While reading a Blog article on alt-market.com I came across some of the things i had talked about in my Barter Section, and others I had not thought of.
While the article goes off into the hinterlands of the tinfoil hat on some subjects in my opinion, there was also some great “oh yeah’s” in there as well.
Before I go on lets briefly go over the tinfoil hat comment i made and why i made it.
Mostly I was addressing the NBC and Gas mask items.
Now I know that as preppers we are prepared for any event, and I have often said this, Prepare for any disaster and you will be prepared for all.
I dont have a problem with anyone getting gas masks, decontamination kits, nbc alert systems, etc. If you feel you want to, go ahead an do it, but in my opinion on the list of “must haves” these are pretty low. Yes Fukushima taught us a lesson, but for me that lesson was community trumps all, the Japanese people banded together, made sacrifices and have survived and thrived after it. But folks, if you have had any training in Nuclear, Biological and Chemical disasters and the warfare associated with it, having a suit and mask isnt going to do it. If some rogue terrorist or worse “totalitarian government” decided to spray a chemical agent over you section of town or city, everything you own is going to be contaminated and useless, now you have a great suit and no preps. Many BIO-agents have no smell and no dark cloud to signal its approach, its there and without sophisticated equipment you wont know its there. Blood agents are the worst (such as the famous VX in the movie “The Rock”) and kill nearly instantly with no precursor. Radiological agents are pervasive and will infect everything you own as well. In short unless you live within a hundred miles or less of a reactor this is not anything you should worry about.
If you dont have your food preps handled, I would say farther along than 2 years per person, dont worry about this stuff! This is the, I have a retreat bought and paid for, cisterns built, large permaculture gardens finished and years of food preps put away, and now i want to buy the just in case stuff type of purchases.
Ok….now onto the good stuff
1) Extra First Aid Supplies. I talked about this in my Medical section, but you need to have extra First aid supplies in the forms of Gauze, anti-biotics, ointments and other essentials, past the what i need for my family amounts. With one severe injury from a axe when your cutting wood you could go through two or three first aid kits supplies of gauze and like materials. Stock up!
2) Solar Panels. Now this isnt a “Forgotten item” but many preppers look at it as a…when i get my retreat ill buy them….type of purchase. Dont do that! They are not a money saver even over the 30 year mark, however they are renewable for decades and a great purchase to have if you find youreself in a situation like India is right now where half the country is out of power! At least get a small battery backup and solar panel kit to recharge batteries and other devices.
3) Raw Building Materials. This was one that i really went “Oh yeah!”. So now the world as we know it has ended and you want to build that greenhouse youve always needed or a root cellar to store your food…but the Lowes is long gone..now what? Well having a good amount of stored nails, lumber, screws even iron and steel could make the difference between dreams and reality, and some cases life and death. Making homemade lumber is almost a lost art and tedious process even in the days when it was the norm, and most likely you dont have the tools for that as well. Look at having extra saw blades, large two man tree saws (like you see in old timey photos), bags of concrete, sealants or even extra material to make new window screens or repair them.
4) Extra “survival” clothing. If you live in the North like we do, then clothing is very important, having extra thermal layers, wool clothing and winter boots are a must. You cant expect your clothes to last you 10 years or a pair of boots lasting 5 in the “new world”, since the last pair you had probably didnt get the amount of work then as it would in that future. Stock up on all those things!
That being said there are a hundred other things, but I hope that this was a good primer for your brain to start thinking of those items that you need everyday and may have forgotten about in your preps!
