In this compendium, Selco describes what it was like living in a city for a year without power, fuel, running water, food distribution or any semblance of traditional commerce. Their currency was useless, there were no police forces or government, and the streets were ruled by gangs and violence. The survival strategies that he, his family, and community used to stay alive are eye-opening and may change some of the priorities that you have when it comes to preparing for a SHTF scenario where you live. Although it’s long read, I highly recommend it given the wealth of knowledge taken from someone who’s lived it.

From Selco:

OK, i wanna share with you my own experience. (be patient with my English, i am from far away )
I am from Bosnia, and as some of you may know it was hell here from 92-95, anyway, for 1 whole year i lived and survived in a city of 50 000- 60 000 residents WITHOUT: electricity, fuel,running water,real food distribution, or distribution of any goods, or any kind of organized law or government.The city was surrounded for 1 year and in that city actually it was SHTF situation.

We did not have organized army or police force, there was groups of defenders, actually anybody who had a gun, fight for his own house and his own family.

Some of us was better prepared, but most of families had food for couple of days, some of us had pistol, few owned AK-47 when all started.

Anyway, after one month or two, gangs started with their nasty job,hospital looked like butchery, police force vanished, 80 percent of hospital staff gone home.

I was lucky, my family was big in that time (15 members in one big house, 5-6 pistols, 3 Kalashnikov s) so we lived and survived, most of us.

I remember US Air force dropped MRE every 10 days (god bless USA for that) as help for surrounded city, it just was not enough.Some of houses had little gardens with some vegetables, most did not.

After three months rumors started abouth first deaths from starvation,deaths from low temperatures, we stripped every door , window frame from abandoned houses for heating, i burned all my own furniture for heating, lot of people died from diseases, mostly from bad water (two of my family members), we used rain water for drink, several times i ate pigeons, once i ate rat.

Money did not worth sh..

we traded things, black market worked, few examples: for 1 corned beef can you could have woman for couple of hours(sounds bad, but it was reality) i remember, most of that womans were just desperate mothers, candles, lighters,antibiotics,fuel,batteries, rifle ammo and of course food, we fight like animals for that.

In situation like that lot of things change, most of people turned to monsters, it was ugly.

Strength was in the numbers, if you were alone in the house, you ve been probably robbed and killed, no matter how well armed.

Anyway, war ended, again thanks to America (and again god bless USA for that). It is not important witch side had right in that war.

It was almost 20 years ago, but believe me, for me it was just like yesterday, i remember everything, and i think i learned a lot.

Me and my family are prepared now, I am well armed, stocked and educated. It is not important what going to happen, earthquake,war, tsunami,aliens terrorists, important thing is that something gonna be.

And from my expirience, you can not survive alone, strength is in the numbers, be close with your family, prepare with them, choose your friends wisely and prepare with them too.

And at the end, this is my first post, and my English is not so good, so don t judge me too hard. ”

Q: How did you get around safely?

Actually city was broken in something like lot of street communities, in my street (15 or 20 houses) we organized patrols (5 armed man every night) to watch on gangs or enemies.

We traded things between people in that street, 5 miles from my street there was one street with something like organized traders, but it was to dangerous to go there, it worked only during the nighttime (during the day it was sniper alley) and you had more chance to be robed there than to trade, i used that street only 2 times, and belive me, only when i am really need something bad.

Q: What about wood? It looked like there are many forests around your city, why did you have to burn doors and furniture?

First, thank you for your questions, i did not expect this amount of interest for my post.
I ll be glad to share lot of things with you guys beecause i want to learn lot of things from you.

Anyway:

Bosnia have lot of woods and forests when you check map, but i lived in city closer to the croatian border, more to the south, i don t want to mention name of the city, but if you check map, south part of my country closer to croatia is all in rock.

Yes we had some trees in my city, parks, fruit trees, but most of the city is building and houses” but belive me all trees in the city is going to be burned very fast when you dont have eletricity for cooking and heating. After that all what you have is furniture, doors, wooden floors… (and belive me that stuff is burning too fast).

There was almost no car use in town because: most of the roads jammed with ruins, abandoned cars, destroyed houses stuff like that, and petrol was like gold.

If i needed to go somewhere i almost always used night time, never go alone but also never go in big group (2-3 man maybe), always armed, very fast, always in shadows, trough ruins, rarely openly on the street, actually always hiding.
We did not have suburbs and farmers, in suburbs were enemy army, we were surrounded with enemy army, and inside town you did not know who is your enemy.

And yes, there were organized groops of gangs, 10-15 people, sometimes even 50, but also there were normal people like you and me, fathers, granddads, decent folks, who robed and killed, there was not too much good and bad guys, most of us was gray, ready for everything.

Q: Did you prep and what kind of skills did you need?

Of course you can ask.

We use what we had, we was not prepared for that situation,we did not know for prepping.

So you can imagine in some aspects we go back in stone age, actually in most of.

We just used everything what we had, one example, i had in my propan(or butan i am not sure) stowe big bottle, cylinder (i am not sure is that right word), and i did not use it for cooking or heating, it was to valuable, i manage to built (fix) that bottle with my friend so i can attach a hose on some kind of ventil (sorry my english is going down here) so i can fill those disposable lighters,(they are not disposable if you knowhow to) those lighter worth a small fortune.

To make story short, somebody bring me empty lighter to me and i fill that lighter with gas, usually i took one can for that or one candle or whatewer he can offer me.

I hope you understand my example, my english is poor on some things.

one more example, i am a registered nurse, in time like that, my knowledge was my thing for trade.

And yes, be trained and educated, in times like that it worth a fortune if you know how to fix things, all your goods is going to be exhausted one day, but your specific knowledge can be your food.

I mean learn to fix things (shoes or people, whatewer you can).

My neighbor use to know how to make some kind of oil for oil lamps( oil in glass, peace of rope) and he was not hungry, he never show me how he made that oil

i belive he use some tree behind his house and small amount of disel, i don t know.

