When is it time to get out of Dodge? Experts have their say

Survival Mom ^ | June, 2013

[Squantos]

We had a train derailment last weekend in our small town..... As a small town we have many volunteers and as such keep a police scanner on the night stand. Very low traffic so its an aid versus a hindrance when left on 24/7 ....

Prevailing winds make the rail line directly south of my home by about a mile a very big threat due said freight trains potential for hazardous cargos aka chlorine etc ...

The downwind hazard is my key industrial local threat.

12:28 am I am awakened by the emergency tones on my scanner and cell phone at almost the same time.

Train derailment !

I was up, with girl Friday in tow and in the truck and gone south and back west to escape and possible downwind escaping gases.....”if it had been a chemical / toxic cargo spill”...

4 minutes from sleep to driving out the garage with 6 large pre packed pelican suitcases off the garage shelf with water, food, clothing, long term survival packs and personal defense weapons.

My cummins diesel 4x4 crew cab truck has a 100 gal bed tank and a 34 gallon OEM tank. Is always kept full. The bug out gear is always on the shelf and easy to grab and run.

That was my recent get out of dodge in a dodge event per se....

Some decisions to stay or not are no brainers.... Situations dictate and vary in every case. Evacuation until the real threat was evaluated was key.

My story .... Simple yet can happen to anyone tomorrow be it a railway or highway spill or local industrial accident.....

And then there’s that riot and TEOTWAWKI thang to consider....

Stay safe....

[Jane Long]

Yes, we've compared Ike and Rita notes ;)

When we bugged out for Rita, we attempted to head out on 90A, as we knew I-10 was going to be a complete gridlock. We didn't get very far until we realized that 90A was gridlocked, too. We finally got to 36 and took that to Gridlock World/I-10. Not pretty. I had 2 kids, 2 dogs and 1 cat in my car. Hubby had the other dog in his truck. We finally made it to our destination - New Braunfels - almost 7 hours later.

Lesson learned...the back roads back up, too. And, we've now prepared our home to be able to ride out most any storm. (Just let me know if you and your Yorkie need to come down here, should the storm NOT go in Old Sarge's direction ;)

[Kartographer]

Number one problem with New Mexico Water. The number two problem water. The number three problem......

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Harry! Harry Randall Truman! Is that you?

[mowowie]

Step 1: Buy a motorcycle

[Veggie Todd]

"I was born here and I was raised here and dadgummit, I'm gonna die here!"

Harump!

[Blueflag]

Here is a good write up. “max” has been developing and testing one.

http://maxvelocitytactical.blogspot.com/2013/06/coming-soon-mvt-shield-thermal-shelter.html

Essentially three layer sandwich. Cloth-barrier-camo cloth. There is more to it. His blog explains it.

FWIW Travis McGee endorses Max’s advice.

[Blueflag]

Matt —

Since you have been there/ done that ...

“A prepper is a scoffer who’s been [suddenly] ‘stranded’ by circumstances they can’t control and never thought would happen to THEM.”

REM: Know also that I have a daughter in school at Stevens in Hoboken. We were moments from executing the pre-planned extraction (Sandy) when the storm shifted south. They lost power for a little bit, but didn’t even get limbs down.

Two essential reads for you:

http://www.afailureofcivility.com
or AFOC as referred to here in FReeperdom, and

“One Second After” — Forstchen

http://www.amazon.com/One-Second-After-William-Forstchen/dp/0765317583/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232080074&sr=1-1

Also on Kindle for only $8. Yes the disruptive societal mechanism is EMP, and you may not believe in EMP risks, BUT, the book presents a plausible and quite chilling look into what’s possible after AFOC. Prepare/plan/think as you see fit.

---

Thirdly, I encourage you to read the Bracken Anthologies.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Bracken-Anthology-ebook/dp/B00A4SCLKK

written by our own “Travis McGee” - Matt Bracken.

These are three very realistic sources, sans the Mad Max hype.

AFOC in particular describes different levels of threats, preps/plans for them, and responses to them. The worst level, DEFCON 1 if you will, is AFOC.

[Godzilla]

During hurricanes even the backroads will be bad.

Normally you have days of warning before landfall. Leave early as possible to reduce those problems. That is also why I have additional alternate routes.

[PA Engineer]

Thanks.

[Ol' Sox]

Competition for resources was the main cause of societal breakdown after Sandy hit. And this competition extended far, far beyond the areas hardest hit.

Here in Connecticut, 75-100 miles northeast of Sandy’s landfall, we had a lot of wind damage due to trees falling and coastal property damage due to extremely high tides. Power was out for up to two weeks depending on how far from the main roads you were. However, main roads were navigable (for the most part) soon after the storm, and gas stations, grocery stores, etc. were up and running very quickly as power was restored to the main roads first.

Most folks around here were wise enough to fill their cars prior to the storm, and many have generators. However, nobody really has a personal gasoline storage capability of more than 5 or 10 gallons, and those gennys made short work of home supplies. So the gas lines formed, but it wasn’t too bad.

