Degrees of preparedness- Level 1

I'd like to take a couple minutes to talk about the varying levels or degrees of preparedness, and what supplies would be good to keep on hand for each level.

When I say degrees, what I mean is that most folks out there do not have a huge underground bunker set up with ten years' worth of shelf stable foods, water and the arsenal needed to protect it.  Nor do most people even want a survival set-up like that.

Most folks recognize the need to be prepared for short-term situations, such as power outages caused by storms, and are interested in prepping for them to make life for their family easier.  They do not believe in, or care about planning for an end of the world scenario.

Also, a lot of people just do not have the room in their homes to stockpile much in the way of supplies necessary for long-term survival.



How can we break this issue down into bite-sized chunks that we can process and understand?

I believe we can do it by classifying survival scenarios into three distinct groups, based on the length of event, and outfit ourselves appropriately for each group.  Based on the list of supplies needed for each level, you will be able to tell whether you have the storage space necessary in your home for the supplies you will need.  Make sense to you?

For our first degree of preparedness (let's just call it Level One) you will be stocking provisions necessary to get your family through a power outage lasting seven days without any outside assistance.  We are talking about making it through a seven day time period where it is not necessary to leave the house for any other supplies, and we are assuming that you will be making all your meals at home.  Let's also assume that your city water service goes out too.  If you have a well on your property, you're still out of luck because the pump needs electricity to run.

What should you have on hand to get through a common scenario like this?

Water is your first big issue.  Everyone knows that you must have at least one gallon per person, per day to drink.  But you must also have additional water available to wash up a bit, shave, flush the toilet, or do an emergency load of clothes by hand, if this power outage happened the day before wash day.

You could probably get by on a total of five gallons of water a day, per person, but more would be better.  This amounts to a minimum of 140 gallons of water to get a family of four through the week.  That sounds like a lot, doesn't it?

I think the easy way to deal with this is to stock ten cases of bottled water for drinking purposes (for a family of four).  A 24 bottle case of 16 ounce bottles equals 3 gallons of water.  Ten cases will give you 30 gallons of water to drink over the course of the week.  A family of four should have a minimum of 28 gallons stored to make it through a week.  This will give you a few extra bottles in case you have visitors.  Your bottled water should be rotated through your normal drinking routine so it stays fresh.  Ten cases of water takes up some space to store, but you could slide most of them underneath your bed to save space.  Get creative, you'll figure it out.....

That still leaves us with 110 gallons of water to account for......how do we handle that?  One easy way to accumulate and store non-potable water in a warmer climate (or for non-winter storage in a northern climate) is to set up a couple rain barrels outside of your home.  Here is a good video that details this set up.  This could account for 50 to 75 gallons of your total non-potable water storage, just by setting up two or three barrels around your home.  The rest can be stored in 5 gallon jugs in your garage or basement.  The camping section at a Wal-Mart will have these water containers in stock.

5/6 gallon water jug

For those of you who live in areas where winters are harsh, interior storage is the only answer.  Plastic 55 gallon drums stored in a basement or non-freezing garage can be a solution when equipped with a manual siphon pump.

15, 30 & 55 gallon poly drums

Siphon pump

If you don't have room for a big drum, 15 and 30 gallon sizes are also available.  These ideas pretty much handle all your drinking and non-potable water needs.  Now on to food........

I cannot and will not attempt to make meal plans for your family, because I don't know what foods you like and what you don't.  But I can give you some general guidelines to go by:

• Try to store foods that you normally eat, so you can rotate your supplies through your weekly meals to ensure that everything stays fresh.
• Dried beans and white rice have long shelf lives and can be used together to create a lot of different dishes if you are inventive.
• Try to incorporate some canned meats into your regular meals.  Chicken, tuna and pork (Spam!) are all available in cans which store really well and will provide much appreciated protein into your diet.
• Keep canned milk as well as powdered milk in your stores.  They can be blended together and put on breakfast cereals, or used for other cooking needs.
• Ritz or Saltine crackers store much better than bread, and go well with soups or chili.
• Boxed cereals, oatmeal and Cream of Wheat are good, simple foods for breakfasts that are easily stored.
• Ramen noodles always make a good foundation for lunches, and store well.
• Granola bars store well and make good snacks in between meals.
• Peanut butter is the do-all miscellaneous food.  Large quantities are good to have around.
• In addition to canned vegetables, semi-complete meals in a can are good to keep in supply.  Examples of these would be canned ravioli in sauce, chili and beef stew.