My point is learn things, people always need somebody who know to fix things.

It was not survival movie, it was ugly, we did what we have to do to survive.

Nobody wins, we just survived, with a lot of bad dreams.

Q: Wasn’t it religious, the war?

Sorry man wrong info, that was not Cristian vs Muslim war, it was civil war, with lot of switching between sides.
And sorry i am not to go in to the politics, i dont care to much for that, i am not going into religious stories, i mean i believe in God as higher power, and I am trying to live by his laws, i am not belong to any dogma, Muslim or Christian.

Q: Who was your support group?

My group was only my family, my blood (relatives like uncles, grandmother…), in my street and in my town trips i had some close friends, but my best friends was my family. I never take stranger in my close group.

Q: If you had three months to prepare today, what would you do?

If i have extra three months to prepare?

Hmmm, probably run overseas  Joke

OK, Now i am very well aware how things can go very bad in very short time so i have food, hygiene, energy etc. supply for 6 months, i live in apartment with some improved security, i have house with shelter in a village some 5 miles from my apartment, in that house also supply for 6 months, that village small community, most of them are my relatives,most of them are prepared (they learned that from war), i have four kind of fire weapons with 2000 bullets for each (sorry, can not go in details, laws are different here for rifles).

I have big garden with that house and some good knowledge about gardening and farming.

I think i have knowledge now to smell trouble, you know when everybody is saying that everything is going to be fine you somehow know that is everything going to fall apart.

I think i have strength to do everything what it takes to keep me and my family alive, because when everything is going to sh.., be sure, you are going to do some bad things to save your kid. You don t want to be hero, you want to survive with your family.

I am nurse, also i am paramedic (US standards)

And i am willing to learn from all of you.

One man survivor, no chance ( OK it is my opinion) no matter how well armed and prepared, at the end you gonna die, i’ve seen that, many times. Family groups or closest friend with lot of preparing and lots of different knowledge, i believe that is best.

Q: What items should we stockpile?

Thank you

Well depends, i quess if you stock only one thing you are not going to survive, unless you want to survive like robber, then you need only gun and lot od ammo.

I believe besides ammo food hygiene and energy things (batteries etc.) you need to focus on small things for trade, pocket knives, lighters, flints.

Also LOT of alcohol, kind that can stay long, i mean stuff like whiskey and that, does not important what kind, you can have cheapest kind, it is very good thing for trade in desperate time.

Also lack of hygiene things killed a lot of people, i ve seen that.

You gonna need to have some simple things, like for example lot of garbage bags, i mean a lot, many uses for that, and a LOT of duct tape, many many uses for that.

In case of weapon keep it simple, i mean now i always carry Glock 45 with me, because i like that gun, but it is not usual gun and usual caliber here, so i also have two 7,62 mm TT russian pistols hidden, because almost everybody have that gun here and a lot ammunition.

I don t like Kalashnikov, but here there is that rifle on almost every 3rd house so…

Most of the time i collect my water from roof in 4 big barrels during the war, then cooked to desinfect, we also had river in that town , too poluted but if you can’t choose…

I don t think i am expert, i am here to learn.

I quess it depends how far you going to go to survive with your actions, you need to be prepared to do some ugly things.
Oh yes it changed my perspective on life, i know now that bad things can happens, and on more important thing, actually i believe it is most important: I don’t anymore believe government and authority, not at all. When they really doing their best to assure you that everything going to be fine, you can be sure that something bad is happening.
Do not just believe, research.

Q: What about the civil war…and the religious fighting? Did gold and silver help much and how did you get the alcohol and other supplies?

Hello to all

It is me again

I believe in some point this discussion gone wrong way, and no i am not offended, everybody have right for opinion, so here is few of my opinions:

It was a civil war, yes there was a great influence of religion, but somebody mention “what did you do with people of other religion?”

Well in my family there are people with different religious beliefs so what do you mean with that?

I ll try to explain you simple; it was an attackers and defenders, lot of switching sides, civil war. War ended without winners, it ended with truce, thanks mostly to USA.It was the wrong war, wrong reasons. I did not fight for religion or ethnicity, i fought to keep my family and myself alive.

For last 15 years we have peace, we live with people who use to be our enemies, i do not to want to have war and enemy again because ethnicity or religion or any other reason.

Please do not try to generalize anything about that war, there was not good and bad side, we all suffered and we all try to live together again.

And yes every side did bad things, and every side had booth good and bad guys.

I am here for one and only reason- survival, i want to learn, and i can share some useful stuff with you.

I don t think about your religious beliefs, your ethnicity or your politic opinion.

Few words about my city before war, it was a usual Bosnian town, normal life, decent people, schools, theaters, parks, college, airport, crime rate very low, town like most of the smaller towns in USA (i think). I was a young man, just like any of you maybe.

Now very important think: i am not here to discuss about war reasons, or sides, religion or anything similar.

Thanks to the war, in my town was REAL SHTF situation, and we can discuss only about that, only that is important.

You have a lot internet pages, you can learn everything about that war, and you can choose side if you want.

OK that s it.

About survival.

I don t know about other people on this forum, but i have lot of alcohol stacked now.

At the beginning of war tank grenade smashed front wall of small distillery (alcohol factory) close to my house, so we took something around 500 liters of rakia (it is something like bosnian whiskey, i guess, it made from grape, very strong)
It was great stuff for trading, people used alcohol a lot, desperate times i think, we also use it for disinfection.

About hygiene, cups and plates, paper or plastic, you gonna need a LOT, i know, we did not have it at all.

My opinion that hygiene things is more important maybe than food, you can easily shoot pigeon, if you have grandmother she may know some eatable plants on nearest small hill (my experience) but you can not shoot hand sanitizer.

Water purifying pills, all kind of cleaning stuff, sanitizers, lot of soap, bleach, gloves, masks, all disposable, take very good care about first aid training, learn how to treat smaller cuts, burns or even gunshot wound, there is not hospital, even if you found doctor somewhere he probably do not have any meds, or you do not have stuff to pay him.

