Jump to content

prepared for the worst


chesters1

prepared or not?  

28 members have voted

  1. 1. alternate heating? IE not dependant on utilities

    • yes
      17
    • no
      8
    • for an extended period ,over a week for instance
      11
  2. 2. alternate lighting IE not dependant on utilities

    • yes
      16
    • no
      10
    • for an extended period ,over a week for instance
      8
  3. 3. alternative cooking IE not dependant on utilities

    • yes
      21
    • no
      5
    • for an extended period ,over a week for instance
      8


Recommended Posts

I thought about this thread too, but as it emerged while we were still engaged with a real life emergency I only had time and the facilities to skim read it.

 

While some of the suggestions may have some validity in certain emergency situations, perhaps power cut offs, but many of them sound more like wishful adventure fantasies when applied to severe flooding, the like of which we experienced in November.

 

For example, my mother’s house, ok it’s on a riverbank, and so one could anticipate that it could flood, it hadn’t for the last 71 years, and then it was nowhere near the extent of this latest one. So fruitless spending ones life worrying too much about it, and if it was going to come, which it did then there is nothing to be done to stop it.

 

She could have followed the type of advice given here, moved to one of her upstairs floors (it’s a 3 storey building), set up all that battery powered lighting, gas fires, emergency rations, but to what purpose? Those living in that area had up to 9 ft of water in their ground floor, (mother had just over 6ft we measured it from the ‘tide line’ once the water subsided). To sit upstairs, in lots of cases alone, cooking and brewing up on a camping cooker, cut off from the outside world, unable to communicate once the mobile batteries ran flat, unable to escape from the place, by means other than helicopter, or put the RNLI crews at risk by having to work so close to such a rapid torrent (the Cocker is the fastest river in England) . The emergency services don’t want people staying in their homes in those conditions, they want to account for everyone, amateur survivalists and the potential trouble they are likely to get themselves into are liable to become nuisances. Some who lived in single storey buildings had to break through the roof or drown, no amount of camping gas or sleeping bags would have been any use to them.

 

Tents, caravans and open fires may be ok in other types of emergency, although I’m unsure of what profit there would be in moving out of the house into the former just because the electric and gas were cut off? The notion of all the flooded out people heading off into the dark in torrential rain and setting up a tent in a quagmire is ridiculous.

 

The grown up, responsible and realistic course of action is to grab what cash/valuables one can, move what can’t be carried out to up above the water line and walk out. Go to stay with a relative or friend, if you don’t have either of those, head for high ground and book into a hotel. The modern survival kit is to have an insurance policy, both property and contents in place, (with local authority/council housing tenants may not need the former and enjoy the security of that authorities responsibility to house them, a double edged situation, the advantage of security yet the downside of reliance upon others) and enough prudently placed resources (some money in an emergency account) to pay for the temp accommodation until the insurance cough up. Making sure your insurers are good ones is a wiser move than stashing a load of boy scout stuff in the attic.

"Some people hear their inner voices with such clarity that they live by what they hear, such people go crazy, but they become legends"
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 70
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

In January 1940, the country was gripped by an Arctic freeze, when freezing rain fell for 2 days over southern Britain. Roads turned into ice rinks, and many places sounded like a battlefield with the explosion of splitting trees, timber and cables.

 

Pheasants and rabbits were frozen in ice and could be caught by hand, birds were stuck to branches and even brought down in mid-flight by ice on their wings. Traffic was brought to a standstill and some drivers were trapped in their cars by frozen doors and windows. But reports of the ice storm were censored to prevent the enemy getting any useful information about the disaster. Only after the end of the war was the scale of the icestorm revealed

 

Even in Britain, we have weather that can paralise transport and render large scale relocation impossible but it doesn't even take that, all it takes is industrial action by energy workers.

Species caught in 2020: Barbel. European Eel. Bleak. Perch. Pike.

Species caught in 2019: Pike. Bream. Tench. Chub. Common Carp. European Eel. Barbel. Bleak. Dace.

Species caught in 2018: Perch. Bream. Rainbow Trout. Brown Trout. Chub. Roach. Carp. European Eel.

Species caught in 2017: Siamese carp. Striped catfish. Rohu. Mekong catfish. Amazon red tail catfish. Arapaima. Black Minnow Shark. Perch. Chub. Brown Trout. Pike. Bream. Roach. Rudd. Bleak. Common Carp.

Species caught in 2016: Siamese carp. Jullien's golden carp. Striped catfish. Mekong catfish. Amazon red tail catfish. Arapaima. Alligator gar. Rohu. Black Minnow Shark. Roach, Bream, Perch, Ballan Wrasse. Rudd. Common Carp. Pike. Zander. Chub. Bleak.

