Category: Family Preparedness

The Basics: Shelter

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Though we all use it daily, shelter is one of the most misunderstood basics of personal preparedness. Let’s take a quick look at essential shelter ideas and how to make sure that we are doing what we need to do.

So Really, What is Shelter?

In the grand scheme, shelter is what protects you from the outside world. At this fundamental level, your skin could even be part of your shelter. Working out from there, obviously you have your clothing, protective gear (gloves, HAZMAT suits, goggles, etc.). Sleeping bags or blankets could also be considered shelter. Next we go to the more traditional thinking on shelter such as tarps, tents, houses, buildings and the like. In extreme circumstances, a shade tree or a snow cave could also be a form of shelter.

There is a common ‘survival’ adage called the Rule of 3’s that goes something like: you can survive 3 seconds in hostile conditions, 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water and 3 weeks without food. That’s a very general statement, but it is easy to remember and helps prioritize your needs. Of course the 3 seconds of hostile conditions assumes VERY hostile conditions such as, perhaps, hot lead screaming in your direction at over 900 feet per second. Regardless, thinking about it in terms of ‘shelter is really important’ we have a starting place from which to explore.

Breaking shelter into three different groups may help:

  • Biological
  • Clothing
  • Structural

Biological Shelter

Your biological shelter is literally the skin you’re in. It is the largest organ on your body and serves to keep ‘you’ separate from ‘not you’. As such, it needs to be in good condition and appropriate condition for your expected activities.

A primary goal in personal preparedness should be making sure that your first line of protection doesn’t get holes in it. Avoid cutting yourself. Cuts can provide an avenue for infection. Take active measures to reduce the likelihood of blisters – which can be extremely painful and, if ruptured, can also be a vector for infection. By this point, other skin penetrations such as being stabbed by a tree branch or knife or other even more violent penetrations of the skin should be seen as something to be avoided as well.

Other, lesser considered issues include chapped hands and lips, over dried out skin or overly saturated skin and sunburn. All of these conditions serve to reduce the protective value of your skin. Take protective action by using lip balm, moisturizing lotion and sun screen. Some may balk at the idea of using lotion. That’s fine. If you are in a prolonged situation where your hands start developing calluses, that is your body forming it own protection and will assist you. Until then, especially if you don’t have excess of experience in the outdoors, lotion will help preserve your skin’s elasticity and moisture in emergency situations. Diet and nutrition also assist in maintaining proper skin health.

Of course the primary way most people take care of their skin is by moving up the scale to the next layer of protection:

Clothing for Shelter

If you take time to think about shelter, it may be obvious that clothing is protection. Most people, however, think of it more as fashion, and expression of individualism, or even a screen for their modesty. Simply stated, in a world of climate-controlled environments, most people have lost touch with the reason that clothing was invented in the first place.

Footwear supports and protects your feet whether you are wearing a hiking boot to take on the local trails or sandals to cross the hot parking lot to throw out your trash. Though I can’t find a lot of practical use for a six-inch, strapless, stiletto-heel shoe, at least it serves as a protective layer from rough or sharp surfaces.

Similarly, pants and skirts, shirts and blouses serve to protect against brush, vines and bushes if you’re in the wild. Heavy working pants protect against rocks if you’re kneeling and the occasional brush against a barbed-wire fence if you’re out running in the field. More modern pants are adapted to our current environments and activities – some even of materials made to wick moisture away from your skin to help in cooling. Shirts are used for the same purpose as pants and loose, thin shirts are often used as protection from the sun.

Hats, gloves, heavy vests, bandanas, etc. all evolved to fulfill their little niche of the protection game. In fact, much of fashion evolved with these items. Gloves of thin material and hats without brims showed that one of significant enough social status that they didn’t need to be protected from the same dangers as those ‘beneath’ their social status. Some truly outrageous shoe designs that would obviously prevent using stirrups on a horse showed that a person was well-off enough that they could afford a carriage – and thus served to elevate themselves above even those well-off enough to be able to afford a horse for riding, but then subject to the dangers thereof.