Learn how and when to use antibiotics and have it a lot.

Belive me with good knowledge and good amount of meds you are gonna be rich.

About gold and silver, yes, me personally gave all my gold for ammunition in that time, but it did not worth too much.

About pets, i did not have it, i did not notice a lot pets in that time, did somebody ate it? I don t know, probably.

About small family, hmm, not good, usualy few smaller families get together in biggest house and stay together, all relatives (my case)

Small family or single man, not good for survive in town SHTF, maybe in wilderness (i don t have expirience in that) Even if you stay low profile, hidden in your house with lot of food etc, sooner or later mob will come, and you have maybe have one or two guns, very hard. I agree with low profile policy, it is very important not to attract people with anything, but when they come, you need to have numbers, people and guns, best people is your family.

About moving trough the city: always night time as i mentioned, never alone, 2-3 man, very fast, never attract with anything, look like everybody else, if most folks look desperate, poor, dirty you need to look same, there is no need that everybody know you have good amount of food, ammo , clean cloths and everything else back at home. Look and act like everybody else.

When somebody attack you or your family then you need to show that you are very ready.

I never walked in big groups,in that time and that situation big group is gang.

Now, this is all my experience, it was then, i did a lot of mistakes, i am not expert, i am here just like any of you, to learn and share.

For example i don t know too much about wilderness survival, i am here to check it.

Oh yes, few things to the Sedoy: my wife is different ethnicity, and she is also a Catholic, i am not, and to answer you : no i am not going to shoot her.

Q: What happened to those who died? Where did people get firewood?

Well, who ever died or get killed in that period, did not get proper funeral.

Folks used used every peace of free land, close to house for burial, sometimes even in the garden, 2-3 city parks turned to graveyards,after war most of them are exhumed and properly buried.

There was not noting like burning bodies or anything similar, as far as i know.

Oh one more interesting thing about fire, some people use to go few miles during the night only to find fire somewhere so they can fire peace of wood and bring it home, and start fire for cooking or heating, lighters and matches was really precious, and most of the folks did not have enough firewood do keep always fire. For most of the people it was constant search for something, fire,wood,food,ammo…

Q: Was salt valuable?

It was valuable yes, but not too much, for example coffee or cigarettes worth-ed much more.

Q What about cigarettes?

Hm, i had a lot of alcohol as i mentioned before, i traded almost everything without any problem, let me say it like this: consumption of alcohol was probably 10 times more than in normal time.Not to mention cleaning and disinfection.

On the other side you made a very good point, if you have money and time and you have a storage it is probably better to store cigarettes or candles and batteries for trade, or food.

I was not prepper at that time, we did not have time to prepare, few days before SHTF politicians on TV stated that everything is fine, when sky fell down we just take what you can.

Q: Tell us more about cooking and the foods you were able to prepare. Were you concerned about the smell getting around and alerting people that there was food over there?

About cooking, before the SHTF i used in my house electricity for booth, cooking and heating, so when everything started i traded some stuff for some kind of old wood stove, i put it in kitchen ad fix exhaust pipe (right word?) trough hole in wall, i use that for cooking and heating.

During the summer i cooked in my backyard (walled fence, brick, luckily)

Concerning the smell of the food, hm, i ll try to picture situation: no electricity, no running water, sewage off for months, dead bodies in ruined houses, grime and mess, believe me it was very hard to smell something nice.
It was not like in movies, it was ugly,dirty, and smelly.

Yes i had few problems because of cooking, only few, but as i sad before, enough people, properly armed and with will to defend and you can manage most of the problems with that.

Probably situation would be different in wilderness.

I ate mostly some kind of pancakes with local herbs (does not require cooking oil and too much firewood), and of course everything what i could get and trade, rice was good to eat, not too much firewood for that.

I think i had luck, only few times i ate funny things like pigeons.

I always had something to trade, i guess that saved me, and guns of course.

Q: 1. Why would the night be safer than daytime? Outside of the obvious of being easier to hide at night, but were the gangs more out during the days? Also, why only small groups of 2-3? What happened to larger groups?
2. Why would you have to go out at night? For instance, where were you going and why?
3. How did you handle the mob situation when they came for you, or your family?
4. You mentioned trading for bullets, etc. How much shooting were you doing during that time and how much ammo did you have, or would like to have had?
5. How were you able to determine who was an enemy and who wasn’t? How did you manage to get out there trade with people and when/where?
6. What fortifications did you do to your home and what kind of guard, or protections did you have in place?
7. Finally, how did you avoid snipers? What precautions did people take against them?

First almost nobody were out during the day because of snipers, line of defence was very close, so whatever you have to do, you do it during the night, trade something, look for firewood (i can express how much this was important in town, and hard), looking for anything, check somebody, go to hear news (very very important, lot of people get killed because they go somewhere just to see what happening, or what s new) remember, no news, no radio ,no tv, nothing, rumors fed lot of people.

Already explained, you can stay home and die of hunger and cold, or even infection of some small wound or go out and risk your life, try to find – trade anything useful.

I did have situations concerning my house only, it is no need for too much details, we had more fire power, and brick wall.
Also we had something like street watch, people from my street were good organized, in case of gangs, now there were a lot shootings.

There was pretty much shooting in town, i did not have enough weapon at the beginning, one rifle and one pistol (ww2), maybe 100 bullets, later i trade some things for more rifles and ammo, remember i gave car battery for 2 rifles.
How much ammo ?

A LOT, as more as you can.

Most of the time you are not able to determine who is enemy or friend, expect my family and few real friend, everybody else is potential enemy. When your friend must choose between his child s death and your death quess who is going to choose.

Rumors, somebody tells you that some old guy few block away have some cans and he is looking for ammo or whatever, you go there, as i say you are always looking for something. Same some people would came in my street as traders, witha some goods.

There was something like trade street during the night, actualy it was a big ruins of sport center, you can go overthere and look for something or offer something, but it was not controlled by anyone so it was too dangerous.

