Emergency Preparedness: Cell Phone Must-Haves

If you only remembered one thing from your time with the scouts, it is likely this: Be prepared. It means never having to apologize to anyone for taking a few extra precautions, even the crazy ones. For instance, no one is going to survive doomsday. That’s why they call it “doomsday” in the first place. If you could survive it, then it would just be a really bad day.

Doomsday implies an extinction level event (ELE). It’s all in the name. You’re not going to make it. That is no reason why you shouldn’t have a well-crafted, well-stocked, well-financed doomsday bunker. You never know what might happen, and what might happen after that.

One thing’s for certain: If things get bad enough that you need to seriously start considering such a bunker, you are going to need a cell phone that can get you through the situation, at least until all of the cell towers are gone. Here are a few things you will need to harden your cell phone against an emergency:

More Battery

It doesn’t matter if you have the very latest Droid Max Pro Plus Giga. Once the juice runs out, it’s out for good. No battery lasts forever, you will always need more battery. And while 7800 MAH may not get you through the entire apocalypse, a portable powerbank and similar products should get you through the most critical part.

In addition to juicing up, you are also going to want to do the following to increase battery life:

• Shut off push Notifications
• Kill Facebook, and other background processes
• Turn off vibrate
• Turn the screen brightness as low as you can stand it
• Stop playing Candy Crush

Regardless of what kind of phone you have, it is completely worthless once the battery dies. If you want to live, make sure your battery does too.

Military Grade

What does it mean for a product to be truly rugged? It is easy to slap that label on a product package. But many products claiming to be ruggedized fail the test. The military has a standard for ruggedness testing. If you find a phone case that advertises Mil-Std-810, you have something that you can be confident will protect your case from drops.

It is not just the phone’s body that needs to be considered. It is also the phones screen. There isn’t much that will cause a phones metal chassis to shatter. Most of the critical internals are non-moving parts. No matter how many gorillas these screen makers use to test their products, phone screens will shatter if dropped just the right way.

When ELE strikes, things are going to be flying, falling, and breaking. If you want to make sure your phone is not one of the broken things, put it in a case that provides military grade protection. And don’t forget the screen.

Security Measures

The ELE may be triggered by an alien invasion, or perhaps just Homer Simpson falling asleep at the nuclear plant. If the latter, there is truly no hope. If the former, at least you can keep them from scanning your smartphone for information. Even without an assault from beyond, it is a good idea to harden your phone against security threats, especially Android phones.

The reason Android phones need the extra security is because 98% of mobile malware targets Android phones. You have to place your best shields where they will protect you from the strongest attacks. We don’t need aliens. The person two places behind you in line is doing his best to break into your phone and steal your passwords right now. If things get bad enough so that you need a doomsday bunker, rest assured that your smartphone will need heightened security.

At the end of the day, it is not some doomsday scenario that will do us in. It is life’s everyday emergencies that we don’t see coming. Smartphone preparedness means having a backup battery to get you through, having enough device protection so that it survives the craziness, and securing your phone against malicious attacks.

In the event the ELE is a robopocclypse, throw your phone as far away as you can. And run for the hills.

Re-hydrating Survival Food Tip #1

Using the Correct Amount of Water

Haha….your kidding, right? Nope, not kidding. This sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how many times people guess at how much water to use when they don’t have a measuring cup around.

Using the correct amount of water is easy when you are at home and have a measuring cup available. But what about when you are camping or you are in a bug-out situation?

The solution? Scratch a mark on your cooking vessel for the correct amount of water needed before you pack your gear. For example, when I go kayaking camping or backpacking I use a stainless steel cup that I have scratched a mark on to indicate the 2 cup level as my backpacking meals require 2 cups of water. If you have a non-stick cooking pot or some other type of cooking cup with a non-stick surface scratch your mark on the outside rather than on the inside if you are concerned about scratching the finish.

By doing this you will make things a lot easier on yourself. I have personally seen someone at a campfire guess at how much water they needed. After the water came to a boil they added the food only to find out they didn’t have enough water. Then they had to add more water to the food which cooled the food and water down. Now they have to reboil and hope that they have enough water. Guess what? They didn’t get it right the second time either. This can be very frustrating after a long day on the water or trail. Measure and mark your cooking vessel before hand to make things a lot easier on yourself.

1. Freeze Dried Food package indicating how much water you need, measuring cup, cooking vessel.

2. How much water do you need?

3. Add correct amount of water.

4. Scratch a mark to indicate the correct amount of water needed.

Emergency Preparedness: Cell Phone Must-Haves

If you only remembered one thing from your time with the scouts, it is likely this: Be prepared. It means never having to apologize to anyone for taking a few extra precautions, even the crazy ones. For instance, no one is going to survive doomsday. That’s why they call it “doomsday” in the first place. If you could survive it, then it would just be a really bad day.