Regardless of fashion considerations, clothing was almost certainly developed primarily as thermal protection. Initially when humans were exposed to the capriciousness of the wild, they layered on mud and vegetation, then animals skins and finally, textiles. Once they finally moved into caves and structures, the clothing changed to meet the new circumstances. That brings us to the final layer.

Structural Shelter

Finally, this is likely what most people think of if you say the word ‘shelter’. The words are synonymous now as it is likely that the first thing built was likely to provide protection. But the idea carries more with it than just buildings. Where clothing is something worn for protection, structures can be considered a location to go for shelter – even if you carry it with you like a sleeping bag.

Generally speaking there are two types of structure: natural and artificial.

Natural structures such as caves, rock overhangs, and trees provide some level of protection from weather. If caught in the wild, finding such a structure for shelter can literally be a life-saver. This type of structure, however, is usually temporary and most likely will have some deterring factor. Trees may not protect from the wind, rock overhangs may be in the path of rising water, and caves may be treacherous to reach or outside of convenient distance from a water source.

These deficiencies are why artificial structures were created. Light-weight, portable tents can be placed where they are needed and moved relatively easily. Sleeping bags provide thermal isolation to allow the user to stay comfortable through the night and thus awaken more refreshed. These items, however, still leave you somewhat exposed to predators. Thus the sturdy building that can keep out the elements and predators while providing a place to gather and keep safe items of importance has become the gold standard for shelter.

Conclusion

Just because a building is literally the go-to in shelter doesn’t mean we should cast off the other elements. Keep the basics with you: lip balm and a small tube of lotion. Dress appropriate for your environment and the activities you plan (including appropriate safety gear if relevant) – with consideration for what may go wrong. Taking just that little extra bit of precaution may make those unexpected hiccups be just a bit easier to weather and may help you get back to home where you can once again keep the world out.

Alternate Routes

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This is an odd subject not often discussed in the context of preparedness, but it definitely should be an emergency planning tool that carries over into personal preparedness.

So what do I mean alternate routes?

Route Autopilot

Most of us generally go about our lives – especially when moving from one oft-visited location to another – on autopilot.

We pull out of the driveway, turn right, go down three blocks, turn left and so on and on until we get to our work then reverse the pattern to get home. We do the same to get to the grocery store, our favorite theater, the train station, etc. Once we are accustomed to a route, we use it over and over. We’re on autopilot.

An employee, years ago, was part of the digital generation and despite living in a relatively small town, he was dependent on his GPS to get to anywhere in town or out. There was a restaurant he passed every day on his way to and from work. I asked him to meet me there for lunch one day and he asked for the address so he could put it in his GPS. There were three traffic lights between his house and work; the entire trip took less than five minutes and the restaurant was at one of those red lights, and he was still unable to find his way to a place he had passed at least 200 times in a year. He wasn’t just on autopilot, he was on someone else’s autopilot.

One day the data cable running to town – yes, THE cable, there was only one – was cut. Immediately the Internet dropped and since we were in a valley with no line of site out of the valley and the cell towers relied on the fiber line to get to outside world, all cellular data dropped as well.

In seconds we went from a moderately thriving small 21st century town to the 19th century. Gas stations couldn’t sell gas, banks couldn’t make deposits, ATMs couldn’t give cash. My employee couldn’t find his way home. I literally drove to his apartment with him following so he could get home.

His was an extreme example, but I’m sure he was not the only person in the country in a similar situation. As we become more dependent on technology to help us perform mundane tasks, we get rusty at those tasks or never even learn them.

So despite his case being extreme, there are many of us who need to take a refresher in how to navigate, plan routes, and make adjustments without the aid of technology.

Route Planning

Taking a moment to plan a deliberate route from your house to the grocery or work, or where ever, is the first step in renewing this skill.