It was primitive pretty much, brick wall around house,bags of sand on windows and doors, over that bags we used whatever you can, big pieces of metal, stones, inside house we put all kind of stuff on windows, only small openning left for rifle, always 5 members of family ready for fight, one always outside on street hidden.

Stone age situation

To avoid snipers, we stay home at day, it was not so much night snipers, even during the night we never walked openly on the streets if we can avoid that, always shortcuts, trough ruins, fast and quiet.

Q: What was your bathroom situation? Where did you go? Did you have anything to wipe with? Sorry ask such personal questions, but this is something that I’ve wondered about in this type of situation.

we used shovel and any piece of land close to house, sounds dirty, and it is dirty, washing with collected rainwater, sometimes go to river (most of the time that was too dangerous) Most of the time we did not have toilet paper, even if i had it, i trade it.

It was a bad situation all the time.

If i can give some advice: first to prep is a weapon and ammo, then everything else, i mean everything, depends how much money and space you have, if you forget something no problem there is always somebody ready for trade, but if you forget guns and ammo then you may not be able to get to trading places.

I do not see big family or group of really( i mean really) good friends as more mouth to feed, i see them as more guns and strength, it is in people nature to adapt.

And keep it simple and use common sense, in the first period weak people vanished, other fight.

Go with small thing, lighters, candles, flints. It is great idea to have fuel generator( electrical generating unit?) but i think is better idea to have 1000 bic lighters. Fuel generator is great, but in shtf scenario in town it is going to attract whole army,1000 bic lighters don t take too much space, cheap, you can always trade it for something.

Real SHTF scenario demands completely change of normal mindset, hard to explain, i ll try through examples.

Q: How easy/hard was it to get weapons AFTER the SHTF and what could you trade for weapon and ammunition

(I remember you saying a car battery for a rifle) and where would I go to find the people who trade in weapons?
Hm, you re right, after the war every house here had a weapon from war, and yes police did some actions to take illegal weapon from population, depends from man to man i quess, lot of people find ways to hide their weapon somewhere, just in case.

I also have legal weapon (license), and authority here have some thing they call it “temporary collecting”, it is says something like : in a case of unusual event (riots, unrest, etc) government have right to temporary collect all legal weapon, so i keep always in mind that, and i acted like some people.

You know some people have legal weapon for everyday carry( i have glock 45 and taurus 38) but some people with legal weapon also have illegal weapon hidden somewhere just in case SHTF and “temporary collecting”.

It is not hard to get weapon in SHTF if you have good stuff for trade, but other thing is important, first days of SHTF is worst in terms of chaos and panic, maybe you not gonna have time to get gun. And to be unarmed in chaos panic and riots is bad.

In my case man needed car battery for radio i think, and he had some extra rifles, so we trade.

Q: What about medical care for people who were shot or became injured?

Wounds was mostly gunshot wounds of course, without specialists and everything else, if wounded manage to find doctor somewhere he had like 30% chances to live, again it is not movie, mostly they died, lot of died even from minor cuts infections, i had antibiotics maybe for 3-4 treatment. Of course for my family only.

Simple things killed people, diarrhea can kill you in a few days without meds and rehidratation, (fluid therapy, IV) especially small kids. Lot of fungal skin deseases,and food poisoning, we could not do too much. Basically we treated diseases mostly with local herbs, and if you had wound, put rakia on it and try to find antibiotics somewhere.
So i was good at fixing wounds in term of emergency help, but longer procedure-bad prognosis.

What i learned? Hygiene again, and a lot of meds, especially antibiotics. You need to learn to treat lot of stuff, go online, finish some training, EMT maybe, first aid etc.

In SHTF things are different, learn how to open IV, when to use certain drug, or antibiotics.

Get your self ANA TE (anti tetanus ) shot injections , snake poison kit, adrenaline kit (allergic reactions, different kinds) thick removal kit, (thick related illness can kill you, learn how to remove thick)…

Get in your prepper storage some reanimation kit (simple one) like small oxygen cylinder, BVM mask etc. It is not really hard to learn to use all of these.

OK let s clear something, of course you can not use anything of this in real world unless you are certified and trained for that ( EMT, nurse, physician ).

But in SHTF nobody ask you for license, just learn and have in your storage big part for medical things.

So to answer question how did i help and treat, most of the time very poor,i help some with resources that i have, i took food or something else for exchange, i was badly prepared for that, now i am what do i need to have.

Q: Did your local currency/money still hold value? Were you still able to use money to purchase items from other people?

No, not really, i mean sometimes you can use foreign money if you had it to buy something, (dollars or German marks) but even in that rare occasion rate was unbelievable for examples 1 can of beans for 30-40 dollars (normal value was maybe 0,50) i quess somebody had connections with outside world, black market you know, so he can earn lot of money.But it was very rare. Trade was main thing to get something.

Local currency crashed very fast, in few weeks or month maybe.

Q: How much space should I keep for alcohol storage? What was security like?

About alcohol first, you right but you are right in booth ways, people need alcohohol more in desperte times then usual, so it is kind of gambling i guess , it is very good item for trading, i never had problems with alcohol trading and having than problems with trading other things.

Also i am thinking about something else, maybe it is better to fill my storage with something less space consuming but still interesting for trade, like batteries, antibiotics etc.

Thing is i had all that alcohol for free, i did not buy it. I don t know about this.

In most of the situations people attack me because they think they are stronger, they did not know for sure what i really had.

About ammunition trade, it depends how much ammo you are going to have, sometimes i trade ammo for food, and in few weeks again food for ammo, but i never never do trade at my home, and never bigger amounts, very few people knowed how much of anything i had in my house.

The point is store as much of anything as you can store (space , money) later during the situation you ll see what is most popular, correction ammo and guns always gonna had 1 place for me, but who knows maybe number 2 for trading gonna be for example masks with filters.

About medical issue , i ll write in my next post what do i have now in my medical part of storage.

