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16 Things to Stockpile with High Barter Value Cigarettes. Soap. Bullets. Alcohol. MREs. Silver Coins. Detergent. Water bottles. Matches and lighters. Sugar. Toilet paper. Water Filters/Purifiers. Bleach. Batteries. Candles.

A recent survey of 1,007 nationally representative Americans ages 18 and over suggests that most of us believe a doomsday scenario of some kind will occur in the next twenty five years. With three million preppers in the U.S. getting ready for widespread disaster, gun sales sky rocketing, and retail precious metals purchases at unprecedented levels, the results of the survey performed by Kelton Research on behalf of National Geographic shouldn’t be surprising. Among other things, the survey asked respondents to choose which natural or man-made doomsday scenarios they believed are most likely to happen in the United States. The...

With real unemployent approaching 25% of the population, 50 million Americans on food stamps, and the prices of essential goods rising every month, it’s no surprise that black market peddlers are turning to new product offerings to make a buck. In What Is Money When the System Collapses? we highlighted some items that would take the place of traditional currency in the event of a catastrophic financial and economic collapse – things like food, fuel, firearms and footwear. But for many, the world as they know it has already collapsed. Unable to afford retail prices for home essentials, these people...

Prepping for the Financially Challenged: A One Month Survival Plan For Under $300 Tom Chatham March 12th, 2012 The American Dream Lost The following article has been generously contributed by Tom Chatham, author of the newly released book The American Dream Lost – Economic Survival Strategy for a New Paradigm. Many people are now waking up to the possibility that the future may not provide the great recovery we all expect it to be. They are begining to sense that something is wrong with the economy and it will not get better. Their first thought is the question, What do...

Looking at survival survey results it seems a lot of people have to see where they put their money. Into preps or have to spend it on things for everyday living. I know how this feels and live like that the last decades. After war I left city with two plastic bags full of random belongings. No documents and nothing else. I was refugee. But lucky that I was able to stay with family on countryside. I never really thought, ok now I prepare or anything. I simply wanted to have all sorts of things I did not have during...

The Survival Mom Teaches You How To Prepare More, Panic Less Mac Slavo March 13th, 2012 Over the last dozen years we’ve witnessed events in America and around the world that have proven one thing: sometimes, really bad things happen. We’ve seen thousands die in terrorist attacks on our own soil, residents of an entire U.S. city transformed into refugees almost overnight after, generations of families swept away by Tsunamis, economic and financial collapse that has wiped out decades of retirement savings, millions losing their jobs and forced into the government safety net for survival, and most recently, a nuclear...

While watching Doomsday Preppers last week, I observed one major difference in the various plans, and that was if the plan included access to land and water. Its one thing to stockpile 2 – 3 years of canned goods, food in mylar bags, freeze dried food, have a rainwater collection system, small backyard garden,,,,. Its another thing to have access to several acres of land, able to have chickens, a nice sized garden for a variety of fresh veggies, various types of fruit trees, access to fresh running water and access to land to hunt on. Maybe even have access...

We live in a world that is becoming increasingly unstable, and the potential for an event that could cause “sudden change” to the U.S. economy is greater than ever. There are dozens of potentially massive threats that could easily push the U.S. economy over the edge during the next 12 months. A war in the Middle East, a financial collapse in Europe, a major derivatives crisis or a horrific natural disaster could all change our economic situation very rapidly. Most of the time I write about the long-term economic trends that are slowly but surely ripping the U.S. economy to...

We are really happy how many people participated in our survey. Over 1800 of you have answered the questions and I have spent the last few nights to whip all the responses into a presentable form. This is done now and I think it gives everyone a good idea what is on most people’s mind, why people prepare, what they prepare for and where you are standing compared to others.

Weekly Preppers Thread.

From the society’s wealthiest and most powerful class to rural off-the-grid types, people are preparing for the worst, and sparing no expense on elaborate underground shelters, buying years’ worth of non-perishable foods and stockpiling fuel and ammunition. Some have embraced the term “preppers,” although precisely what they are preparing for varies. “We realized that we were totally unprepared should something happen,” said Jack Jobe, who was prompted to prep for a natural disaster after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. Jobe, who will be featured on an upcoming episode of the NatGeo’s “Doomsday Preppers,” has invested about $3,000 in a safe...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The largest solar flare in five years is racing toward Earth, threatening to unleash a torrent of charged particles that could disrupt power grids, GPS and airplane flights. The sun erupted Tuesday evening, and the effects should start smacking Earth around 7 a.m. EST Thursday, according to forecasters at the federal government's Space Weather Prediction Center.

