Dear Preppers and Survivalists,
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photograph by
William Strode, E.P.A.
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The Past
Our ancestors dealt with similar events, just like us. They faced economic collapse, natural disasters, and having to quickly evacuate their homes and places of business.
Just like us, they used the available resources and technology to protect their families.
Vests
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source
United States Air Force
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When folks talk about a 'survival' vest, they immediately think of a pilot's multi-pocket survival vest bulging with survival equipment.
Well, ... What about a Cowboy's vest at the turn of the last century.
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photograph by
Twice25
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The two or four pocket vest would hold the immediate needs for survival, such as fire making material (striker and flint with char cloth). Plus, the vest would keep the body's core warm.
For the modern person, a four pocket vest could hold ...
* Matches in a ziplock baggie
* large heavy-duty plastic bags
* pencil with bright post-it notes
* a small snack
The matches, butane lighter, firesteel (ferro rod), 9-volt battery with fine steel wool, flint and steel with char cloth, Light My Fire, magnifying glass, water bottle, paperclip with an AA battery, reading glasses, aluminum soda can, sticks and a limpet shell, and many others would be used to provide a fire for warmth, during an event.
The large, 55-gallon size plastic trash bags (I like the 'contractor' garbage bags) would be used to make an improvised rain poncho or tarp to provide shelter, in an emergency.
Lastly, the pencil (really a writing utensil such a marker, crayon, ink pen, pencil, or ) and paper are used to leave notes for potential rescuers. These notes provide the essentials, like who, what, where, when, and why.
An example:
Katniss and I are walking the west trail out at Flintstone park, for fun. We should be back by noon, today.
Needless to say, you and your family leave the note in an easily seen place, before you leave.
Many Options
As you can see, these past few weeks, there are many options for carrying your emergency evacuation equipment.
With that said, I would like to change the subject to ...
Caches
Caches are, basically, supplies and equipment that are stored away from your home. These supplies could be at a relative's home, in a storage locker, or other offsite location away from your home.
High Speed
There is a manual floating around the internet. It is titled TC 31-29/A: Special Forces Caching Techniques. This manual, supposedly, was written to teach Special Forces soldiers how to cache supplies for unconventional warfare.
In my opinion, it is a good manual for you and your family to read and heed.
But, ... The manual, if it is authentic, was written for a well funded and highly trained military organization.
With that said, ...
Family and Friends
You and your family probably aren't going to need a super secret cache to survive an event, but you are going to need a cache of clothes, cash, and other necessities at a friends or relatives home, just in case. Remember, your emergency evacuation kit is only designed to get you and your family away from trouble for 72-hours.
The items could be stored in a plastic tote from the local big box home improvement store.
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Plastic Tote Cache
stored in a relative’s basement
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Of course, your family's relative's don't need a basement to store your cache. The cache could be stored in a garage, outbuilding, or other secure place.
Kind'a High Speed
Some of y'all have heard about using PVC pipe as a cache. The PVC pipe with two end caps are buried providing secure storage for small critical items. Notice, I said small.
For the same price as a large storage tote, you would purchase a length of 4-inch PVC pipe with several end caps and glue with primer. The long pipe is cut down, with a hacksaw, to smaller lengths then one end is sealed with an end cap, by following the directions on the can of glue.
Of course, you have to make some decisions.
First, do you and your family want to recover the whole pipe or just the contents. If you just want to recover the contents, you can glue a threaded end cap to the pipe to allow the cache contents to be easily removed.
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Buried Cache with Threaded End Cap
and contents in mesh bags for easy removal
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If you want to recover the whole pipe with the contents, you will glue the other end with a regular end cap. Of course, you are probably going to need to bury the pipe on it's side or use a very short length of pipe.
Second, you have to decide what are the critical items that you're going to store, forever, in the cache.
I say 'forever' for a reason. The more often you visit the cache, the greater the chance of the cache being discovered by other folks. Plus, you might die, unexpectedly, and no one will know where it is, so the cache's contents are lost to history.
O.K. Back to the ...
Contents
A small (2 inch) PVC pipe cache could hold a few silver and gold coins while a larger 4-inch PVC pipe cache could hold a .22 LR bolt-action rifle and 100 rounds of ammunition. Larger PVC pipe is available, I have personally seen 30-inch pipe, but it cost prohibitive for most families.
The largest, economical, PVC pipe that I have seen is 8-inch with the caps running about $50 each. Ouch.
With that said, an 8-inch pipe could hold a few weeks worth of basic food (white rice and dried beans)
Needless to say, like the emergency evacuation kit, the contents of your family's cache is up to you and your family.
One More
If you're lucky, there is a place that sells open head plastic 55-gallon drums or plastic septic tanks. These drum could be buried for a cache, a very large cache.
Link:
Off the Grid News - 15 Things Cowboys Carried With Them In The Wild West To Survive
http://www.offthegridnews.com/extreme-survival/15-things-cowboys-carried-with-them-in-the-wild-west-to-survive/
Histroy.com - Cowboys
http://www.history.com/topics/cowboys
Cowboy Showcase - Cowboy Personal Gear
http://www.cowboyshowcase.com/personal-gear.html
Archives - TC 31-29/A: Special Forces Caching Techniques
https://archive.org/details/milmanual-tc-31-29-special-forces---caching-techniques
YouTube: Prepared Suburbanite - My Survival Cache: Lessons Learned
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-lAqm0X8m8
YouTube: Sourthen Prepper One - Scenario: A large cache made from a large oil drum.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rO2biIvvRgM
YouTube: Sourthen Prepper One - A 500 gallon septic tank for a cache or small underground shelter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZEbOyrtBqQ
YouTube: thehossusmc - Checking A Survival Cache
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLhrojG6lXM
XDM50 - Retrieving My Buried Survival Cache--IT'S GONE!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8OLelq8kGI
YouTube: Jezzaoutdoors - 'Experimental' survival cache Three years in the ground
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cD3kv3GsezQ
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