Then, the folks from out of town showed up. People from the hard hit parts of New Jersey and New York traveled out our way, and added to the lines, bringing with them both a sense of desperation and worse, a sense of entitlement. Lines grew to 1974 levels, and there were some problems until the local cops took a firmer hand.

We learned a few things - first being that social disruption is inevitable and scales up quickly when a highly populated urban/suburban area is affected. Folks will travel to your neck of the woods, quickly, and will compete with you for resources you thought were your own. Second is that a gas generator is not the best solution for a long term, widespread outage. A propane generator with a large propane tank, or a solar charged bank of batteries would have been a much better approach to providing electrical power (with a much lower exposure to the effects of social disruption).

[yorkiemom]

My hurricane plans are made, I'm staying home, and I have gone over these plans several times with my other family member, my Yorkie, so she knows what to do - get in her bed and sleep through it. She knows there is plenty of food for her stored and plenty of good water and plenty of her potty pads.

I did get, in the past month, two low metal doggie gates to put one at the front and back door, so when power goes off and I put up the screens and leave the doors open for a draft of air through the house, she can't walk through the split screens held together by magnets, and take off to the outside world.

That is so sweet. I'm glad Prissy is thought of with regards to your prepping plans and is well taken care of!

[Marcella]

“...or a solar charged bank of batteries would have been a much better approach to providing electrical power (with a much lower exposure to the effects of social disruption).”

That was my choice. A solar panel and charger capable of charging any size battery in a reasonable amount of time and having excellent rechargeable batteries. Four AA batteries will charge in 3 hours. This set up will last for years and no one will know I have it - makes no noise.

You might want a large solar array, I went with one panel that would do the job - give me light and operating fans and a working portable TV that runs on batteries plus radios and a short wave receiver radio. I won’t have a fridge/freezer, but neither did my grandparents.

[Marcella]

Right now, Prissy is sitting on my recliner chair with her head on my ankle, looking toward the front door. If anything moves out there, she will start barking and run up to my chest and starting hitting me with her front paws. That means, “Get up and go look - something is moving out there!”

I had been putting off getting those gates but knew I had to get them before hurricane season. Power will be off and it would get very hot in the house if I couldn’t open the two doors to get a draft through here. I didn’t have those screens during Ike, so I had to deal with that.

Every time one goes through a no power situation, something is always discovered that could have been done better. I didn’t have her when Ike came through. since Ike, I bought the screens to put up and had to get something to keep her in.

I also bought more small individual “boxes” of water. That water goes with us if I have to leave the house. I had enough individual boxes for me but had to buy more so she would have water. It’s just like one would have to do for a small child.

[GBA]

Staying in place seems best unless the nearby nuke plant begins leaking or spewing freely and the wind changes.

The storms have recently tested some of my preparations and shown me some areas that need to be improved.

Those LED headlamps, the solar powered lanterns and fresh batteries were my personal favorites after back to back storms ripped up the area a couple of weeks ago.

I definitely need a better bow saw and would like to have a decent chainsaw after several of my yard's trees fell across my driveway and another fell blocking the street in front of the house and others fell in back taking out a section of fence.

I was trapped in place along with my neighbors until I cleared the trees out of the way. Love my ibuprofen, but I need a better saw! And a small generator.

[AlexW]

“Staying in place seems best”
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Of course, if it is a weather or minor physical disaster.
I have been through a few ice storms. When I was a child in the 50s, an ice storm forced us into a hotel in downtown Memphis.
In 1990something an Ice storm out in my rural county required many of us to help the Electric company pull lines through fields and wooded areas. Power was out for almost a week.
In case of civil unrest, however, what will you do?
The standard reply of claiming a huge stock of ammo may sound good, but not so likely to save anyone.
I prefer to get the H out of Dodge before SHTF.
I notice that many on the Prepper series seem to live in godforsaken areas, such as desert southwest. It is obvious that they need prepping.

[GBA]

I tend to agree with you about that, which is one of the reasons I moved out of Dodge a few years ago.

At this point, my rational is if I can rely upon my neighbors now, in the normal good and bad, I figure my chances are fairly decent if the fan gets covered.

I'm still scouting for better, but most of what I've read about the ultimate worst case stuff talks about the importance of support and the downsides of being a lone wolf.

Somehow I lucked out and have been blessed with much better than average neighbors, something I definitely do not take for granted.

[AlexW]

“I’m still scouting for better”
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Good for you, but you should still investigate options for expiating should the USSA gets even worse. Local and weather disasters are one thing, but political breakdown is another matter.
Central and South America seem to be the most popular destinations.
Internationalliving.com and EFAM.com are good sites to keep in mind. I get email updates from them every day.

[GBA]

Thanks for the info! I've given it some thought and haven't ruled out those possibilities and have some friends who are very interested in getting started right NOW.

Personally, some days I look around and think I won't have to go to a different country, they've all come here and now my country is a different country.

Still pissed this is happening on my/our watch, and they're winning, you know? Oh well, the real fight started long before I was born and I only recently began to see things that have been "right before my very eyes" all this time.