Doomsday implies an extinction level event (ELE). It’s all in the name. You’re not going to make it. That is no reason why you shouldn’t have a well-crafted, well-stocked, well-financed doomsday bunker. You never know what might happen, and what might happen after that.

One thing’s for certain: If things get bad enough that you need to seriously start considering such a bunker, you are going to need a cell phone that can get you through the situation, at least until all of the cell towers are gone. Here are a few things you will need to harden your cell phone against an emergency:

More Battery

It doesn’t matter if you have the very latest Droid Max Pro Plus Giga. Once the juice runs out, it’s out for good. No battery lasts forever, you will always need more battery. And while 7800 MAH may not get you through the entire apocalypse, a portable powerbank and similar products should get you through the most critical part.

In addition to juicing up, you are also going to want to do the following to increase battery life:

• Shut off push Notifications
• Kill Facebook, and other background processes
• Turn off vibrate
• Turn the screen brightness as low as you can stand it
• Stop playing Candy Crush

Regardless of what kind of phone you have, it is completely worthless once the battery dies. If you want to live, make sure your battery does too.

Military Grade

What does it mean for a product to be truly rugged? It is easy to slap that label on a product package. But many products claiming to be ruggedized fail the test. The military has a standard for ruggedness testing. If you find a phone case that advertises Mil-Std-810, you have something that you can be confident will protect your case from drops.

It is not just the phone’s body that needs to be considered. It is also the phones screen. There isn’t much that will cause a phones metal chassis to shatter. Most of the critical internals are non-moving parts. No matter how many gorillas these screen makers use to test their products, phone screens will shatter if dropped just the right way.

When ELE strikes, things are going to be flying, falling, and breaking. If you want to make sure your phone is not one of the broken things, put it in a case that provides military grade protection. And don’t forget the screen.

Security Measures

The ELE may be triggered by an alien invasion, or perhaps just Homer Simpson falling asleep at the nuclear plant. If the latter, there is truly no hope. If the former, at least you can keep them from scanning your smartphone for information. Even without an assault from beyond, it is a good idea to harden your phone against security threats, especially Android phones.

The reason Android phones need the extra security is because 98% of mobile malware targets Android phones. You have to place your best shields where they will protect you from the strongest attacks. We don’t need aliens. The person two places behind you in line is doing his best to break into your phone and steal your passwords right now. If things get bad enough so that you need a doomsday bunker, rest assured that your smartphone will need heightened security.

At the end of the day, it is not some doomsday scenario that will do us in. It is life’s everyday emergencies that we don’t see coming. Smartphone preparedness means having a backup battery to get you through, having enough device protection so that it survives the craziness, and securing your phone against malicious attacks.

In the event the ELE is a robopocclypse, throw your phone as far away as you can. And run for the hills.

USA Made Fire Steel: Have You Tried it?

Recently I went to a preparedness convention in Georgia and had a great time. I was very impressed with a lot of the booths that were set up, but I have to tell you about one of my favorites, the Fire Steel Booth with Georgia Pyro.

I have seen a LOT of fire starters in my day and have tried many different kinds. This one takes the cake. What drew me to his booth was the amount of sparks I saw flying from one strike, but also the size of the sparks. They were HUGE!

So I started asking questions about their product and found out some very interesting things. For starters, they are USA hand made right here in Georgia, but also that their fire starters produce an amazing amount of 3000 degree sparks and their magnesium burns at 5000 degrees. WET or DRY and their larger rods give over 20,000 strikes!

Their scrapers are 1/4″ square high speed steel tool Bits. They are very sharp and very easy to strike. So much so that you can actually use it to scrape wood shavings to use as tinder. David Bailey demonstrates in the videos below.

Look at all those sparks!

Starting a Fire with Cotton

Scraping Off Tinder

If you want to see for yourself, he has a list of shows he will be at on his website. There are nothing but outstanding reviews there as well. We purchased the fire block at the show but will be getting the Tiger Maple one soon to add to my husbands bag. I can not stress enough that you will not be disappointed in this product. You guys know me, if it is USA made I’m all about it. Especially if it is done by an individual verses a corporation. I personally prefer supporting the little guys. 🙂

Backpacking For Emergency Preparedness

In the prepping community the term “Emergency Preparedness” is used a lot but what does it really mean to be prepared? There is more to being prepared than just stocking up on food and water. In order to have a good idea of what it really takes to take care of your family you will need some type of experience under your belt. A backpacking trip can be a great way to get the experience needed to help with being prepared.