Defence were very primitive, again we were not prepared, we use what ever we could, windows were broken, roofs mostly damaged from shelling, all windows were blocked with something, sand bags and rocks,every night i blocked my yard gate with junk- rubble from the street and i use old alluminium ladder to get over the wall, when i come back i called somebody from house to get me that ladders so i can move in.

Guy from my street barricaded his house completely, if he go out at night he use a hole that he maded in one room that is connected with neighbor s house, and go trough his (ruined and destroyed) house out, actually he had secret entrance.
It may look weird to say but most secured houses are gone first, of course we had some very nice houses in neighborhood, with walls, dogs, alarms, steel bars on windows, alarms. And you can quess what happened, mob attacked those houses first, some were defended other not, depend how many guns and hands thea have inside.

So i think security is great, but be sure that you keep it low profile, forget about alarm, if you live in town and SHTF you gonna need simple looking non interesting secured house, with lot of guns and ammunitions.

Just keep it low profile and not interesting.

On my apartment door now i have steel door for security reason, but only to keep me trough first short period of chaos, then i am moving out to connect with bigger group of armed people (family and friends) in the country (i hope).

Well in my case migration did not happen because it happen very fast, other army just closed city in ring and that s it, if you ask me where was that army and how we did not seen them coming, the answer is simple, that army was an ally of army of my side and people, and one day we woke up and figured they are enemy now and they are closing all ways out. Politics . It is true, one more side of civil war.

But i heard from others parts of country, and my frends who stayed in villages in the other parts in state, that they have much better situations,countryside had land,corn,wheat, fruit trees, farms etc they had enough food, it was bad, but much better than in city.

I know one thing if we had some way out from the town, we would use it, we did not have it.

Q: What was the situation with banks and stores?

About banks, loans, credit cards. Complete monetary system died for about one year, so nothing works.

It is complex question in many ways, i ll try it to answer it in some future posts, need much more time and much much more space to describe it. Even now almost 20 years later folks are at European court suing banks, because they dont want to admit their savings in banks, lot of different things happened in that period , they changed money, i mean monetary name, they changed it 2-3 times , hyperinflation occurs, lost of paper trails about savings, loans … i remember some people use that situation to get rich, they still rich.:)

So i ll try to describe that in separate post.

There was a lot problems with proving people s property after everything, for example: my father had nice apartment and because war he must leave it, after war ended he was at court for about 4 years proving that apartment was his, reasons for that were different, because politics in that time, but also he did not have enough paper work to prove that apartment was his (he did not took papers from apartment when he fled, he had more important things to care).

On the other side during the worst period, people just moved in empty house, and that s it.

I mention rural areas in other post. As far as i remember it was better there.

In that period there is not running vehicle, actually i remember tank at the front line, and Lada Niva (check it on web) with cut of doors and roof and installed machine gun ( i think it was an old m53) and those two only moved when they fired( they keep it hidden behind ruined houses).

For let me call it “civilian population” there was no moving with vehicles, streets were mostly under rubble and unusable and fuel was too expensive.

Not to draw attention was a big thing, about clothing, there use to be some sort of town defense, it was not like real military,mostly mixed civilian clothes with part of uniforms, different weapon, so no rules.

But as soon as go in to that things and try to talk about two armies, their strength, war crimes, politics i am not gonna like it any more, because people gonna start to choose sides, and i think it is not important for us here.

As i said before there was not organized army, but we all been like soldiers, we had to, most of us carry weapon and try to protect from enemy army and robbers.

Inside the town you did not want to look fancy because somebody shoot you and took your good stuff, you did not want to have fancy rifle, because probably you not gonna find ammo in that caliber and also you are drawing attention.

So let s me try to put it this way: if SHTF tomorrow, i will try to look like most of the people outside, scared, desperate, confused and i ll scream maybe, no fancy looking stuff, i ll not go out in fancy new uniform and yell “I am here, you are finished now looters and robbers” I ll stay low profile, heavily armed and well prepared waiting to see my options, even if i have to go out with all my gear to do things i ll go in night, with best friend or brother. Maybe sounds ridiculous, but from my expirience it works, be wery well prepared, but let nobody outside your house know or see that.

No matter how good is your house security, how good is your weapon, if people see that they have good reason to rob you they probably rob you in town SHTF, it is only matter of time and number of guns.Don t ever give them reason to be interesting for robbing. Stay uninteresting. Now this is my opinion, maybe is not working in different situation.

About robbing grocery store and gas stations, it happened very very fast, as soon as shooting started all valuable things was emptied, there vas some effort of authority to keep it together but everything fall apart in first weeks.

Additional Resources

If you’re interested (and you should be after reading this), be sure to check out Selco’s blog, SHTF School. It’s a great urban survival resource.

Around 3 years ago here in New England we had a pretty serious winter ice storm that knocked my power out for around a week and in many close-by areas they were without power for 2 weeks.

From that experience I realized I was woefully unprepared for winter.

Sure, I had plenty of food and water storage, and I had a wealth of wilderness survival experience to draw on if I needed. I would simply have to make a winter shelter for my wife and 2 year old…yeah right.

My wife packed up the kid and went to her mother’s.

I on the other hand, decided to “man it” at home to ensure that the house was taken care of (drain pipes, clear fallen limbs and debris etc).

At night I would sleep in my sleeping bag and during the day I’d start a fire in my fireplace (which is inadequate for warming up an entire house).

Eventually I had to pack it up and head to my Dad’s where he had the internet so I could get some work done (as well as a warm shower).

Experience breeds wisdom

What did I learn from that? Well, it was time for some new preps.

Sure, if needed we could have survived. I could have blocked off the room where the fireplace is, set up any number of improvised mattress shelters (which are killer indoor shelters btw), and with plenty of food and water and a place to cook and heat it we would have been fine.

But, it’s not just about surviving, but thriving in tough times remember? (see tag-line)

Now fast-forward three years to the present day and we get hit with a good-sized winter storm (we got 15 inches where I live) that knocks out our power again.