Via: On the probability of occurrence of extreme space weather events Key Points Probability of a Carrington event occurring over next decade is ~12% Space physics datasets often display a power-law distribution Power-law distribution can be exploited to predict extreme events By virtue of their rarity, extreme space weather events, such as the Carrington event of 1859, are difficult to study, their rates of occurrence are difficult to estimate, and prediction of a specific future event is virtually impossible. Additionally, events may be extreme relative to one parameter but normal relative to others. In this study, we analyze several measures...

If your first exposure to prepping is through the media, you are probably thinking all preppers are extreme or kooks. I once thought of preppers and survivalists were some kind of crazy Rambo-Grizzly Adams hybrids. At best, I thought they were like Woody Harrelson’s character “Charlie Frost” the doomsday radio DJ in the movie “2012.” I believe you will find, as I did, that the majority of preppers are actually pretty sane, even ordinary. There are two major details to keep in mind regarding media portrayals. One, ‘ordinary’ doesn’t make for good entertainment. Second, hours of film are shot which...

So much for a fast start to the recover in 2012. A week after announcing the worst durable-goods orders report in three years, the Commerce Department’s report on factory orders and shipments in January show the worst outcome in sixteen months: New orders for manufactured goods in January, down following two consecutive monthly increases, decreased $4.8 billion or 1.0 percent to $462.6 billion, the U.S. Census Bureau reported today. This followed a 1.4 percent December increase. Excluding transportation, new orders decreased 0.3 percent. Shipments, up eight consecutive months, increased $4.1 billion or 0.9 percent to $463.6 billion. This followed a...

SHIPPING CEO: Iran Could Send Oil To $440/Barrel Gus LubinMarch 5, 2012US Navy The scariest Iran scenario yet comes from Bob Bandos, CEO of marine logistics and services company GAC North America. Bandos tells Pierre Bertrand of the International Business Times: [T]ankers can haul 1.8 million barrels of oil a day through the strait. If that supply is choked off, the effect would be similar to the fuel shortages of the 1970s - but more extreme, Bandos said. "That would be nothing compared to this," Bandos said, who added the shortage would be global. If the 1973 embargo experience repeats...

Weekly Prepper Thread, for posting tips, new products, good prep buys etc..... “There is no greater disaster than to underestimate danger. Underestimation can be fatal.”

No Matter How Much Food You’ve Got Stored, It Will Eventually Run Out in a Full-Blown Collapse Joe Alton, M.D.,aka Dr. Bones March 1st, 2012 The following article has been generously contributed by Joe Alton, M.D., aka Dr. Bones, of Doom and Bloom Nation where you can find strategies to stay healthy that include traditional medicine, alternative remedies, and medicinal/survival gardening. For the best in emergency and long-term disaster medical preparedness we encourage you to check out The Doom and Bloom Survival Medicine Handbook and follow Dr. Bones and Nurse Amy on their weekly podcast. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To Survive, How Much...

The Boy Scout motto — Be Prepared — is probably considered evidence of terrorist (or at least extremist) inclinations in the USSA Today. I won’t even get into the parts about hiking in the woods, carrying knives and practicing “survival” strategies. In my day, we even had a merit badge for marksmanship with a gun. But, weekend camping expeditions aside, how to be prepared in situ? In your home? For when the SHTF? Guns (and ammo) are obviously good things to have. And every person who wants to be prepared for a possible fecal-flinging scenario ought to have them. So...

Society as we know it will break down and collapse in a five stage process outlined here. While it can be accelerated by certain events like war, a natural disaster, pandemic, terrorist attack, or even an impending asteroid impact, history has shown that economic collapse will essentially happen in this five stage process. To survive the collapse, it is important to read and interpret the signs and understand what assets are important to the current situation so you can be prepared for the worst thereby allowing you to survive intact and with as little damage as possible.