Who is actually prepaired for a disaster?

[sparq]

Im just curious how many of you think you are prepared for a serious disaster? Be it natural (hurricane, earthquake, tornado, etc.) or man-made. Are there any "dooms day" folks here who have a shelter, years of supplies, etc. that seem to be left over from Y2K :p ??


Im just curious, I think that the US is in for more terrorist attacks in the future - and I seriously think that a dirty bomb will happen within the next 10 years. But dooms day aside, how many even have basic supplies? Do you know where they are? How long will it take you to assemble them?

If you dont have at least 2-3 gallons of FRESH water available for every person in your house hold, you should at least try and do that. Since fresh water is one of the more important things you can have. Me personally, am not ready for much - I dont live near a major city, I dont have to worry about earthquakes, or tornados, or hurricanes. Its rather quiet, all I have to worry about are winter ice storms where we loose power. THAT can suck, staying warm when there is no heat is not easy.

If you have supplies, what do you have? I think it would be neat to talk amoungst the other members and make a few differant lists of supplies you should consider having to be prepaired.

[BuezaWebDev]

Good job on the preparations.

I haven't actually thought about preparing for a world disaster. I guess I should start. I watched War of the Worlds...imagine if that happened to us. :P

[sparq]

I mean obviously you can not be prepaired for EVERYTHING, but even having SOME preperations is better then none! Food & water are a must, candles, can opener, flash lights w/ rechargable batteries, solar recharger, wind up radio, this list can grow and grow and grow.

Me personally? I will have to grow accustomed to the taste of small animals, as my .22 rifle is my best friend. That is, if there are animals to hunt!

Yeah war of the worlds would be crazy, but think of just something small. Look how quickly supplies run out when a hurricane is coming. You want to have everything you need in your home and ready to go. So if we some how get advance notice of (say) a nuke, you can take steps to get ready. Not be running around outside where you will most likely end up getting stuck in traffic and turned into dust...

[sclark]

I live in the hurricane capital of the world, Central Florida. Last year we had thousands of dollars in damage from hurricane Charley, and had no power for 6 days. We lived in one room with a window air conditioner running from a generator--I called that room the "hollowdeck" because life was almost normal there. Outside that room it was hot, wet, dark (the windows were boarded) and "the land of the hurricane." Gasoline was a priority since the stations also had no power, and without power, the pumps don't work. It was like living in Mad Max land.

Moral of the story: be prepared, or be prepared to move back in time to the dark ages in such an emergency.

[Ben Rogers]

If there's a disaster, natural or otherwise, near me...bye bye, I guess. I don't hold so much value to human life that I'd try to survive a nuclear attack, and a hurricane or tornado is highly unlikely here. We have a basement and root cellar anyhow. We live not too far from a cow farm, I'm sure there could be...arrangements if we needed meat, and there's a river within a 2 minute's walk. Any more preparation would be overkill, IMO. Woot for the semi-boonies.

[BuezaWebDev]

If there's a disaster, natural or otherwise, near me...bye bye, I guess. I don't hold so much value to human life that I'd try to survive a nuclear attack, and a hurricane or tornado is highly unlikely here. We have a basement and root cellar anyhow. We live not too far from a cow farm, I'm sure there could be...arrangements if we needed meat, and there's a river within a 2 minute's walk. Any more preparation would be overkill, IMO. Woot for the semi-boonies.


Slacker!

[buntine]

I'm with Ben. I am not scared of death. Preparing for global disasters would prompt me to live in fear.

[BuezaWebDev]

I'm with Ben. I am not scared of death. Preparing for global disasters would prompt me to live in fear.

How about your loved ones? Aren't concerned about their safety? :/

[buntine]

Concerned? No. If there was a meteor flying towards me, I don't think my preparations would hold out too long. Being prepared is smart, but I dont deem it necessary at this point in time.

There is NO way I would ever consider getting "prepared" for a terrorist attack, though.

[BuezaWebDev]

Concerned? No. If there was a meteor flying towards me, I don't think my preparations would hold out too long. Being prepared is smart, but I dont deem it necessary at this point in time.

There is NO way I would ever consider getting "prepared" for a terrorist attack, though.

Hahah, I'm pretty sure no one could have prepared anything to stand up against a meteor. :)

[sparq]

There is NO way I would ever consider getting "prepared" for a terrorist attack, though.

Ignorance is bliss, people who say they are not SCARED of death; or think there is no need to be prepaired just make my life after something happens that much easier. One less person I have to worry about, as they wont last long.