When planning for emergency survival situations you can make it as simple or as complicated as you want. We’ve all seen the prepper shows where people have underground bunkers, guns & ammo, tons of provisions, water plumbing systems, sealed and filtered air systems, etc. Most Americans have no interest in prepping on that kind of level nor can they afford it.  Realistically, your emergency preparedness items will consist of  basic food, water, shelter, and miscellaneous items stored in a closet or in a small room.

Emergency preparedness can be narrowed down to three basic scenarios that covers everything from a basic power outage to the infamous zombie apocalypse. Really? Yes, really, and if you plan for these three scenarios you should be good to go for whatever comes your way (within reason of course).

1. The first scenario is when you are in survival mode at home (bugging-in). This may happen for any number of reasons including long term power outages, road closures due to flooding/earthquakes/wildfires/ice storms/etc., civil commotion (riots, protests, unrest), home being severely damaged from a storm and you are camping out in the yard until it becomes livable again, and the list goes on and on – I’ll spare you the zombie examples:)

2. The second scenario involves vacating your homestead for any number of reasons. This can range from evacuating with your vehicle due to a flood or wildfire, to hiking out to the woods and living off the grid for a while.

3. The third scenario is car survival. Car survival could also be considered for workplace survival. If you are stranded at work and can’t get home you should be able to rely on your car survival kit to provide you with the basic essentials.

Going on a backpacking trip can help get you prepared to handle all three of the above mentioned scenarios. I recently went on a 2.5 day / 13 mile backpacking trip with a couple friends (Chris & Derek) and realized how little you really need and also realized that what works for one person may not work for another. Below are lessons learned while on the trip, the goal here is for you to learn from our experiences and apply them to your emergency preparedness plans.

Water

Filtering water from the creek

Experience:
The weather was perfect, not too hot and not too cold but the terrain was very challenging. My backpack weighed over 50lbs on the first day and over 60lbs on the second day. Due to the less than desired terrain and the heavy pack I consumed a lot more water than I thought I would while Derek barely drank any water. I started the trip with 1.3 gallons of water, on the first day I drank about half of it and then topped off at a creek about half way to our camp. I ended up running out of water by the next morning while Derek still had plenty water left. On day two we topped off at our water cache and then packed more than an additional gallon each (hence the 10lb weight increase on day two).

Lesson Learned:
Water was a much bigger issue for me than I thought it would be. I will need to make sure that I always have plenty of water or have access to a place to filter water on a regular basis. Some people require more water than others. There is really no way of knowing this until you get out there and experience it for yourself.

Shelter

Darrens Setup: REI Bug Hut Pro 2 with Kelty Noahs Tarp

Derek’s Setup: Hammock with cold weather barrier in the bottom and tarp over the top.

APN recommends Snugpak Jungle hammock with mosquito net

Experience:
My shelter was the REI Bug Hut Pro 2 Tent with enough room for me and my gear. To shed some weight I left the rain-fly at home and packed a Kelty Noah’s Tarp to use as a wind break, sun shade, and a makeshift rain-fly. Derek used a lightweight hammock with a tarp over the top for cover and lightweight barrier on the bottom to keep the cold from coming up underneath. Chris used a one person backpacking tent, the Eureka! Solitaire Tent, but he didn’t like the fact that there wasn’t any room for his gear inside. We all had lightweight shelter options but they were all very different from each other. Some people with back issues may not be able to sleep in a hammock while others would love it because they don’t like sleeping on the ground.

Lessons Learned:
I was comfortable and had room for my gear inside my tent but it weighed more than the other guy’s set-ups. Derek liked his hammock setup but learned that he will need some type of netting to keep the bugs off of him and a larger cover tarp to keep his gear dry in case of rain. Chris learned that one man backpacking tents are lightweight but there is no room for your gear to keep inside for easy access or to keep dry in case of rain.

Food

Experience:
Just like the shelter, we all had different thoughts on food so we each brought something different. I ended up bringing freeze dried backpacking meals as they were super lightweight and I was able to pack along a lot of food without adding a ton of extra weight. However, even though my food tasted good and I was full, I found myself wanting something more, something to satisfy a craving I was having. That’s when I remembered that I had a few packets of apple cider and hot chocolate. After drinking one of each the cravings I had went away. Maybe it was the sugar or maybe it was in my head but I was satisfied afterwards.

Lesson Learned:
Food is a huge morale booster. Obviously you need your regular food for the calories but be sure to pack something to satisfy your “craving” whether it’s a piece of candy, hot chocolate, coffee, dried fruit, or whatever, be sure to include these type of items. They may not seem important now but when you are in survival mode they are definitely worth it!