Did you first discover your autopilot route years ago? Have streets changed, new streets been built, old streets altered? Could there be a more efficient route? Does the route you take avoid the most traffic / take less time / go fewer miles than a new alternative? If you don’t know these answers immediately, take a few minutes to research. You might be surprised. You can even use your technology to help you make good decisions – this is what technology should be used for, assisting in making decisions, not outsourcing the decision-making process.

Once you have your new route, or have validated your old route, broaden your view.

Researching the Alternates

Now that you’re thinking about it, what happens if your primary route is no longer feasible? What if there is a water main break? How about if a construction crew closes down your route? Where do you turn?

It is always good to have a backup route.

For those of us in and around large cities, being able to navigate to important locations using major highways is a given. If you like avoiding the inevitable traffic jam, being familiar with your alternate routes is just as essential.

My commute to work used to take an hour to an hour and a half, each way. There was one bridge that was a major choke point and there were wrecks on that bridge at least once a month and major wrecks causing serious delays a few times a year. I knew two routes to get around that bridge that tacked on about 30 minutes to my commute. If traffic was backed up to a particular exit on the freeway, I exited and took an alternate route. If I heard about the accident or delay before getting on the freeway, I had another alternate.

Know When to Use Alternatives

That brings us to the next question: When do you use the alternate route?

As above, you set parameters for yourself and pay attention to warning signs.

I listened to the radio traffic reports to know if I needed to take my pre-freeway alternate. I continued to listen to the traffic reports on the freeway and made my final go / no-go decision when I approached my exit-based alternate.

You can do the same. Listen to reports, watch for signs of congestion, or signs on delay such as the flashing lights of construction or emergency response vehicles.

Now Go Big

Once you have a little practice at planning and using alternate routes, expand it be part of your emergency planning.

Do you have a fishing retreat? Do you have friend or family member’s house that is far away? How many ways do you know of getting there?

Does your route pass through areas that may be subject to civil unrest? Does it pass through natural choke points that can easily be controlled or disrupted? Can you find an alternate route that would bypass such areas? That would be your secondary. Can you find another that is even less convenient, but that is virtually certain to get you to your destination? That is your tertiary.

Add even more if you can – and then practice the route(s). Communicate the routes to those you’re likely to travel with such as your immediate family or close friends.

These alternate routes can serve their intended purposes, but like with many things in personal readiness and emergency planning, once you start building or renewing these skills, your mind starts exploring options and solutions. You’re rewiring how you think. You’ll start seeing a world of choices and options to explore well beyond the trip to the grocery store.

Strategic Shortage Preparedness

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It looks like we’re heading to a new round of lock-downs across the country. Even in areas where lock downs are unlikely – such as states where they have sworn them off – there may be an impact. Just like when we have a headache, it makes it difficult to do other things, when one area of the country locks down or integrated supply chain makes it a virtual certainty that the impact will be felt nationally – even globally.

Pre-stock

With that in mind, this is a good time to make sure we have our supplies in order. Do you have your canned meats, your veggies, the items you like in your freezer, disinfecting wipes, toilet paper, and all the rest? If you don’t, consider getting what you need now.

There are three main reasons for pre-stocking:

  1. Ensure you have what you like. Even during the depth of the early-COVID shortages there was usually  substitute for what you like. If the store didn’t have your favorite green beans, then probably had – or shortly received – some green beans. But you have your preferences and during times of stress it is nice to have what you like and the products your familiar with.
  2. Maintain your safety. Regardless of whether you believe COVID is as a harmful as is being reported (we won’t be getting into that), by being able to avoid stores jam-packed with people who are desperately seeking what they need you can avoid the hassle and potential of infection.
  3. Allow others to get what they need. If you have what you need, you can not only avoid the need of being in the store, you can help ensure that those who have not stocked or who were unable to stock up can find what they need.

This last point is something that many seem to not only fail to consider, but actively work against. It is an important consideration though. By leaving something behind and not contributing to shortages, you actually help ensure that the supplies you spent your hard-earned resources on last longer.

