Survival skills and equipment are generally considered to be those that will help a person survive in a potentially hostile environment, without the benefit of the support systems generally associated with civilized life- i.e. safe to drink tap water, grocery stores, medical care, shelter, etc.
Here is a superficial, quick review of survival basics.
This isn't meant to be the final word. This is meant to give good, usable information until you can make better decisions on your own.
Survival is usually taught with reference to “The Rule of Threes”-
You can live three minutes without air.
In a hostile environment, you can live three hours without shelter.
You can live for three days without water.
You can live for three weeks without food.
These are not so much absolutes as generally useful rules of thumb to help you prioritize your activities in a survival situation.
Learning survival skills usually begins with ensuring these basic needs are met.
There are two schools of thought when it comes to survival, with much overlap between them. The first is that some simple gear will make it much easier to come out of a survival situation ok, and that having a survival kit is the first line of defense in a survival situation.
The second is that you should not depend on gear, but instead you should be sufficiently knowledgeable and skilled in primitive and expedient survival techniques that you could be dropped naked into the wilderness without tools, supplies or even clothing, and have the skills to find and create what you need to survive.
The happy medium is to have a minimum of basic survival gear like shelter items, water carrying and purification items, a good knife and a way to make fire. Redundancy, if not cumbersome, is a valuable insurance policy against unexpected loss of use of primary survival gear. For example, having two or three methods of water purification and fire starting is a good idea. A familiarity with primitive and expedient skills functions as a backup in case of loss of gear.
Shelter can be as simple, inexpensive and light weight as a contractor’s garbage bag in your pocket, or some combination of things like a military surplus wool blanket, a cheap Home Depot poly tarp, a tube tent or even a backpacking tent or bivy sack with a sleeping bag inside. You specific situation will dictate what makes sense for you.
The simplest way to handle water needs is to have enough potable water on hand. How much is enough? About a gallon per day, for most people, in most environments. How many days will you need? I don’t know. How many days should you have? As many as you can. If you are on foot, that may only be a few quarts. If you are in your home, that might be a hundred gallons or more. If you need to gather water, you should do things that will make it more safe to drink. This can get complicated, and you should do your own homework, but a here is a few things to get you started-
Boiling water can make water safer to drink.
2 drops of common chlorine bleach per liter can make water safer to drink.
More details here-
http://www.epa.gov/OGWDW/faq/emerg.html
For small quantities of water you could use Katadyn Micropur purification tablets, which run about $15 for 20, each tablet treats 1 quart or liter of water. These could be kept in your survival kit, duct taped with a few feet of duct tape to your water bottle.
One of the best things to use is PolarPur, which is iodine based. A teeny little bottle, which runs about $10, will treat 500-5000 gallons of water, depending on how you use it. It takes a bit of knowledge to use it properly, so it isn’t a good choice for unsupervised children or adults who behave like unsupervised children.
Knives
Cold Steel makes a model called the Bushman, which is a very serviceable, fixed-blade (not a folding) survival knife that is about $20. The more expensive Cold Steel blades are very good as well. A multi-tool such as those made by Gerber or Leatherman may be more useful. I like the Leatherman Wave, which runs about $60-70. Swiss Army knives tend not to be as robust, with few exceptions.
The best place for you to begin learning survival skills is with some good videos, a few good books, practice, hands-on instruction from a qualified instructor, and lots more practice. Then more practice. Oh yeah, and don’t forget to practice.
People who practice these skills lots are the ones who die less often in survival situations.
The best way to start with videos is by picking up the complete set of Hoods Woods videos here-
http://www.survival.com/
Right now the complete set is $399. For most people, this is the best way to begin learning these skills. The videos are professionally done, and are great fun to watch and contain a great deal of information and quality instruction for the money. There are a number of survival experts out there with videos for sale. Some are good, and many are not that great. The Hoods Woods are the best there are right now, and I don’t think any others serve the purpose that these DVD’s do, nor as well as they do.
If $399 is too rich for your blood, you could start out with just these three, which would give you the most important, basic information and will cost you about $60 or so-
Volume 1 - Spark Based Fire Starting
Volume 2 - Survival Shelter Selection
Volume 3 - Making and Using your Outdoor Survival Kit
There are lots and lots of books about survival, but The Complete Book of Outdoor Survival by J. Wayne Fears, is, I believe, the best one to start with.
Outdoor Survival Skills, by Larry D. Olsen is also great, but with a more primitive bent. The sixth edition is the current one, as of this writing.
A handy and useful book is Build the Perfect Survival Kit, by John Mccann.
For primitive skills, the two books by John & Geri McPherson-
Primitive Wilderness Living & Survival Skills
and
Primitive Wilderness Skills, Applied & Advanced
-are top-notch.
Earth Knack, Stone Age Skills for the 21st Century, by Bart & Robin Blankenship is also incredibly good.
With these things, and practice, you will be well on your way to being well prepared to face most survival situations.
No comments:
Post a Comment