Species caught in 2015: Brown Trout. Roach. Bream. Terrapin. Eel. Barbel. Pike. Chub.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A house on the edge of our village was without electric for about a week recently, so my mate lent them his generator, which kept everything going pretty well.

Anglers' Net Shopping Partners - Please Support Your Forum

CLICK HERE for all your Amazon purchases - books, photography equipment, DVD's and more!

CLICK HERE for Go Outdoors. HUGE discounts!

 

FOLLOW ANGLERS' NET ON TWITTER- CLICK HERE - @anglersnet

PLEASE 'LIKE' US ON FACEBOOK - CLICK HERE

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Tents, caravans and open fires may be ok in other types of emergency, although I'm unsure of what profit there would be in moving out of the house into the former just because the electric and gas were cut off?

 

Nobody suggested that - why have you this desire to belittle some very sensible suggestions that others have made ?

 

This thread was started in the context of cold weather and utility failures, with possible distribution difficulties/disruption with food. The suggestions of most posters address this.

 

Stay in the house, burn coal (if you have it) or logs on the open fires some of us had the wisdom to retain when the central heating went in. Use candles for lighting and wind-up torches when short-term full light is required.

 

(If you have no open fires then my advice would be to install a wood-burning Rayburn or something similar as soon as possible - problems with utilities are not going to go away soon.)

 

Use the caravan just for cooking with the propane gas when it rains or is cold, use the outside wood/charcoal fired barbie when the weather allows.

 

If you have hunting and fishing skills and there is fish, flesh or fowl within walking distance, be prepared to go out and catch/trap/shoot some to augment rations.

 

As for all this being irrelevant in the case of flooding - all I can say is that nothing would induce me to live on a flood-plain in the first place, nor near a river subject to flash floods. Born in Norfolk in an area where there is an ever-present risk of the sea breaking in, and having travelled back there to assist during the storm surge of the early fifties, I saw enough to choose a house 700 ft above sea level and on the side of a sandstone ridge.

 

I'm sorry for those that get flooded, and sorrier still to see that government is still prepared to build houses in areas of flood risk.

Edited by Vagabond

 

 

RNLI Governor

 

World species 471 : UK species 105 : English species 95 .

Certhia's world species - 215

Eclectic "husband and wife combined" world species 501

 

"Nothing matters very much, few things matter at all" - Plato

...only things like fresh bait and cold beer...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

both versions are available

http://www.fireplacemegastore.co.uk/gas-wa...gas-wall-heater

 

certainly worth thinking about if you have the funds, would be nice in your shed or bivvy as well :D

why one or the other? seems silly (to me anyway) to have only one choice .my scenario would be to run it of natural with a switch that lets it run lpg if needed ,perhaps my logic is tainted?

Edited by chesters1

Believe NOTHING anyones says or writes unless you witness it yourself and even then your eyes can deceive you

None of this "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" crap it just means i have at least two enemies!

 

There is only one opinion i listen to ,its mine and its ALWAYS right even when its wrong

 

Its far easier to curse the darkness than light one candle

 

Mathew 4:19

Grangers law : anything i say will  turn out the opposite or not happen at all!

Life insurance? you wont enjoy a penny!

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical." Thomas Jefferson

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In January 1940, the country was gripped by an Arctic freeze, when freezing rain fell for 2 days over southern Britain. Roads turned into ice rinks, and many places sounded like a battlefield with the explosion of splitting trees, timber and cables.

 

Pheasants and rabbits were frozen in ice and could be caught by hand, birds were stuck to branches and even brought down in mid-flight by ice on their wings. Traffic was brought to a standstill and some drivers were trapped in their cars by frozen doors and windows. But reports of the ice storm were censored to prevent the enemy getting any useful information about the disaster. Only after the end of the war was the scale of the icestorm revealed

 

Yes Ken, I can just about remember that (I was 6 at the time)

 

Much more vividly I remember the winter of 1947.

 

Then, as now, we were suffering a cash crisis (due to six years of war in 1947).

 

Then , as now, we were suffering from a Labour government with its spendthrift ways and control freakery.

 

Strachey, Minister for food, kept rationing going for SEVEN YEARS after the war (sugar came off ration in 1952)

Shinwell, Minister for fuel and power, anxious to appease his mates in the National Union of Mineworkers, had not stockpiled coal for the winter (stockpiling coal was seen as a defensive weapon against miner's strikes)

Stafford Cripps had imposed swingeing taxes.

Attlee, Prime Minister, was about as much use as Gordon Brown is today.

 

All set for the bitterest winter of the 20th century - food rationing, coal shortages, power cuts, etc etc.

 

The only people to emerge with credit were the railways (and their reward was to get nationalised on Jan 1st 1948) who kept disruption to a minimum (I can only remember one day when the railway did not get me to school)

 

This lot is not over yet, but it is following the 1947 pattern so far.

