuses on one narrow aspect of looming problems that threaten to create the perfect storm that could bring the American and world economy to its knees.

Again, it is easy to ignore what people like Stansberry or me are saying because it sounds so impossible, yet it is only impossible if one ignores the inevitable lessons history taught past nations and civilizations who thought the same things.

Now is the time, more immediate than ever before, for you to get ready. Get out of debt. Make sure you can provide for your own basic needs without the need for constant infusions of cash. If you live in a city, have a plan for how to get out and where you are going to go. Have supplies and means of self-defense on-hand.

I grant that I could be wrong and that these things may never come to pass. History is quirky that way. Yet, I cannot miss the fact that it can and does happen and that the United States is not exempt from that reality.

The signs are all there. Are you going to pay attention?

DLH

The simplest part of immediate readiness is assembling a readiness kit. The government website Ready.gov has a good list for a basic kit, and a quick Google search can reveal hundreds of variations on the theme. That said, everyone’s kit is going to contain different things based on each person’s views, approach, and the kind of changes the person might be planning for. I tend to follow the advice presented by Laughing Wolf in his “Readiness Week” posts at the blog Blackfive because he has assembled quite a bit of information and experience all in one place. Whatever list someone might use, it should contain, as a minimum, the following:

• Three gallons of water per person involved in the plan.
• Enough preserved food to last each person involved in the plan for three days.
• Flashlights and batteries (a hand crank radio with a built-in flashlight is really the better way to go).
• A portable radio with batteries (a hand crank radio with a built-in flashlight is really the better way to go).
• Weather appropriate clothing and footwear for each person.

In addition, some other things to consider as part of immediate readiness kits that do not always come up in lists:

• A good quality multi-tool. I prefer multi-tools from Gerber, but brand is not so much of an issue as quality, but it needs to have pliers, a knife, and a flathead screwdriver as a minimum.
• At least 100 feet of rope. I prefer military grade 550 cord because of its versatility.
• A length of malleable wire (such as electric fence wire or steel ground wire). Wire can be used for all sorts of purposes, and even a short coil can prove to be infinitely useful.
• A roll of duct tape.
• A backpack big enough to hold all of your immediate readiness supplies.

The previous two lists are far from complete, but they are a good place to start. In my opinion, the best way to start an immediate readiness kit is to buy one of the ones someone else has already put together. There are as many kits as there are places that sell that kind of thing, but my personal preference right now is the Personal 72 Hour Emergency Kit with MREs from Emergency Essentials, to which I would add a Pocket Survival Pak (or a Pocket Survival Pak Plus when they become available), an emergency blanket, an emergency sleeping bag, a multi-tool, a 100 foot coil of 550 cord, a 100 foot coil of wire, and a roll of duct tape. My kits also tend to collect a variety of other things along the way, but pay attention to how much you put in the bag because they can get really heavy really quick.

I also take my kits one step farther by trying to stock one kit for each person in my house and another in my car, that way, even when I am away from home, I know I have at least a three day kit nearby. I also always carry a small pocket knife with me and will probably add some sort of survival key chain to the mix at some point so even if I cannot get to my kits, I am not without resources.

An important part of a complete immediate readiness plan is having an evacuation plan. Some sudden changes, like a natural disaster or a political upheaval, may require people to relocate, sometimes very suddenly and very quickly. Evacuation plans should include the following considerations:

• Make sure there is enough fuel on hand for vehicles that may be used in an evacuation.
• Make sure that some part of the readiness supplies are easily portable in case evacuation means walking.
• If evacuation means walking, make sure you have appropriate clothing and footwear available. This idea is especially important if you find yourself needing to evacuate from work where you might not be wearing walking appropriate clothing and shoes.
• Make sure that portable readiness supplies include supplies to weather being outdoors, possibly for several days.
• Establish several rally points at increasing distances from the sites of potential changes and discuss those rally points with anyone involved in your plan.

Immediate readiness can be a lot more complicated than these simple considerations depending on the specific events someone might plan for, but starting at this simple point is a good way to establish a baseline from which more complex plans can be built.

DLH