Many people prepare not only for themselves, but to assist others who are less fortunate in emergency situations. If these people don’t need to deplete the shelves purchasing items during a shortage, then more people will be able to provide for themselves, thus reducing the need for the prepared to provide for others.

Shortage Plan

In this spirit, have a plan for shortages:

  • Prepare before the shortage. Know how long you want to be able to sustain yourself, develop inventory levels and maintain those levels when there is no shortage, then rotate through your stocks in normal times.
  • During a shortage, replace items as they are used, but don’t exceed your inventory levels. Remember not to completely deplete your items before seeking replacements. Since you’ll still have something in your inventory, make sure to leave something on the shelf for those who don’t. Never take the last item – allow your community to take care of itself.
  • Replenish your stocks from alternate sources. If the local stores are having difficulties maintain their shelves, order your restock from online sources, from stores that have higher stock levels, or with bartering with others in your preparedness community. There will be people who will need that last can of beans on the shelf for dinner tonight. Let them provide for themselves by sourcing your supplies away from where others will be gathering their immediate needs.
  • Prior to the shortage, determine what you have set aside for helping others. Ration these supplies so you can help those most in need. Once the shortage has started, do not replenish your donor supplies, especially from local stores as you will effectively be removing these supplies from circulation only to redistribute them.

By following these simple strategies, you can assist yourself, those close to you, and your community at large. Once the shortage resolves, be sure to replenish supplies strategically so you can be prepared in case the shortages return.

How Do I Stock Up?

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Getting Started

I was asked a variant of this question the other day, but it can take on many forms:

  • How do I start getting my pantry ready for uncertain times?
  • What food do I need to get?
  • What should I put aside?

They are all similar questions and the answer boils down to ‘it depends’. So let’s discuss some of the things it depends upon.

Considerations for Stocking Up

As in most things, your two top considerations are time and resources.

It is much easier to stock up if you start well before a period of uncertainty starts. The more time you give yourself, the more options you will have.

For instance, if you can grow a garden and can preserve the rewards of your harvest, you can stock up relatively inexpensively, but it is at a great cost in time.

On the other hand, if you’ve waited until the hard times begin, then you’ve given yourself no time to find good deals or alternative sources for necessary products or food. This will almost certainly mean that anything you can find will be higher priced and you may face an issue of limited to no availability – take the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Even outside of international disasters, the more time you have to prepare the better your options will be. For instance, investing in a savings account – with compounding interest – when you’re young is much better than trying to squirrel away all you can save beginning five years before your retire.

So What do I Need?

It is difficult to tell you specifically what you need. What I can tell you is that you already know and you have a pretty good idea of how much you need.

You know what you and your family like to eat – and what you don’t like. So it would be useless for me to tell you to get 4 (or 400) cans of corn. If your family can’t stand corn that would be more wasteful than buying junk food or candy – because if you followed that advice, you wouldn’t have the resources for what you truly need.

The first step in determining what you need is to look at what you currently use.

If you eat canned corn, get canned corn. If you don’t know how to cook and normally buy frozen dinners, get frozen dinners (then learn to cook and start eating real food). If you need a good starting place, check out the Tools page on this site for exactly that kind of guidance.

Where you may run afoul is with protein. In the modern Western world, we eat a lot of protein – usually in the form of meat. If a meal just isn’t a meal without a chunk of animal on your plate (such as is the case for me), then stocking up on animal protein may be a little outside the norm.

Having meat in store-bought products (such as canned stews or chili) is one way to go about it, as is purchasing canned meat such as SPAM, corned beef, canned chicken and canned fish. Another avenue for those with the skills, or who are willing to learn the skills, is to home can meat. Purchasing meat from the grocer or butcher and taking it home to can means you do not need a freezer.

Where Do I Put it All?

Freezer space brings up another question, where do you store your food? Again, it depends on what you have.

