How Prepared Are You?

sillysally

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#1
The amazing go-bag Fran talked about her mom packing for her made me realize just how unprepared we are for a natural or man made disaster we are.

How prepared are you, of at all? If so, what steps have to taken?
 

sparks19

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#3
Don't know what a go bag is but we are prepared if we have to be stuck in our house for days. We've got food to last us weeks, water as well as huge jugs for water, batteries out the wazoo, flashlights, lots of blankets, boardgames. We even have a battery powered fan so we can have our white noise at night lol
 

sillysally

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#4
We got a battery powered fan last year when the power went out in the summer and there was no way I was sleeping with no fan or AC!

When you store water and food, do you rotate it out when it gets close to expiration? How do you keep track?
 

sparks19

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#5
My food storage is a constant rotation. It isn't the sort of thing I stock up and just leave it. Like my canned tomatoes, when i need tomatoes i grab a can from storage and whatever I have used I replace when they go on sale. So I am always using what is in my stockpile but always replacing it :)
 

oakash

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#6
Not really at all. I mean, we have loads of canned food, and we have a large amount of camping supplies, but we don't specifically keep things on hand for disasters. When it looks like a hurricane will actually be serious we will check to make sure we're covered, but I don't know, I guess we're used to this kind of stuff.
 

Fran101

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#7
My go bag (lol my mother is a bit...boy scouty :rofl1:) for those who need ideas

- My medication
- Passport
- Cash
- Laptop charger
- Water bottle
- Power bars
- Rain jacket
- Socks
- baby wipes
- Underwear
- Toothbrush/paste
- Extra phone charger
- Long sleeve shirt
- Sturdy Leggings
- Deodorant
- Feminine items
- Sunblock
- Basic first aid kit
- Swiss army knife
- Whistle
- Tiny flash light
- Dust mask
- Battery powered radio
- Warm hat
- Local map
- Permanent market, notebook, duct tape
- Photos of self and Merlin
- List of emergency contacts/drug allergies
- Hand sanitizer
- Emergency blanket
- Work gloves

It is in this backpack.
 

Laurelin

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#8
I'm not and I'm fine with that. When I lived in hurricane territory we'd stock up a week or so in advance. Don't wait till the last few days because everybody runs out of the essentials. Right before Ike none of the stores had any water.

I live smack dab at the center of tornado alley but there's really not much you can do.
 

Jules

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#9
Not prepared at all. I try to use as many fresh foods as possible so we rarely have cans in the house. I'm dine with that. Funny though, I doubt have a pet "go bag".

I guess we do have a box of leftover MREs from hubby's Marine Corps days in the closet. But they are yucky.
 

Michiyo-Fir

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#10
I have absolutely nothing prepared LOL. I don't live in an area that doesnt have any natural disasters Except for a massive earthquake that people say is every 300+ years. And we're overdue on that 300 years. But essentially I live on an island and if an earthquake/tsunami hits, the entire island will sink because it's made from sand deposits at the mouth of a river. So I don't think there would be much I can do in that situation. The only 2 bridges to get off the island would probably break... Maybe I should get some life jackets
 

Shai

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#12
I have absolutely nothing prepared LOL. I don't live in an area that doesnt have any natural disasters Except for a massive earthquake that people say is every 300+ years. And we're overdue on that 300 years. But essentially I live on an island and if an earthquake/tsunami hits, the entire island will sink because it's made from sand deposits at the mouth of a river. So I don't think there would be much I can do in that situation. The only 2 bridges to get off the island would probably break... Maybe I should get some life jackets
Sleep in a boat? ;)
 

GipsyQueen

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#13
Absolutly not. We don't live in an area where we have natural disasters, except MAYBE tiny earthquakes, but thats about it. Though we probs have enough pasta to servive a week if need be. :p And since we buy water anyways we have that here.
 

xpaeanx

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#14
I am snowed in today. I have enough food and such to last a few days without leaving the house.... I am not zombie apocalypse prepared though. No bug out bags or any of that.

About the only doomsday prepper preparedness going on in this house is that I have antibiotics on hand... But that is mostly to give to the dogs and my hiking first aid kit. I do take antibiotics with me for long hikes... If I cut myself on something extra nasty I want to start a broad spectrum right away.
 

JessLough

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#15
The only real issues we ever have here is power being knocked out... from ice storms or the power plant blowing up.

In that case, I can eat salad. Lots and lots of salad. That's about it for our preparedness, though.
 

Catsi

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#17
There is an ad in Australia which asks the public if they could survive 3 days in an emergency.

With my pantry, I could survive 3 months plus I reckon. :rofl1:

I don't have the dogs with me at the moment, but I usually have their stuff in one spot and I have made a list of stuff that would be essential (or even just useful) if I had to leave in a hurry.

But I'm not really that prepared at the moment, which is quite silly because I live in the tropical north and it's cyclone season.

I have some candles.
One small torch (but no spare batteries)
No bottled water (because I don't like to use bottled stuff when I can get water straight from the tap)
No alternative cooking source (I have electric oven and other appliances)

To be truly prepared I'd like to have some water in case of contamination/cessation of local supply, a small gas camping stove with spare gas, a couple of large torches and a good supply of spare batteries.

If something happened today I'd have to make do with filling two buckets as I don't even have a bath tub.

But food wouldn't be an issue. I wouldn't be too worried about cooking food, I'd just use what I can from the fridge first (if the power went out) and then the freezer, but I wouldn't bother going to the effort of cooking stuff. But the gas stove would come in handy if I needed to boil the water supply.

Water supply would be the greatest concern for me and this thread has probably prompted me to pop down to the supermarket during the week and purchase a large container or two of water.
 

Romy

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#18
I keep a machete in with my spare tire, in case there's ever a zombie apocalypse when we're away from home and I need to defend my kids or go kill a deer for everyone to eat.

Actually, for reals I have a 72 hour kit with food and medical stuff in my car. I packed food for two adults, the kids, and one of those huge beef dog food chubs in case there's a dog with me. Then I've got drinking water, a blanket, flashlight, lighter, can opener, etc.

And a machete. lol
 

sillysally

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#19
I keep a machete in with my spare tire, in case there's ever a zombie apocalypse when we're away from home and I need to defend my kids or go kill a deer for everyone to eat.

Actually, for reals I have a 72 hour kit with food and medical stuff in my car. I packed food for two adults, the kids, and one of those huge beef dog food chubs in case there's a dog with me. Then I've got drinking water, a blanket, flashlight, lighter, can opener, etc.

And a machete. lol
Romy, you are/were a Morman, correct? I'm curious--there seems to be a trend with Mormans as a group to be into storing food...why is that?
 
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#20
Romy, you are/were a Morman, correct? I'm curious--there seems to be a trend with Mormans as a group to be into storing food...why is that?
I was. The church encourages members (and back it up with certain scriptures) to be prepared so that, should anything bad happen, they can care for themselves and their families. They help to instruct members in how to build up financial savings and their food storage, not just for natural disasters but any sort of "emergency." Should the breadwinner lose their job, for instance, it is handy to have money and food saved up.
 

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