Staying Warm

Experience:
In addition to what I was wearing I had only planned on packing extra socks (keep the feet happy!) and extra underwear. Since the temperature was expected to get down to the upper 40s and lower 50s I wanted to pack my sleeping bag but I didn’t have room for it. So instead I left my sleeping bag at home and packed long underwear, a long sleeve shirt, wool socks, a beanie (stocking cap) and a pair of insulated gloves. These items weighed less and required less room than my sleeping bag. With the help of a poncho and an emergency blanket I stayed nice and warm.

Lesson Learned:
Thinking outside the box and improvising can really save you a lot of weight and space. Try to use items that can serve multiple purposes. For example: Should you pack that large and heavy survival knife or a lightweight Gerber multi-tool that has a knife, pliers, wire cutters, saw, and other items built into it?

I can give several more examples of lessons learned but this article is already long enough and you get the point. Once you learn what works for you and other members of your family you can then determine between what is actually needed for emergency preparedness versus what you think you need. After you’ve had some minimalist camping/backpacking experience under your belt you will know exactly how to pack your car survival kit and your evacuation kit within the space allowed in your pack. A minimalist backpacking trip forces you to be resourceful and will help tremendously in survival situations, including bugging-in at home.

Tools You Will Want in an Outdoor Emergency

When preparing an emergency kit for the car or camper, or for a compartment in your backpack, keep in mind that usefulness must be combined with situational likelihood. If a vehicle malfunction leaves you stranded on a forest service road in the mountains, you may need certain items that aren’t all that necessary if your car breaks down on the interstate highway. Likewise, if you’re on a backpacking trek, you might need to fend for yourself for longer than if you encounter bad weather and flooding at a campground.

In addition to the obvious inclusion of energy bars, dried fruit, Mylar thermal blankets, rain jackets, and matches, consider packing some special tools that will come in handy. The following list contains essential items that you may want to keep in a separate duffel bag in your car or SUV, or in a special container stowed in a larger backpack.

1) LED Flashlight

These are lightweight, the battery lasts far longer than a light with an incandescent bulb, and most of the outdoor-suitable models are practically unbreakable. In fact, it’s a good idea to have at least two LED flashlights on hand, one of which is head-mounted for hands-free use.

2) Collapsible Shovel

The best models are the ones that have a simple, pull-out handle that is then fixed tightly with a twist mechanism. The shovel head should be made of high-strength steel. This tool can be valuable if your car gets stuck in thick mud or gravel, and it can also be used to dig a fire pit. Choose a model that fits into a stowaway compartment on the SUV or laid flat in the bottom of an outdoor preparedness duffle.

3) Lighters and Fire-starter

Several disposable lighters should be packed in a watertight compartment in the emergency kit or in a zip-loc style bag in a backpack. In addition, invest in a Magnesium Fire-starter. These come as two blocks that are struck together and come on a chain. Make sure to practice using it before you head out into the wilderness. (APN recommends these fire starters. Jalapeno Gal has one and it is her personal favorite.)

4) Multi-Purpose Knife and Fixed Blade Knife

A Swiss Army knife or similar model is one of the most invaluable tools you can have with you should you become stuck in the wilderness. It only takes a little practice to memorize where the various blades are located. Make sure the model chosen has a mini-sized saw blade, a small pair of snippers or shears, and a metal file. Keep a fixed-blade knife with at least a five-inch blade in the emergency kit in addition to the folding knife.

5) Stainless Steel Water Bottle

It’s important to have plenty of water, and most of the supply can be stored in plastic bottles. However, keep at least one steel water bottle in the emergency kit as well. It can serve as a container for boiling water if necessary. Stainless steel has naturally occurring anti-septic properties that will keep your pumped water cleaner than most other bottles.

6) Outdoor Wallet

Although fashionable to carry in public, a camo wallet is actually designed for easy location of cards, folded maps, and small tools. Some of the best dual- and tri-fold styles have separate cash pockets and checkbook inserts. When taking one with you on a trip, keep a list of map directions to nearby destinations inside. If your phone or GPS goes dead, you’ll be glad you did.

7) Map and Compass

You might not think of these as tools, but they can save your life. Don’t rely on GPS devices if you get stuck in the middle of nowhere. Make sure you have a paper map that shows the area where you are traveling, and download a map onto your smartphone as well. Keep a compass in the emergency kit, separate from those you carry on your person. Remember to keep the emergency kit compass in its own container, and don’t store it next to anything else that is magnetic.

Here is Everyone Who Has Emigrated to the United States Since 1820

Test your knowledge of Utah snakes, spiders

SALT LAKE CITY — There are many animals and insects that send chills down our spines —Two of them are snakes and spiders.

In Utah, we are very familiar with both creatures — several of which are venomous. There are three venomous spiders and nearly 10 venomous snakes that can be found in the Beehive State.

In this quiz, we’ll test your knowledge on snakes and spiders found in Utah, as well as quiz you on some facts about the creatures.

If you can't access the quiz, click here for the full link.