Cool, dark places are best. Even canned food last longer in cool places than in warm or unregulated places.  If you have a basement, that is probably a good place to consider. For those without basements, a dedicated pantry would be nice, but is may already be filled with your daily-use items. So consider under the bed, on closet floors, or in dedicated storage cabinets specifically for your stored food.

Wherever you decide, make sure that it is accessible. You want to ensure that you can get to what you need and you also need to ensure that you can view it for inventory purposes so you know when you need to restock – or so that you don’t forget you already have twenty cans of pickled herrings and don’t need to get any more.

Let’s Look at Your Window

Once you know what you need and where you’re going to put it, and assuming you have time, with what you know and build.

Determine your window so you can determine your stock level. Your window is the amount of time that you want to accommodate. If you’re unsure – and especially if you are on a tight budget – start with a relatively small window – such as one week. That may seem very short, but the most recent study I could find (from 2012) related that approximately 53% of Americans do not have three-days worth of food in their homes. In other countries, where smaller refrigerators and daily trips to the local grocers are more the norm, it is likely even less. So for many people, a full week supply could be considered aspirational. If you already have a week, great for you, choose another time frame such as a month or three months. Build toward that goal as resources allow.

When you go to the grocery, get a little extra. It may be that you get the five-pound bag a shredded cheese and split it into smaller bags that you store in the freezer. Perhaps you get three cans of vegetables rather than just two – then set the extra to the side. Try to find the ‘extra’ items when they are on sale or have coupons so that you have more resources to continue your plans.

The trick is that the ‘extra’ you bought should not be consumed as a part of your regular diet. Remember you decided on a stock level, right? These extras go into stock. If you eat your two cans, go get two more cans (or three, if it supports your stock level) until you have reached your stock level. Then begin rotating.

What’s This with Rotating?

Rotating stock is the best way to make sure your pantry has the best, freshest food available at any given time. When you purchase items for stock, add them to the back of your shelves (/freezer/pantry). Use from the front, but replenish from the back.

When you use something from stock (which means you’ve already used your daily-use items), you replenish to get back to the stock level you determine earlier.

For example, let’s go back to that canned corn. Let’s say you keep two in your pantry have a stock level of six. Since you have two in daily-use, you will have four in storage. You use one from the pantry. You add that one can of corn to the grocery list and replenish. That new can goes to the back of storage and the one on the front of the shelf in storage goes to the back of the shelf in the pantry.

You’ve just successfully rotated your stock.

Is there More to It?

There is always more to it, but that doesn’t it has to be difficult. Food is just one item. What about your hygiene products (toothpaste, shampoo, paper towels, soap and yes, toilet paper)?

Are you on dietary restrictions? If so, make sure that what you are stocking accommodates those restrictions.

Do you take prescription medications? Try to find a way to develop a safe supply that you can fall back on if needed – always rotate prescriptions to ensure are taking the freshest possible medications.

Do you have fuel stored? I once lived in a small town where the single long-distance internet cable coming into town was damaged. Gas stations no longer had the ability to take payments and had to shut down. Having an extra 5 gallon can in the storage shed in the backyard, or making sure you never drop below a half tank (which is a variation on the stock level / rotation strategy) can make sure you’re able to get to work, or gat out of town if needed.

Wrapping it Up

In the end, it is more important to do something than nothing, as long as that ‘something’ is not a waste of resources (remembering that time is a resource). So whatever you choose to do is a good first step. Just keep taking those steps and you’ll soon find yourself well down the path to preparedness.

Where is Your S.A.F.E place?

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Today we’re making the leap from planning to preparedness.  Buckle in.  I’ll try to make this as pain-free as possible.

Start Where You Area

One of the easiest ways to prepare is to start where you are – literally – and determine where to go from there. This method is great for those who are trying to prepare their family and may be facing some reluctance.

Even without knowing what situation you will face – and we will discuss how to plan for specific situations elsewhere – you can begin some basic planning.