 

 

RNLI Governor

 

World species 471 : UK species 105 : English species 95 .

Certhia's world species - 215

Eclectic "husband and wife combined" world species 501

 

"Nothing matters very much, few things matter at all" - Plato

...only things like fresh bait and cold beer...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Emma has a point in this perfect world she lives in but i for one would have no problem living upstairs if needed ,things have come on since Baden powell dibbed doubly! my original point in the flood thread was there was no need to move out if you had an upstairs and certainly with forethought to hardly notice you were .if ofcourse you didnt have an upstairs then further effort would be needed ofcourse and why "cut off" you can charge phones many ways you dont need a socket to plug into nor be any different to living normaly anywhere the only difference is your living ten feet higher than usual :rolleyes: if i were unfortunate to be flooded i would simply camp in the garden or probably move indoors after the muds been removed ,having lived in a semi flooded bunker for 3 weeks the pong of damp ,foul water and a few drowned rats is still better than shacking up with (imposing on) friends IMHO

your camping fridge is just as efficient as your real one although i agree smaller ,heaters running from gas are many for camping and just as powerfull as domestic ones albeit cruder.#

lighting well make your choice its endless as you know.Camping (in tents or in your bedroom) isnt what it was when we go we take all the modern comforts and modern caravans and motorhome probably better fitted out than the one in your house ,blown heating is a joy theres no huddling around a tiny solid fuel stove like when we lived in a caravan for 4 years :D

in many peoples lives outside of the nice world Emma lives in some people dont have insurance (i certainly do not ,weve lost everything more than once its only "stuff" the last time in 2001) ,some cannot knock on friends houses and inconvenience them (no friends luckily to impose on but i wouldn't if i did) as for booking into a hotel its laughable living on the Mr's benefits we couldn't afford blooming B&B without scrimping on something for a month in advance. biggrin.gif

some people have no choice in pre dilemma situations just as some have none after .

my post was about simply not having to depend on others like the emergency services who then can get to helping those that cannot look after themselves.

why the need in some dashing out (in the case of the snow we have now) endangering others getting food or heat etc when for a little thought being prepared lets you get on without the need to impose on anyone if it all went bad.

as i said being a camper helps and gives an advantage being an angler also but you can have a backup with little outlay if your canny.

i'l agree this snow isnt as bad as a flood but it still has its effects, but its perfectly easy to live for some time without bothering other people because you didnt make an effort to look after your self.if my post has opened just one reader that perhaps they should think about where they would be in times of bad weather then i'm happy! if they didnt i expect just as many unable to get very far because of the snow like us are wishing perhaps they had.

were lucky theres no power cuts so food isnt a problem in the freezers like there would be in a flood but if you had the money generators could even make bedroom campers lives almost normal ,we dont have one they are frowned on camping nor do we have the money to have one doing nothing "just in case" but i have worked around the problem in other ways.

we sit here with forethought thinking snow what snow ? its not a problem to us in our lives at the moment ,in a month of it perhaps we will get worried if the electric went we would miss the telly after the batteries ran out but still could survive adequately as "campers"

in an emergency ofcourse we would be buggerd and have to call out the emergency services hence my thinking a pair of snow chains could lessen that eventuality in the future if the mrs was suddenly ill wink.gif

as for camping in a quagmire i can assure you in many years its called a normal camping holiday and you pay dearly to do it :D

Edited by chesters1

Believe NOTHING anyones says or writes unless you witness it yourself and even then your eyes can deceive you

None of this "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" crap it just means i have at least two enemies!

 

There is only one opinion i listen to ,its mine and its ALWAYS right even when its wrong

 

Its far easier to curse the darkness than light one candle

 

Mathew 4:19

Grangers law : anything i say will  turn out the opposite or not happen at all!

Life insurance? you wont enjoy a penny!

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical." Thomas Jefferson

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes Ken, I can just about remember that (I was 6 at the time)

 

Much more vividly I remember the winter of 1947.

 

Then, as now, we were suffering a cash crisis (due to six years of war in 1947).

 

Then , as now, we were suffering from a Labour government with its spendthrift ways and control freakery.

 

Strachey, Minister for food, kept rationing going for SEVEN YEARS after the war (sugar came off ration in 1952)

Shinwell, Minister for fuel and power, anxious to appease his mates in the National Union of Mineworkers, had not stockpiled coal for the winter (stockpiling coal was seen as a defensive weapon against miner's strikes)

Stafford Cripps had imposed swingeing taxes.

Attlee, Prime Minister, was about as much use as Gordon Brown is today.

 

All set for the bitterest winter of the 20th century - food rationing, coal shortages, power cuts, etc etc.