Plan on keeping enough shelf stable food on hand to last your family for the Level One seven day period.

The next item on our list is a little spendy, but will be worth its weight in gold when your power is out for a week.  A generator will make your life much more bearable while the grid is down, and it will save the food in your fridge and freezer from going bad.  It will give you somewhere to charge your cell phone, and allow you to use your electric mixer when you are making mashed potatoes.  It can power electric lights at night and your coffee maker in the morning.  

6kW Propane fired generator

Plan on looking at models from 3500 watts to 7500 watts, depending on how many items you want to run at once.  Try to find a generator that runs on propane instead of gasoline.  Large quantities of gasoline are not safe to store at home, and carburetors can become gummed up with infrequent use.  A couple 100 pound bottles of propane can find a home in the corner of your garage, and have a virtually unlimited shelf life.  Modern blends of gasoline start to deteriorate after only 30 days, by the way.  Don't forget to have multiple heavy gauge extension cords on hand to run your electric appliances.

If you have well water at your home, it is possible to use a generator to power your well pump.  Just keep in mind that well pumps have large motors (.75 HP and greater) that require more juice to get them spinning compared to most home appliances.  You will more than likely need a 7500 watt or bigger generator to run one.  And you should have the modifications made to the well pump wiring ahead of time to make this a plug and play set-up when it is needed.

A propane grille can handle most of your cooking tasks, and an electric skillet plugged into your generator can do the rest.  Having a spare bottle of propane on hand makes good sense, too.

Wet wipes and hand sanitizer can save a lot of water and help maintain personal hygiene.

Pick up two or three oil lamps and a couple gallons of lamp oil for night time activities and to keep from running your generator too much.  A couple dozen candles for supplemental lighting are good to have also.

Every member of the family should have their own reliable flashlight for getting around in the dark. These are necessary to minimize the safety hazards associated with all the open flames now in your home.  I recommend flashlights with LED bulbs for their brightness, durability and minimal energy consumption.  I also recommend flashlights that run on CR123A lithium batteries because they last much longer than alkaline batteries and have a 10 year shelf life.

Streamlight ProTac 2L

Since a grid down situation is always something of a tenuous time, I recommend having a firearm in the home for defensive use.  The preferable scheme is to have a gun for every adult in the home, along with a box or two of ammunition for each weapon.  Your shooters should get out to the range at least twice a year for practice and familiarization.

It is also a good idea to maintain at least a half tank of fuel in your vehicle(s) at all times.  If the gas stations aren't able to pump fuel, you will still have a minimum of a half tank to get around with for a few days.

Make sure to keep cash available at your home for incidental purchases while the power is out.  It is a somewhat personal decision on the amount, but I recommend between $300 and $1000.  Remember, there will be no working ATMs or point of sale purchases; folding cash is your best option if you really need to buy something.

If you have kids, pick up a few board games and a couple decks of cards to keep them occupied in the evenings.  Cable TV and internet service may or may not be up and running....

If you are on prescription maintenance medications, try to get them through the mail order process if your insurance allows it. This may help to avoid the hassle of getting them at the local pharmacy when their power is out, if for no other reason than a 60 or 90 day supply does not run out as often.

For some additional information, check out the Good List for Prepping Beginners that I posted here a while back.  It contains more items than are needed for a Level One prep, but may be helpful when gathering your supplies.

Although I'm sure that I overlooked a few odds and ends, this posting will get you fairly well equipped for a week without power.

Please add your suggestions in the comments block so that we can get a well polished list out there to help people.

LWM out................