So according to you, having your lungs burned out because breathing through your shirt offers no protection against chemical agents sounds like more fun then having a $100 gas mask that would protect you, and make you live another day?

I remember seeing an article not too long ago, that even after all those hurricanes hit Florida and the other areas, 90% of the people in the area were NOT prepaired for this years hurricane season. I mean seriously, you live in an area KNOWN for big storms, yet you dont have any plan, any water, nothing.

Oh, and to the person that lives out in the sticks, near a cow farm, how do you think you will get meat? You think the farmer is going to give it to you? You can be damn sure the farmer will be prepaired with shotguns and rifles to protect his crop, so stealing a cow wont do much -- then you have the added joys of trying to move a multiple hundred pound animal, butcher it, etc. on top of the fact that should there be a loss of power, refrideration isnt gonna happen -- so you better eat all that cow up quick, or your hard work will just be waisted.

I think people here in the US just feel invincible, Sept. 11 proved that we werent, yet people still have the lackadaisical, "it cant happen to me" attitude. Maybe I should write a book...

[Ben Rogers]

Ooh, someone is certainly in the demographic. Here's something new for you, sparky: people die every day! All told, a few thousand people doesn't make that much of a difference. What changed, other than airport security--and that's just there to make people like you feel better--are we having a shortage of people now? No. There's too many people already. I live in the suburbs by the way, and I retract my earlier statement.

Saying that I couldn't get to food is just ridiculous. Worst case scenario, I get snowed in. That means more than enough clean water (or clean enough) water for weeks then, doesn't it? And assuming that the weeks it would take a well saturated person to starve to death go by, you think it would be practical to have food enough for that long? How paranoid can you get?!? If you live in a hurricane area, some canned food is one thing, but preparing for terrorist attacks, and bomb shelters? That's ridiculous. You die, you're dead. Not like you're gonna care much when your brain waves don't register anything anymore and your corpse rots in the ground.

[sparq]

First off, you are taking everything I say to the extreme. Being "prepaired" and being a dooms day freako are two completely differant things!

Lets talk about a terrorist attack for a second...

You do realize that no matter how far you are from a major city, you can still be effected by a major attack? All it takes is a nuclear bomb in a shipping container, and it will shut our ports down for weeks. Regardless if it actually goes off or not... as it will take that long to search all the containers for possible more bombs and to develop a new plan on how to deal with the fact that we dont search MILLIONS of containers every year because we dont have the man power.

I never said you COULDN'T get food did I? Im not sure if you have ever lived near an area that has hurricanes. But the moment people find out the storm will hit them, what do you think they do? Run to the store in a last ditch effort to buy whatever supplies they can. So now, add the fact that if something on the scale of a nuke came into the US, dirty bomb, warhead, you name it. People will be out there buying up whatever they can, so why you would not at least be prepaired and have things you want to eat handy rather then getting stuck with some nasty GOYO beans or something I have no idea.

El Nat-ur-al baby...

Mother nature can be a b*tch! You said yourself the worst case for you is getting snowed in. Ok, you get snowed in, you have all this snow for water right? How you going to turn it into water? Your own body heat? You do realize this will cool you down correct? What about providing heat for yourself? Lights? Sure you got flashlights, but where are your batteries? Everyone always seems to keep these items in two seperate locations, so finding them in the dark becomes a challenge :p Keeping all your supplies in one, easily accessible area will make your life that much less stressfull as you try and run around and find everything.

Numbers... Also, you say "a few thousand", this number is so unrealistic its almost laughable. You do realize the whole goal of a "terrorist" is not just to take lives for whatever cause they feel is just... but its to create shock and panic to people who DONT die. Like everything, there is progression.... processor speed increase, hard drive storage space increases, and the mode in which people will attack will also increase. I read a news article the other day that brought up the fact that Al-Qaida already has 40 nuclear weapons... with papers recovered which mentioned they already had a plan that would kill nearly 4 million people. Being that 7.5 million people live in NYC itself, and another 15 million in the "spawled" area of Los Angeles, leads to point that smaller areas will also be targets, you attack the larger cities so people become scared and flea outward, and then bomb them where they feel safest.



Being "prepaired" can be as simple as having a plan, hey if this happens, this is what im gonna do. Its that simple, but you need to have the plan BEFORE something happens, and if you want it to actually be effective you need to think about things from various angles as well as do at least a little research. But have a plan, have fresh water in containers, have a way to heat up some food -- or like the taste of PBJ :p

[Ben Rogers]

"but its to create shock and panic to people who DONT die" -- I'll start with this. If that is their goal, they've succeeded with you. Anyone who wants to live in paranoia can go right ahead, the rest of us will accept that the improved quality of life coming with relaxation and logic will be worth it since we're not prepared for that small chance a terrorist attack befalls us.