 

The only people to emerge with credit were the railways (and their reward was to get nationalised on Jan 1st 1948) who kept disruption to a minimum (I can only remember one day when the railway did not get me to school)

 

This lot is not over yet, but it is following the 1947 pattern so far.

My dad was talking of the the 1947 freeze last night , the coldest in his lifetime he reckons he,s 83, all the mills in our town were shut down so many of the out of work people were employed for snow shifting for six weeks everyone chipped in with butties brews and cakes the streets were clear including the pavements PS he said the 1963 was nowt compared to that

Number me with Rage it,s a shame Number me in Haste its a shame

Link to comment
Share on other sites

bugger i'v just thought of another facility unavailable in hard times my hub couldnt work with no electric (the phone rarely goes off unless the lines are down) hmmmm on inspection its a 12v psu so the hub could work on battery and my PDA could still get AN albeit crudely :thumbs:

 

so thinking about it with forethought pretty much anything is possible even logging onto here ranting about the weather those with a modern phone ofcourse have the facility but theres no signal around here to let them

Edited by chesters1

Believe NOTHING anyones says or writes unless you witness it yourself and even then your eyes can deceive you

None of this "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" crap it just means i have at least two enemies!

 

There is only one opinion i listen to ,its mine and its ALWAYS right even when its wrong

 

Its far easier to curse the darkness than light one candle

 

Mathew 4:19

Grangers law : anything i say will  turn out the opposite or not happen at all!

Life insurance? you wont enjoy a penny!

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical." Thomas Jefferson

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nobody suggested that - why have you this desire to belittle some very sensible suggestions that others have made ?

 

This thread was started in the context of cold weather and utility failures, with possible distribution difficulties/disruption with food. The suggestions of most posters address this.

 

Stay in the house, burn coal (if you have it) or logs on the open fires some of us had the wisdom to retain when the central heating went in. Use candles for lighting and wind-up torches when short-term full light is required.

 

(If you have no open fires then my advice would be to install a wood-burning Rayburn or something similar as soon as possible - problems with utilities are not going to go away soon.)

 

Use the caravan just for cooking with the propane gas when it rains or is cold, use the outside wood/charcoal fired barbie when the weather allows.

 

If you have hunting and fishing skills and there is fish, flesh or fowl within walking distance, be prepared to go out and catch/trap/shoot some to augment rations.

 

As for all this being irrelevant in the case of flooding - all I can say is that nothing would induce me to live on a flood-plain in the first place, nor near a river subject to flash floods. Born in Norfolk in an area where there is an ever-present risk of the sea breaking in, and having travelled back there to assist during the storm surge of the early fifties, I saw enough to choose a house 700 ft above sea level and on the side of a sandstone ridge.

 

I'm sorry for those that get flooded, and sorrier still to see that government is still prepared to build houses in areas of flood risk.

 

 

The thread was started in November when our flooding occurred. It may have nothing to do with that event and would have been started anyway. If so fair enough as it has the potential for an interesting discussion, and maybe some even back then anticipated the significantly severe weather which we are experiencing now?

Some of the suggested solutions to coping with having ones electric/gas/water ceased are sensible if common sense ones and have not been ‘belittled’ at all.

What does stretch things is this moving into a tent business, what circumstances would come about to make life better by evacuating a building to do that? Fire and flood (that again) spring to mind as the most obvious, in the former one would have course have to have rescued all the necessary camping stores and rations, ditto with the latter, but more importantly, why? Incidents like this happen to people who are old and infirm, new born, blind, bedridden with terminal illness, mentally ill, heavily pregnant as well as those who are or who imagine that they are capable undertaking such rigours. A whole cross section of society. Camping in a flooded, and by definition contaminated building also raises a 'why?' It would be easy to fill the page with real life examples to render the notion dangerously irresponsible.

 

Chesters expended considerable time in here ensuring that we know the motives for his independence and self sufficiency, and his scathingly dim view of those who ill prepare themselves for all that life may throw at them (its perfectly easy to live for some time without bothering other people because you didnt make an effort to look after your self). However it’s difficult to extend credibility towards one who expresses these views yet occupies accommodation provided by the community, lives off benefits (‘living on the Mr's benefits we couldn't afford blooming B&B’ ) and who feels that a television, computer, private vehicle and a whole heap of camping gadgets are more important than having insurance.(outside of the nice world Emma lives in some people dont have insurance i certainly do not), or to have the prudence to keep a reserve of money for a rainy day to properly look after oneself and ones family for even a short emergency period. Far from being independent he is what neo-conservatives like Murray et al call, call the 'feckless'.

Edited by Emma two
"Some people hear their inner voices with such clarity that they live by what they hear, such people go crazy, but they become legends"
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We and our partners use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences, repeat visits and to show you personalised advertisements. By clicking “I Agree”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. However, you may visit Cookie Settings to provide a controlled consent.