Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

[Emily]

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

...

Solar path lights can also be left outside to charge and then grouped in a vase or half-gallon jar to provide some light inside. My experience with them, however, suggests that the cheapie ones from your local discount store don't last very long or provide much light. I haven't tried any of the more expensive ones yet.

That was my experience with solar path lights from a big box. They were promptly returned. I always try to test things before a return window closes and buy from suppliers with a good return policy for defective or not-as-advertised reasons. This means return shipping would be paid by the seller in those cases when you buy mail order.

 

[zincfinger]

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

you might want to consider one of the no battery, hand crank flashlights (solar lights might not do well in long periods of bad weather.

But buy ONE and try it out repeatedly. Theoretically they should provide a light source indefinitely but most are poorly made and break easily or wear out in a short time. I'm still looking for a well built one that can hold up.

Low tech is more reliable, although it does require care for safety.

VERY IMPORTANT if you have any source of heat or light indoors that burns fuel: get a battery powered carbon monoxide detector. Especially in really cold weather, indoor wood, propane etc. stoves can be deadly. Carbon monoxide is odorless and many people don't realize that their headache may be the only warning they are going to get before they go to sleep and don't wake up.

Gas generators should ALWAYS be located outdoors or in a shed or somewhere that does not share a ventilation system with the living quarters.

Keep batteries that you use in a central location with enough extras for emergencies and keep it topped up and use on a strict "first in, first out" basis so that when the emergency hits, they have a lot of shelf life left. KEEP IT ORGANIZED so you know which ones to use first.

 

[BestlaStormcrow]

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

It's a good idea to have multiple redundancies. Kerosene, solar, LED lighting all have pros and cons, so having some of each covers a lot of bases. Same goes for most emergency prep gear. Have varying levels of technology so you have options depending upon the circumstances.

 

[Lunabell]

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

Re: What are FluTrackers personally doing about the various political, social, economic, disease uncertainties - Fall 2014

While we are pseudo-preppers, mostly because of living in an earthquake area, and do have a food and water stash, we are lucky enough to live where we can try moving towards self sufficiency. We have a farmette. We try to grow most of our own veggies and are working on a root cellar, along with canning. We also have chicken and ducks and now have added males so the flocks can be self-perpetuating. We are also looking at getting into meat rabbits.

For everyday issues, it means knowing exactly what we are eating. For disasters and such, it means we would have enough to eat.

 

[zincfinger]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

RE: ?The one thing that immediately comes to mind after reading your post is that health care workers wash their hands BEFORE and after using the bathroom. You don't want whatever germs you have on your hands to be transferred to your clothes or anywhere else.?

Ideally bathrooms should have unlatched doors with push plates (you can push with your elbow) and faucets with level controls that you can push with your wrists. That avoids transferring germs to and from doorknob and faucet handles which often negates the value of the hand washing.


RE large doses of vitamin C: use with caution (and only for short times, not chronically. They can cause serious problems with kidney stones for some people. At the first twinge of a stone, STOP. Also avoid consuming a lot of calcium in any form while taking large doses of C. Ebola may make you die. Kidney stones may make you WISH you would.


BUSH MEAT: avoid eating anything that you find already dead and, if driven to by desperation, prepare it wearing gloves and cook very thoroughly (especially raccoons which can carry rabies). If an animal shows signs of disease (lesions, etc) don't eat it.


STORED FOOD: TEST your selection: try living for a few weeks on the selection of foods you plan. Selections for storage may be very different from what you usually eat and some make discover the hard way that the selection is very unsuitable to them for individual reasons (for example below symptomatic unknown case of celiac disease could suddenly become a huge problem if switching suddenly to a diet very high in grains. You don't want to find out the hard way when you are already locked in to eating it for a long time. Wait until you know you can tolerate it before buying large amounts to store. (Remember: you'll also be eating it periodically, even in the absence of an emergency to ?turn it over? and keep stocks fresh.)

Despite the conservation adage to ?use everything but the squeal?, do not eat brains, period. Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies (variations of ?mad cow disease?) are endemic in USA wildlife, in squirrels, for example. And cooking does not inactivate them (in fact, high temperature processing for animal parts feed to herbivores of the same species may well be what started BSE (mad cow disease) in the first place. (high temperatures killed all the living pathogens but caused the misfolded proteins that got mad cow started (and I do not live in Texas so they can't sue me!)

SOCIAL DISTANCING: live unavoidably requires risks. The trick is to make them reasonable and don't waste undue effort avoiding the very low ones. There is a risk of being the first in an area to catch a newly arriving disease but it is very low, most especially if you don't get much exposure ordinarily. Save the effort for when the risk is high enough to justify it: reduce contact when the disease is present in your area. Premature reduction in contact may lead to built up needs that drive you to contacts that would otherwise have not been needed when the risk IS high.

INSULATE: in an emergency it is far more effective to insulate yourself than your local environment. Even crumpled up newspaper stuffed under the external layer of your clothing can be highly effective (DO NOT use when exposed to open flames or any source of ignition!) A large percentage of heat lost is from your head and neck ? covering that is much more effective than other places. Insulate the head, neck and trunk the most.
Hypothermia: the FIRST thing that goes wrong is your thinking! Hypothermia kills far more often than statistics indicate because, in the wild, it often clouds your judgment so your direct cause of death is some stupid action you took that you'd not have taken with a clear mind. (For example you turn an indoor fuel burning heater on high AND close all the windows and other ventilation tight. Carbon monoxide poisoning gets the blame but hypothermia may have been the root cause.) Don't wait until you get really chilled, stay comfortable. (If you start shivering you are in real danger. If it's uncontrollable you are in immediate very serious danger.) Coveralls or a bathrobe can be a good container for holding almost anything DRY with insulating power around you.