Natural disasters is a logic thing. The WORST that could happen is we get snowed in, I said. That means there's very little chance of it (and btw, yes. I would eat snow if I had to. Something I've done since I was a toddler, oh noes. [Don't plan to stop 'till it becomes polluted or I become colour blind. :p])

Really, the only thing I'm saying is what you call preperation is overkill; stupid; paranoia--you get the idea. Your life isn't worth so much you need to be ready for every goddamn thing. If you have some reason to beleive that a disaster will befall you soon (like, you live in Florida during certain seasons) then preparation is a good idea, but gas masks, and preparation for carpet bombing? Come on, now...

[buntine]

Ignorance is bliss, people who say they are not SCARED of death; or think there is no need to be prepaired just make my life after something happens that much easier. One less person I have to worry about, as they wont last long.

This is extremely offensive to me and I will ask for an apology on the grounds that you and I do not perceive the reality of neither death nor the threat of a terrorist attack in the same way.

Whether you take it upon yourself to apologise is, of course, your decision.

Regards.

[qzn]

last night i was in the basement during a tornado scare
i did comment that maybe we should bring some candles down here permanently since we seem to be doing this often
thats about as prepared as we will likely get

[HostBreak]

You are talking about a big terrorist like activity in next decade and you are talking about fresh water to be saved. What do you think that if fresh water is saved for this long period will it remain fresh?

[sparq]

No one said duck your head in the sand and wait for things to happen.

Whats the big deal with replacing water? I didn't say put everything in one place and expect it to be ready when you need it. Like batteries, have a limited shelf life -- etc. you obviously have to keep up with some things. I was not trying to imply that everyone needs to run out and dig themselves a hole in the ground and build a concrete bunker for protection, but to simply have supplies available and in convenient places so when they are needed they could be found.

But yes, I do believe within the next decade we will have another MAJOR event. Look at how many car bombs and suicide bombers there are in the middle east, using this to "spread their message" -- and the UK bombers were suicide bombers as well. Just wait till the day that stuff hits the US shores, our feeling of invincability will once again be lost.

[sparq]

I would just for a DAY, like to see what would happen in our society with no power and no running water. Not being able to flush your toilet, not be able to use the internet or cell phone... not being able to keep the food in your fridge cold... so many things that seem unimportant, until you cant do them.

[wamboid]

I would just for a DAY, like to see what would happen in our society with no power and no running water. Not being able to flush your toilet, not be able to use the internet or cell phone... not being able to keep the food in your fridge cold... so many things that seem unimportant, until you cant do them.
We've had several major snow and ice storms here as far south as Missouri, knocking out power for as much as 2 weeks. You would be surprised how resiliant people are when need be. Yes, we tend to be lazy with all our modern conveniences, but I think we would do like always, and find a way to cope.

[David Harrison]

But yes, I do believe within the next decade we will have another MAJOR event. Look at how many car bombs and suicide bombers there are in the middle east, using this to "spread their message" -- and the UK bombers were suicide bombers as well. Just wait till the day that stuff hits the US shores, our feeling of invincability will once again be lost.I live in the UK, and I can quite heartily say that I'm not in the least bit concerned about the london bombings. Is it because I don't live in London? No. I live in Manchester, another biggish city that could easily be another target.

Am I prepared for a huge attack? No. If there was a 5 minute warning that an A-bomb were about to go off near by, would I try to run away? No. I don't know what I'd do, probably sign into MSN, open windows to all my contacts and type "/all lol I'm about to die in the coolest way EVER." Or something.

Understand, not everyone is like you, not everyone prepares and not everyone cares. I don't care.

I would just for a DAY, like to see what would happen in our society with no power and no running water. Not being able to flush your toilet, not be able to use the internet or cell phone... not being able to keep the food in your fridge cold... so many things that seem unimportant, until you cant do them.I'd sleep. All day. And maybe the next.

[Paul Jr]

I'm with Dave on this one. Sure, I could prepare for some natural disasters, but the worst we get here is a bad storm every now and then, and bad ice storms in the winter -- neither of which poses any sort of a major threat. As for some major terrorist attack -- hey, if it's going to be THAT bad, than I guess I'll die and that'll be the end of it. Oh well.

[Mausau2000]

Has anyone heared of nuclear winters????