Did that past experience breed some present-day wisdom? Absolutely. Here are some new preps that made all the difference (and kept my wife and kids at home with me  ):

5 essential pieces of gear that got us comfortably through a winter power outage

Generator (Energy)

For energy production I now have a generator.

The one I ended up buying is a Yamaha EF2000is. I actually had it custom built by www.propane-generators.com to allow it to run off of 3 different types of fuels: Propane, Gasoline, and Natural Gas.

This is perfect since I have around five 25lb propane bottles that will get me through at least 1 1/2 weeks of power loss and I plan on purchasing more.

The generator will run my fridge, tv, some lights and my pellet stove without issue — all my family needs for a comfortable time through the coldest of nights.

And given that it is an inverter-type generator it will power my computer without harming any sensitive electrical components (it produces a pure sine wave much like the grid’s electricity).

If I needed more power, it also has the ability to be run in parallel with another matching EF2000is for 3600 running watts (4000 max) of power. Plenty enough for most any application.

One of the other things that really attracted me to it, is how quiet it is. With a range of 51 – 60 dB of sound (depending on load) it’s one of the quietest generators on the market (comparible to Honda’s EU2000i) — an ideal feature during a SHTF situation if discreetness were to become a priority.

Oil Lamps (Lighting)

My favorite types of lighting during a power outage are oil lamps. These can be found in most of your big-name hardware stores for under $10.

Not only do they burn paraffin oil (what is typically sold with it) but it will burn any of your cooking oils you may have as well (olive, vegetable, etc). They are bright, effective and the oil will last a long time.

In a pinch, remember that you can easily make your own homemade lamps from everyday objects.

Pellet Stove & Big Buddy Heater (Heating)

For heating, I primarily use my pellet stove. It doesn’t draw much power (starting watts is 400 running is just around 200) so it’s perfect in conjunction with a generator.

At night, when we’re all tucked away upstairs, I use the Big Buddy Heater. This also runs on propane and on medium it kicks out enough heat to warm up my upstairs without an issue.

If long-term heating were required I do have a wood-burning stove given to me by a good friend of mine. However, I don’t have the proper piping at this time to vent it through my chimney – so that is still on the list to get done.

Rocket Stove (Cooking)

For cooking I primarily use my rocket stoves (see the reviews for the Stovetec and EcoZoom here).

Since I have a fireplace, it allows me to easily cook inside. Here’s a pic of me cooking up some breakfast during the power outage (btw cast-iron pans are perfect for rocketstoves):

For fuel, while I do have stored/seasoned wood, there is so much of it on my property in the form of dead trees and branches that it would take a lifetime to deplete it since the rocket stoves are so efficient.

As another redundancy, I also have a propane camp stove, however I like to save the propane for heat and energy production since there is so much wood for cooking.

Conclusion

So if you’re not yet prepared for a power outage, where do you start?

Since most grid-down situations are usually resolved in under 2 weeks, I would first start by getting yourself prepared for at least a 2-week power outage. You’ll want to cover each of the four areas that our grid provides: energy, heating, lighting, and cooking (if cooling is a major worry instead of cold winters, just replace heating for cooling).

Once your 2-weeks are secure, start considering what you’d do in longer-term power outages. As you do so, keep in mind what would be most beneficial for your location/environment and living area.

Also consider what natural resources you may have available since these will be what will carry you through long-term emergencies.

For example, you may be in an area that gets a lot of sun or perhaps wind. If that’s the case solar or wind power might be an option for you.

Or if you, like me, have lots of wood or bio-waste then gassification is a definite consideration. Or any combination of those may be good for you.

So what type of setups do you guys have? Any particular preparations you have that get you through power outages? I’d love to hear from your experiences so we can all benefit, so please comment.

In this series I discuss the skills you need to avoid getting and spreading disease, and how to deal with waste and trash when your town and city services are no longer working.

• Survival Sanitation: It all Begins with the Hands
• Survival Sanitation: Disposing of Human Waste
• Survival Sanitation: Disposing of Garbage Off-Grid

When the grid goes down it doesn’t take long for serious sanitation problems to erupt. Take Auckland New Zealand for example:

In 1998, Auckland suffered a 5-week long power outage that halted water supplies, causing a large part of the city’s apartment dwellers and office workers to lose the ability to flush. Since the average person did not know how to properly deal with human waste, after only three days the resulting lack of wastewater services quickly escalated into a sanitation nightmare.

Here are two accounts of that time (please see footnotes for full articles):

Since water and sewage rely on electrically-driven pumps to get them into office blocks and towers, these services often aren’t available either. What little power is available is being used by emergency and civil services as far as possible, with other services like traffic lights being run if there’s anything to spare. Many office blocks have no power, water, or sewage services available. Combine the lack of sanitation with abscence of airconditioning and you can imagine what conditions are like in parts of these buildings.^[1]

And here is an account from someone who was tasked in writing up a white paper for the New Zealand government on the effects caused by no running water:

People in general are not smart. Rather than try and conserve or make a plan once the water stopped flowing, they would flush their toilets. Without power from the force of water pressure the tank doesn’t refill. The domino effect is not only gross but staggering, what human beings that have never lived beyond modern conveniences will do is unimaginable.

What I researched and wrote about blew my own mind…when people were actually confronted with such a situation, they went where ever they could – they filled the toilet, the toilet tank, the tub, the shower, the sink – when the bathrooms became uninhabitable, they went in corners, boxes, bags, closets…most however left by the time they were using the tub. Guess how long that took? That’s right, three days!.^[2]

How to Dispose of Human Waste in a Grid-Down Situation

If you’re in a situation where the grid goes down and the water stops flowing, you’ll want to be sure you’re correctly dealing with human waste.

Here’s how:

If You Have a Septic System

First off, if you have your own septic system, you’re in a better spot over others connected to a town/city sewer line. With a septic system, as long as you have availability to water (from storage or any grey water source), you’ll still be able to flush.

