Posted on 11/04/2009 8:11:03 AM PST by ChocChipCookie
I've read dozens, and I mean dozens, of lists telling me everything I need to have with me to survive. Usually there are no surprises. I know a flashlight, pocket knife, and water are musts, but every now and then I come across something that makes me say, "a-ha!" Here are thirteen of my favorites.
Lightsticks. You can pick up one of these every time you wander into a Home Depot. They don't need batteries and can be hung around the neck with a string making it easier to spot everyone in your party when it gets dark.
Wool socks and sweaters. People have literally frozen to death wearing their layers of cotton knit tees and hoodies. For true survival conditions, nothing beats wool.
Upholstery needles and thread. What if a sleeping bag or tent rips and you have no way of mending it?
Roll of quarters. Handy for phone calls, but if you put it in a sock and wield it like a sling, you have a handy-dandy weapon!
Pencils. Forget the pens. They can run out of ink and freeze in cold weather. With a pocket knife, you'll always have a sharp pencil.
Super glue. Professional hockey players always have this on hand to seal up small cuts, and the glue itself is harmless. Unless you get it in your eye, like I did. But that's a story for a different type of post!
Rubber bands. String just doesn't cut it when what you really need is a rubber band.
Tampons in a cardboard tube. Did you know a tampon can be fit snugly into a bullet wound? Guys on the battlefield carry these with them. Honest! I've also heard they're good for kindling.
Paracord belt. It's an accessory and survival tool in one!
Waterproof wrist watch. Makes perfect sense. I had just never thought of it.
Animal repellant trash bags. Use these when you're camping and animals will stay the heck away from your trash.
Safety pins.
Dental floss. Besides helping to keep your teeth clean, I've heard it makes sturdy thread for mending.
What have I missed?
Better than volumes of matches is the ‘flame stick’ which when rubbed with iron/steel makes prodigious fire starting sparks.
bump
Cheap. Fixes everything.
Good point.
May I add WD-40? With duct tape and WD-40 you can fix anything:
If it moves and it's not supposed to use duct tape.
If it doesn't move and it's supposed to use WD-40.
More seriously WD-40 is a good rust preventive, lubricant, for some types of crud a good cleaner/remover, and in a pinch can help you light wet wood.
For fifty or less, a radio that has a crank handle for power and charging things. You can even run a computer or cell phone off of it. Comes with weatherbandds and some shortwave frequencies, too.
When telephone service is out, a lot of the time pay phones are the first ones back in service. I have no idea why.
I don't see this mentioned in too many places but if you or your children wear glasses you absolutely must have spares.
If TSHTF arrives, a hearing enhancement device will also come in very handy on guard duty.
And a huge supermarket shopping cart to carry all those extras freepers have suggested.
A metal coffee can. Use it to store small stuff and when camped use it to boil water. Ever try to melt snow or ice without a metal pot? How about boiling water from a creek to avoid the mountain runs? A cooffe can is cheap now, what would you pay to have one in a survival situation? I’ve melted snow to boiling water and used it make a stew out of what I found.
Aluminum foil, try cooking a fish with the old stick basket trick, too well done and it will fall through, solution Aluminum foil. Also can relect sunlight like a mirror and if you have to hike through snow, wrap your feet with it and it will relect your body heat back.
A knife sharpener. Dull knives suck.
I like a thing called a hatch. It’s just an ax/hammer head with a threaded center where you can screw in a branch or root to make an ax. The hatch will mount on your belt and you’ll forget it’s there until you need it. The ax end is also a wedge for splitting wood, you can hit the hammer end with a rock and get into the dry unfrozen inners of a piece of wood to get the fire started. I found a nail in a piece of drift wood during a survival exercise and used it as a wedge to spread the end of the wood treaded into the Hatch so it wouldn’t spread. A few nails are now in my survival pack.
Oh yeah you might run out of matches so carry a flint type fire starter too. A few sticks of fire starter are helpfull as dry tinder can be a problem to find. Best use of a field guide to survial might be burning a few pages to start a fire.
30 gallon plastic garbage bag can be used as an emergency rain coat, to store water, etc.
Role of duct tape.
A roll of red or yellow ribbion is good for marking trails if you are going to be moving around the campsite so you don’t get lost.
With electonics in vogue now a cell phone or GPS are great to have. A small hand crank charger is light and worth it’s weight in gold. Get one with a light on it too. They sell emergency radios with all that built in.
C4; Handgrenades; and Napalm!
Glock makes three of things that should be on everyone’s list, the gun, the knife, and the shovel!
Though my fleeces are "MY" BASIC all weather gear, some people don't have fleeces, and can't afford them. But they do have a wool sweater. For those who can afford them, fleece IS the way to go. BUT wool is a tried and true alternative.
Also, some might assume that their fleecy sweatshirt is "polar"fleece, most are not. Most sweatshirts are nothing but cotton towels. Terrible for survival.
One other thing about fleeces, being a polyester fabric, they melt. Around open flames or sparks, fleece is not good, where as wool is.
The most important thing is a BOB to carry all that crap around in. Mine is a Camelbak.
Would you please change the link I provided in this post? I inadvertently used my wp-admin link. It should be:
Thanks!
Agreed. Nothing against wool. I did numerous ski-mountaineering camping trips with wool as the primary insulation layer before fleece became available. Worked great. But not nearly as well as fleece, when it came out.
Fleece really isn’t all that expensive, if you don’t insist on a top brand. Costco has had perfectly workable fleece cardigans for $15.
Bullets? If you're planning on reloading. How about CARTRIDGES.
Good point for all South Floridia Freepers preparing for an extended emergency. Keep them from freezing and keep the mosquitoes off ;-)
I was talking with a DARPA head, and he was interested in light-weight replacements for batteries 'to lighten the load a combat soldier had to carry'.
When I pointed out it wouldn't lighten the load, that every pound of batteries removed would be replaced by a pound of C-4, he had to allow that I was right.
You can never have too much C-4...
Seriously.
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