ping
I’d rather stand my ground than hide or flee if the so called SHTF ever. Should we be cowards or Americans?
Case in point:
The Los Angeles Fire Department is on record as saying that after the inevitable mega-quake in SoCal, it expects the resulting fires in urban areas to rage out of control for weeks.
Anyone in the way of the fires will have to bug-out or burn in their homes.
I pretty much agree. My primary bug out plan is to bug in. We’re in a semi-rural area, our home has almost everything we need for a year, and we have enough neighbors that we know and like that we feel secure. Our secondary plan is to bug out to a neighbor’s home. He’s a farmer with a fair amount of land, I’ve shot with him, helped him with home and tractor repairs, and known him for a couple decades. His secondary plan is to come to my home. That’s as far as I’m planning on going - 1/2 mile in my backup plan.
Note: I know that the situation is different in an urban area, but even then I would want to be aiming for a specific address where I know the people, not a hypothetical mountain with my rifle and a plan to go hunting.
I go hunting every year, and see lot of meals on the hoof; but my license only permits a buck with certain antler dimensions, so I take nothing. Were I in a survival mode, there would be many meals. I hunt for the joy of being out in nature, not for the joy of killing.
Gunner
I’m looking for an excuse to trade around for a good sailboat that can be brought up to shape for circumnavigation.
I first became aware of a possible economic collapse during the Carter administration. I had a wife and young child.
I had thought about what to do and decided I would take my family and move to my parents farm. They no longer farmed except for a large garden but both my parents had grown up in a time when they literally existed with very little dependence on the outside world.
My Mother had grown up on a 1000 plus acre farm so in a way that was way different from making a living on a small acreage. Still both of them knew how to grow their own produce, slaughter and preserve their own meat etc. I can actually remember when we had a smokehouse and how great it smelled inside it.
Now, my wife is deceased and my Daughter and her family live a thousand miles away. I am too old to live in the woods etc. I simply would stay home and do the best I can. I do have plenty of everything except food. Water is no problem here. I guess I really do need to stock up on at least a few months supply of staple groceries which store well.
I have persuaded my Daughter and SIL to stock up on groceries. They are moderately well to do and can afford to get about anything they want. I think telling her to do so to protect their children was the deciding factor.
Plenty of food/water in my pantry. Enough for me to go about 30 - 40 days. Well-stocked and diverse collection of defensive “tools and toys”. If the SHTF event requires more than that...
Hold until relieved
Yippy Chi Alpha! :)
actually, if I were convinced the society would collapse, I’d go back and live in Mormon country, where the tight society would survive by helping each other...Orson Scott Card has a few sci fi stories that give a realistic scenerios of the future that posit just this.
They remember their history...
when they were on their own in a hostile land.
There could be a time to “bug out”, that wouldn’t be when society was still functioning, when you still had a job, utilities, phone service, could go down the street and buy groceries, or if you had a tight neighborhood and area of strong willed, armed and prepared neighbors. In the event of collapse and invasion of your area, and would depend on the enemy, it would be prudent to “bug out” especially if you had a secure area to go to. In the kind of situation we are discussing most of the population would either end up as casulties or refugees anyway. Predicted natural disasters such as hurricanes or fires would of course be an exception and in certain areas you should “bug out” but should have an advance plan about where to.
Good article that goes a long way in de-romanticizing the notion that bugging out will be like in the movies. Selco’s articles on SHTFschool.com also brought reality to the survival romantics ideas that they could go it alone during a shtf scenario. Glad this info is available because we all know that it’s all going to crash... sooner or later.
Avoid planning to “bug out” to government-owned park/camping areas in the West in the event of large disaster. Those would be forcibly evacuated and kept off limits due to the problems that would develop with overcrowding (lack of local resources for so many, lack of preparations by campers, likely conflicts, hygiene, winter conditions, etc.).
If you own vacant land free and clear, at least have a water well drilled and septic system built before planning to flee to it. Costs of water and waste disposal are complicated by fuel costs to fetch and dispose—very high costs per, say, month. There are also energy (brutal, long winters in parts of the West, with propane prices and other items for camping hugely high), food, and so on.
Refugees are inevitably provided for in camps or damaged cities by their relatives in the Guard (rations and entertainment given by polite, tired young men and women, oh, boy).
IMO, if I were in a suburb, I’d plan and prepare for staying at home. ...or staying with relatives, friends or the like, elsewhere, if staying at home were not possible (hurricane destruction, etc.). Stock-up, and provide for alternative energy, etc.
I live in a rural area of the Florida panhandle so staying at home which is what I would do, may not be a realistic choice for people in cities.
Actually, I don’t think there is a good option for urban dwellers. Get out of Dodge but where to go? just moving into the country with no preparation sounds like a disaster in waiting but still probably better than staying in the city.
Kart - Check it out
Uh-huh.
But bug out time arrives after most if not all of that has already been lost.
The idea that bugging out is wrong and should not be prepared for or considered is ludicrous. It should be considered, it should be planed for and if the time comes that it is necessary then you don't have to try to do it under the worst of conditions.
And yes, those who plan to "bug in" should still be prepared to bug out. Your fellow humans are not the only thing you have to fear. Rising water doesn't care if you live in the boondocks. Neither does fire or wind or earth quake or any of the other delightful little gifts nature sends our way.
You should have bags ready and you should have at minimum four places where you know you can go.
Or you can wait until the water is rising and end up in a shelter with a bag of oatmeal, five mismatched socks and a bottle of sunscreen.
A bit exaggerated for effect but you should get the point.
I am sure you have all heard of BOB (Bug Out Bag) we have Bags Sorta Like that but they are for Getting Too a specific point be it Home or designated Rural Sites apart from our own.
I’m too old and decrepit to go out stomping through the woods with a rifle and backpack (that’s so 1st CAV mid-seventies).
I’m stocking up on everything and will make my stand in my own home, if required.
Que sera, sera.