How to Flush without Running Water

	To flush, you can fill up the back tank until the water reaches the float and then hit the flush lever, or…
	If you have a big enough bucket (at least 2 gallons), quickly pour the bucket of water directly in the bowl which…
	will trigger the siphoning action and cause it to flush on it’s own.

If you’re short on water, then I recommend you follow the same procedures as those who are connected to town/city sewer lines:

If you are on Town/City Sewer Lines

If you’re connected to a town or city sewer line then the the absolute first step is:

If the sewer main is down, don’t flush the toilet. Not flushing will prevent your lines from mixing with neighborhood crap and backing up into your plumbing (not just the toilets but the sink and tub too).

If you’re absolutely sure there is no issue with the sewer lines, then you can follow the same method as someone on a septic system. Just be sure you have enough water for drinking, cleaning and cooking.

Non-Water Dependant Methods of Waste Disposal

Before I get into some of the non-water dependent methods of waste removal, there are three things you need to be mindful of: flies, pests and pets. These guys would like nothing more than to chow down on your business and in some way come into contact with you or your living space.

Flies especially are notorious for landing on your food and plates while eating, and wouldn’t think twice about doing that after having just enjoyed a fecal feast at your expense. And what will soon follow is a fecal-borne pathogen’s ultimate fantasy — amounting to a health nightmare for you and your loved ones.

Given that, you want to do everything in your power to prevent them from coming into contact with your excrement by keeping it covered and clean (more details to follow).

Waste Disposal in a Rural Area

If you live in the boonies or a semi-rural area but are still connected to the grid, consider yourself lucky. For you guys, it’s just a matter of doing your business outside.

The Cat Hole

In a short-term emergency, a few cat holes is all you need. Just take a garden trowel, a small shovel, or a post digger and make a hole about 6-8 inches deep and 4-6 inches in diameter. Do your business in the hole, wipe, throw the toilet paper (or leaves ) in there too, and cover it up with the dirt you took out.

Although this is an easy method, here are a few rules you’ll want to abide by:

The Trench Latrine

For a longer-term sanitation solution, you’ll want to build yourself a trench latrine.

A trench latrine is basically an oversized cat hole that is used multiple times. With the exception of dispersing it over a wide area, the same rules above apply to trench latrines as well.

The minimal recommended dimensions are around 1.5 feet (.45 m) wide x 1 foot (.3 m) deep and 2 feet (.6 m) long.

It’s also recommended that you build some type of privacy partition. An emergency situation is stressful enough. You don’t need to give anyone the added pressures of becoming a peep show. For example, a simple partition can be built with a few stakes in the ground with blankets, sheets or tarps stretched between them.

Since it is a multi-use station, you’ll also want to prevent any flies and pests from coming into contact with the exposed excrement. To do this, after each use cover your business with some wood ash, quick lime, or a few inches of the dirt that came out of the ground when making the pit.

Waste Disposal in a City

The average person produces around 2-3 pints of urine and 1 pound of poop a day. Multiply that by the number of people in your family and in a short time you can only imagine the amount of crap that would pile up in an extended grid-down situation in the city.

In most cases, city dwellers (and many suburbanites) do not have access to land where they can safely dig a trench latrine or cat holes. If you are one of these unlucky folk you’ll need to consider other options. Here are two possibilities that you could use:

Use Your Existing Toilet

Even if the sewage lines are down or if you’re short on water, it’s still possible to use your existing toilet:

	First, remove as much water as you can from the bowl.
	Second, tape a doubled-up trash bag to the underside of the toilet seat and let the bag fill the cavity of the bowl.
	Have a pail of wood ash, quicklime, kitty litter or sawdust available so that after each duty is done, the offender can sprinkle a liberal amount over it. This will keep the stench down.
	Finally, when the bag is filled up 2/3 the volume of the bowl, add a good amount of quicklime, wood ash or other disinfectant. If you do not have any of these things, you can use dirt with a little bit of a chlorine solution sprayed in it. After the addition of the disinfectant, securely tie up the bag and place it in a temporary, sealable container (like a 5-gallon bucket or trash container). Keep it in there until you can find a good time and place to dispose of it.

Use a 5-Gallon Bucket

A 5-gallon bucket can be used in a similar way to the toilet as explained above.

Like the toilet-method above, you’ll want to line it with a double-bagged layer of trash bags (heavy duty are highly recommended). For a seat, you can either sit on the rim of the bucket directly (it’s actually not as uncomfortable as you’d think), place your existing toilet seat on it, or place a couple of 2x4s or other similar objects on the rim to fabricate a makeshift seat:

If you feel like spending a little money you can pick up a toilet seat cover made for a 5-gallon bucket.

I’ve also seen them sell bags that are made for these 5-gallon expedient toilets as well as toilet deodorants that control the smell and are made for these types of portable toilets. I don’t have any experience with these but they seem to get good reviews in Amazon (click on an image to see the product and reviews):

For those of you with a bit more money in your pockets, they sell non-electric composting toilets that are completely off-grid, require no water, and supposedly convert human waste into usable compost without odor.

If any of you have these types of toilets, I’d love to hear from your experiences. That may be something that an apartment/city dweller could use in a SHTF situation.

Conclusion

I hope you come out of this post realizing how important the safe disposal of human waste is and how you can properly take care of you and your families waste if times get bad.

In the next and final article in this series I’ll be covering how you can properly dispose of garbage in a grid-down scenario.

Resources

1. Auckland’s Power Outage
2. Sanitation in Grid Down Situations

This is the first post in a three-part series on survival sanitation. In a survival situation, proper sanitation is of utmost importance if you want to avoid your family getting seriously sick.

In this series I discuss the skills you need in order to avoid getting and spreading disease, and how to deal with waste and sewage when your town and city services are no longer working.