 

[Sollydog]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

Several different threads here prompted me to take a good look at what I had in the way of food supplies and I pulled out all the canned goods see what I had and to check the dates. I realized that it was hard to read many of those dates even with bright sunlight so I grabbed a big marker and started writing the month and year on the top of each can.

Much of my career was spend in purchasing and inventory control but it was inanimate parts that do not expire. I decided that I needed a written record of what I had and when I needed to use it. Scrounging around my stock of office supplies I ran across some index cards in different colors and also some post it flags in green, yellow, red and blue. I figured that once everything is written up I can flag stuff using a color code. To keep it easy to remember I decided that the start date would be Jan 1, 2015 since it is just a couple of months away. Anything with a date through the end of April 2015 would get red flagged, end of August 2015 a yellow flag and end of Dec 2015 a green flag. All things with a day of 2016 or beyond would get blue flagged on the index card.

If I eat down the inventory that I already have it will help me save money and if I run across something that I'm not all that fond of I can choose to let the dogs have it if it's OK for them or pass it on additional stock to the food bank.

When it's time to fix something to eat I can grab my box of index cards and see what sort of "interesting" meals I can concoct the way I did during my backpacking days.

I know that we cannot recommend specific products but I did run across two companies that make Indian food that comes in pouches that do not need refrigeration. When living in the SF Bay Area I had my choice of several good Indian restaurants but Sw VA has none so this was a nice find. I tried a couple of different items and they seemed pretty good, (maybe because it's all that's readily available).

I do wish I had a pantry with shallow floor to ceiling shelves rather than a few deep cupboards where things can get shoved to the back and not see the light of day for ages. Now that I've come up with a way to keep a written record of my inventory I need to figure out a better way to organize the physical stuff so it doesn't wind up lost in the back of beyond.

 

[BestlaStormcrow]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

Great idea Sollydog!

I've tried maintaining shelf lists for my pantry, but it's easy to get lazy. Even just flagging the actual items with red/yellow/green would be helpful for me.

We built floor to ceiling shelves in the pantry (the spare bedroom) out of really sturdy 2x4s and 1/2" plywood. But a few years of use makes it pretty clear that shallower shelves would have been more efficient. Ours are 24" deep and even 18" would be better.

Since we're in earthquake country the plan is to eventually move that shelving out to the garage and replace it with tall wooden utility cabinets. We bought one on craigslist for $100 and it is awesome. It's bolted to the wall and a couple of dowels through the cabinet handles keep things from rattling out if we get a shaker.

 

[MHSC]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

realized that it was hard to read many of those dates even with bright sunlight so I grabbed a big marker and started writing the month and year on the top of each can.

Great idea!

 

[Lizw]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

I know that we cannot recommend specific products but I did run across two companies that make Indian food that comes in pouches that do not need refrigeration. When living in the SF Bay Area I had my choice of several good Indian restaurants but Sw VA has none so this was a nice find. I tried a couple of different items and they seemed pretty good, (maybe because it's all that's readily available).

There is an Indian grocery in Roanoke, and a "world" grocery in Blacksburg that carries a pretty good selection of Indian foods, many in the foil pouches that are shelf stable.

 

[BestlaStormcrow]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

I keep a few of those pouches at work. Kind of spendy, but a nice alternative to other ready to eat food.

 

[Amish Country]

Re: Emergency Preparedness Ideas - 2014

Food:
The days between Thanks Giving and Christmas are the most wonderful time to prep. Frozen turkey can be had for under a dollar a pound! I keep one in the fridge defrosting, one is cooked and ready to can as soon as I can find the time. This repeated a few times results in a lot of nice canned turkey in turkey carcass broth fortified with vegetables.

Sweet potatoes are under $.50 a pound. I buy them by the case and keep them in a cold, dark corner of an unheated basement. They will last (if not eaten first) until spring. Winter squash and pumpkins are used for holiday decorations. I plan to use then for dinner and lunch. They usually go on sale for next to nothing right after Thanks Giving. Depending on the variety, winter squash are stored like the sweet potatoes for anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. I have found that sweet potatoes actually store better in my basement than white potatoes. A mesh sack or two of onions is also hanging in the basement. These are the pungent yellow onions. they store much longer than sweet onions. I hang them because they do not rot as fast if air can circulate around them. I try not to store them to close to other vegetables.

Christmas is a time when a lot of baking supplies go on sale, flour, sugar, nuts, dried fruit, coca, chocolate etc. Yum!

I also keep a watch for other holiday shelf safe foods on sale like candy, stuffing, canned sauces, gravy, pie filling etc.

Other preps:
Candles are also usually plentiful and on sale.

Home Maintenance:
Within the last month we have had most of the major systems in our home checked and maintained by professionals. Heating fuel has been taken care of.

Car Maintenance:
We have had our cars inspected. The oil and filters changed. The tires were rotated or replaced if needed. A good cleaning and vacuuming didn't hurt them either. Other scheduled maintained has also been kept up to date.

72 hour bags
These need to be updated for winter use and changing needs of the family member who is responsible for them.

People maintenance:
Everyone has had a physical. All vaccinations are current. Dental exams are up to date and teeth are good to go. Eye exams and extra sets of glasses are on the to do list.