Talk to whoever you live with and just decide on a meeting place if something happens. If you don’t live with anyone, talk to friends or family members or neighbors about how to contact one another if an emergency situation arises.  Make a suggestion – something like, “Hey, if we have a fire or something and have to get out of the house, let’s meet out by the mailbox.”

We were taught this behavior from childhood when we had fire drills at school.  We all had an assigned space to go to so the teachers could get a head count.  In most workplaces this behavior has carried over. There is nothing wrong with carrying this through to a behavior in the house.

Step Forward

Now you can progressively increase the distance away from the house.  You might even be able to fit it in with the conversation about your house meeting spot.

“Hey, if we have a fire or something and have to leave the house, let’s meet up by the mailbox.  If it is a big situation, and we can’t get to the house, let’s meet at Mikey D’s around the corner.  While we’re at it, if it is something like a gas leak where we can’t even get that close, let’s meet the gazebo in the town square.  I don’t think we’ll ever need to do it, but at least we’ll be able to find one another if we do.”

Of course cell phones and other forms of communication may be up and working but this very primitive method of establishing a gathering point should not be neglected just in case our modern conveniences are not working.  It will be at a time like this, more than ever, that we’ll need the comfort of knowing where our loved ones are.

A S.A.F.E. Place

Make the meet point be a SAFE place.

This is an acronym for Specific, Accessible, Far enough, and Effective.

Make it Specific.  Notice we’re getting together at Mc Donald’s not just ‘around the corner’.  “Around the corner” is too general and we might not find one another.

Make it Accessible.  If you choose a building, or even a restaurant, make it one that is open 24/7/365.  You don’t want to say to meet up on the observation deck of the Empire State Building.  The lines are long at the best of times and it could take hours to get there – plus you have to pay to get in and there are times during the year or at night when it is closed and simply not accessible.  Much better to meet on the street outside the Empire State Building.

Make the place Far Enough away from the suspected source of danger.  If you have a mailbox on the side of your house rather than on the road, you probably don’t want to meet at the mail box.  You’ll probably want to get together where your driveway meets the road or across the parking lot at the Dumpster if you live in apartments.  If you think there may be a gas leak in your neighborhood you don’t want to try to gather at the neighbor’s house…it probably won’t be far enough away.  But only you can decided specifically where to meet.  Just make sure it fits with your suspected need.

Finally, make it Evident.  Some people may disagree with this and even I disagree with it in certain circumstances.  In general though, if you are just faced with a normal inconvenience, make it in an evident place.  Make it so that you can see one another, even from a distance.  You don’t want to meet up crouched behind some bushes or in the Dumpster, you want to be able to see that your loved one is safe from a distance and you want them to be able to see you approaching.  This greatly increases morale and enhances the likelihood that you’ll actually find one another.

As an aside – if we go in to a End of the World as We Know it / Without Rule of Law situation, I would invert that “evident” element and make sure that you cannot be seen unless someone is specifically looking for you…so the specific element of the SAFE acronym will become even more important.

Also, make sure that the area makes sense for your needs.  The Empire State Building, corner of E 33rd and 5th would be an excellent place to gather – just not for me.  I live over 2,000 miles away.  It would be totally impractical for me to set this as a meet point.  Unless you live on Manhattan Island, the south side specifically, it would probably be impractical for you too.

Move Forward

So this is it!  You’re on your way to implementing a plan…and if you have reluctant participants you have started the process in a very non-confrontational manner.  Now you can start building upon this foundation.

So, now that we know where to meet, what should we bring to the meeting?

Of that stuff, what do we need to know how to use if we don’t already know how to use it?

Where do we go once we’ve met up?

What will we need for that?

See, all these questions build upon one another and again, it is done in a non-confrontational manner in order to ease others along as painlessly as possible.

All these other questions, and even how to open frank discussions with others about preparedness, will be covered in future discussions.

Until then, I’ll let you get back to your day.  Thanks for joining me.