[marktwain]

You have to eat.

The food has to be available.

There has to be a way to distribute it.

Water has to be available.

Sewage has to be taken care of.

Without electricity or communications, those things become very iffy for very large percentages of the population.

I do not think it will happen. Parts of the grid would be brought up quickly.

The number 90% has a very unlikely premise attacked to it.

Lots of people are pretty tough.

My brother and I have played around with this premise extensively.

You pretty much need an all out nuclear war to achieve it, and then we have lots of other problems as well as the power grid and communications.

Food distribution is one of the biggest problems.

But finding a way to kill off a lot of Americans is really quite difficult. Finding a way to keep the power grid down for months, is difficult as well.

I think it very unlikely to happen.

Puerto Rico is a good example of having a *partial* destruction of the grid. They, overall, are doing pretty well.

[af_vet_1981]

Puerto Rico is a good example of having a *partial* destruction of the grid. They, overall, are doing pretty well.

That is because there is a friendly power with huge resources to help them.

[familyop]

"Food distribution is one of the biggest problems."

The most necessary freight would run with organization, direction and security but not immediately afterwards. Everyone should have some extra supplies at home before any such disaster is even close to happening. There wouldn't be any home refrigeration for most people, and that would also be difficult.

If your house is all electric and on the grid, consider getting something that runs on gas to cook with and enough cooking gas (if propane, white gas, etc.) for about two months. For propane in small bottles, that's about at least 40 pounds. For the gas grill type bottles, get at least three "20-pounders" because too many vendors only put 15 pounds in each bottle, especially in western states. And keep propane tanks outside--not in the house. Learn in advance to fry bread, biscuits, cookies, etc. (lid being necessary), instead of baking. It can be done nicely. I did it for years.

After a large nuke exchange, truckers, farmers and many others would be working very hard with safe enough levels of exposure but not within the first few days (decay rates too high).