Bug Out Bag (BOB) or “Get Home Bag” DIY Checklist
When I was working, once monthly I would have to drive from fresno calif to lompoc california. Approximately 200 miles or slightly under. When I lost the account at lompoc I still had to drive to santa maria, about 30 minutes from lompoc.
So anyway, when I read the book Going Home by A.American, where an EMP hit the usofa, and he had to walk home 150 miles or so, I thought to myself that I should do something like that. Make a Get Home Bag, that is.
So I bought a large backpack and filled it with stuff I thought I could use to help me get home if shtf. I am extremely glad I didn't have to try walking home. My bones would probably be bleaching alongside some road over there.
A few years back I thought I was gonna have to use it to stay overnight in my truck when there was a bad storm over there and all the roads home were closed by the chp. Fortunately I was able to drive about 80 miles northwest and take another road back to fresno. Slow driving cause everyone else had the same idea.
Now that I am retired, I have thought about bug out bags. But, my wife has health issues, and frankly, bugging out is not gonna work for us. And if we did bug out, where we gonna go? There are so many people living in this valley and in this state, that just ain't gonna work. So we are going to bug in.
Earthquake and the house falls down? Livin in the back yard.
UN troops walkin down my road? Gettin out the AK and going to work.
As I said, buggin in, whatever the consequences.
For the vast majority of people staying where your at is only thing possible.unless If your flooded or burned out you couldn't take all the stuff you needed.
ReplyDeleteNo, bugging out for me is not an option. You are correct, you can't haul enough stuff.
DeleteWhile I'm not planning on bugging out, I do have a plan B. I keep a cache of supplies at a trusted friend's house (as he does at mine) so if something impossible comes our way we can bug out to the other place. Thrift stores are still pretty awesome for cache supplies. Id SHTF high style might not be in style :-). Plan C is the Deer Camp also with well hidden caches.
ReplyDeleteIf you don't want tweekers living in your deer camp hide the windows and doors under the shack. Not livable so they have wandered by (trash found) but left. I can install them in less than an hour.
We are close to national forest here. I think the whole valley might try to go up there if shtf. That's well over a million people. So for us, we will stay here. Hopefully our plan B is not dying in place and making plant fertilizer.
ReplyDeleteBoth my wife and I have health problems so not likely to bug out. The only exception would be if there is a wildfire necessitated having to go. We do have an easily loaded camp box and emergency bags that go along on trips to town which is 200+ miles away!
ReplyDeleteWow! That's one hell of a commute.
DeleteI liked Alan Kay's response to that idea (the guy who won first season Alone, living alone, unsupplied in that very wilderness so many imagine they'll bug out to) ... "Sure you are ... you're gonna die".
ReplyDelete“Bugging out” was always a recipe for disaster, “bugging out to” on the other hand.
I never understood the literal masses of equipment suggested by internet ‘experts’ for get home bags, yet nobody brought up the simple idea of a folding bicycle. They’re available in many forms, from the Swiss paratrooper models down to briefcase size models, and they’ll allow even a medical discharge like me to cover 100+ miles in a couple of days (if not less). (My paratrooper and fold-up trailer takes up less space than a spare tire).
I still have a bag to allow me to bug out to the preprepared caches, sites (a cabin, shed and a storage lease) and friends further away (with my supplies already in situ).
I have a friend who uses an old three-wheel ‘off-road’ childs buggy because they can no longer hump a ruck. It was strong enough to be used to evacuate an immobile but non-life-threatening adult casualty off a mountain – so you could consider similar options.
But yes, as the sensible here have already said, bugging in (assuming you’re not living in Mordor) is always the best option (once I finally get my hand-pump well finished at least).
When I was working and thinking of a get home bag, I had a collapsible hand truck with me at all times. My plan was to use that to haul the heavy as heck backpack until the wheels fall off and then carry it myself. As for folding bicycles, I never even knew there was such a thing. Gotta look it up.
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