• Survival Sanitation: It all Begins with the Hands
• Survival Sanitation: Disposing of Human Waste
• Survival Sanitation: Disposing of Garbage Off-Grid

This may be a bit cliché, but having clean hands is really the first step in staying sanitary in a survival situation. Since the hands are the primary contact point with every-day objects as well as between humans, they are also the top spreaders of disease. Hand washing — although it’s a simple practice — is the single most effective way to prevent the spread of communicable diseases.

Diseases Spread through the Hands

The hands can spread disease caused by fecal-oral transmission (you or someone else goes to the bathroom, wipes, and doesn’t wash), indirect contact with respiratory secretions (coughing or sneezing into hands), and coming into contact with urine, saliva or other moist body substances (I won’t go there, but I’m sure you get the point).

Here is a list of the most common diseases that are easily spread by the hands:

Diseases Spread through Fecal-Oral Transmission

Ingesting even the tiniest particles of fecal material can infect you with any of the following:

• salmonella
• shigellosis (causes dysentry)
• hepatitis A
• giardia
• enterovirus
• amebiasis
• campylobacteria
• cholera

Diseases Spread through Indirect Contact with Respiratory Secretions

• influenza (flu)
• Streptococcus
• respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)
• the common cold

Diseases Spread by Contact with Bodily Fluids (Saliva, Urine, etc)

• cytomegalovirus
• typhoid
• staphylococcal organisms
• Epstein-barr virus

Given the many types of diseases that are so easily spread through the hands it should be a given that hand washing be put at the top in terms of importance during an emergency. This cannot be overstated — if you want to prevent your family from suffering from disease, be it a mild case of diarrhea or worse, then this must become a high priority.

Creating Good Hand Habits and Avoiding the Bad Ones

Just like we preppers like to practice fire-making, off-grid cooking, cooking from our food storage and all the other skills we do during non-emergencies, it’s important that we “practice” getting in the habit of keeping our hands clean during normal times. That way, if things get bad — whether it’s 3-days or 3-years, we’ll have one less thing to think about. This also includes getting rid of habits that involve hand-to-mouth contact (other than eating of course).

Habits to Develop

• washing hands after going to the bathroom
• washing hands before eating
• washing hands after coming into contact with another person’s hands
• sneezing or coughing into the crook of your elbow instead of your hands

Habits to Avoid

• fingernail biting
• chewing on objects (pens, pencils etc)
• coughing or sneezing into your hands
• general hand to near-mouth contact (many people have the habit of putting their hands near or on their mouth when they are deep in thought).

Homemade Sanitizing and Handwashing Solution

In a recent article I talked about how to make your own chlorine bleach that can be used not only for water disinfection but for sanitation as well. To make a simple solution that can be used for hand sanitizing, you’ll want to add one cup of household bleach (or homemade bleach) to a gallon of water.

To use, after washing your hands with soap and water simply rinse your hands with the sanitizing bleach solution.

Homemade Anthrax Killer

For an even more effective disinfectant that is actually powerful enough to kill anthrax spores, you’ll want to add a cup of vinegar to the cup-to-gallon sanitizing solution above.

According to Norman Miner the president of MicroChem Lab, vinegar changes household bleach from alkaline to acidic which will make it 80 to 200 times more effective at being an antimicrobial product.

(Nancy Kerchevel – Bloomberg News) “Bleach has been used as a disinfectant for decades. People just assume it will kill everything on a countertop,” Miner said in an interview.

“It’s one of the myths.”

Bleach can’t be bottled in an acidic state because it’s unstable, Miner said in an interview. After a day, it would start losing the chlorine that gives it its bleaching power.

Researchers tested the vinegar recipe on dried bacterial spores, considered the most resistant to disinfectants used on microbes, the Euless, Texas-based company said.

After researchers swabbed surfaces with the acidic dilution, all the spores were dead in 20 minutes, Miner said. An alkaline dilution left only 2.5 percent of the areas free of microbes after the same amount of time.

Emergency Aid

“In the event of an emergency involving Bacillus anthracis spores contaminating such environmental surfaces as counter tops, desk and table tops, and floors, for example, virtually every household has a sporicidal sterilant available in the form of diluted, acidified bleach,” Miner said in a statement.The vinegar-laced bleach also killed aspergillus negri, commonly recognized by most people as the black fungi that infect the tile grout of shower stalls, Miner said.

“Diluted bleach at an alkaline pH is a relatively poor disinfectant, but acidified diluted bleach will virtually kill anything in 10 to 20 minutes,” Miner said.

Keep in mind that this solution will lose it’s effectiveness after about a day, since it will start losing the chlorine that gives it it’s bleaching power. For household use, given the short effective shelf-life of this solution, you’ll want to make it in smaller amounts that can be used on a day-to-day basis.

Resources

• Medical News Today
• American Society for Microbiology
• MicroChem Lab

Improper (or a lack of) sanitation is one of the key contributors to hundreds of thousands of deaths throughout the world each year. Although most of these incidents occur in third-world countries, recent history (Katrina; Auckland, New Zealand etc) has shown that even in short-term grid-down situations, major sanitation issues can quickly escalate into huge health problems. Combine that with a lack of medical services and you’ve got some serious problems.

For example, if the water services shut off and people lose the ability to flush, in a matter of a few days this can quickly turn into a sanitation and health nightmare. This is especially true in the cities where people don’t have other options as far as where to relieve themselves.

I know that sanitation is not as sexy a topic as the latest firearms, fire-making, or bug-out bags, but knowing how to keep clean and properly deal with waste and sewage are some of the most important pieces of knowledge to have as a modern survivalist. You CANNOT let your family become complacent about sanitation or you will all suffer the consequences.

In this upcoming series of articles, I’ll be explaining and demonstrating how you can keep things sanitary and properly dispose of waste in a grid-down situation — whether you’re a rural, suburban or city dweller.

Unfortunately, the average shelf life of liquid bleach (being stored between 50 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit) is around 6 months. After that, bleach will lose 20% of it’s strength at around the year mark and then 20% each year after that. So if you’re not vigilant about keeping it rotated, chances are when you need it for disinfecting water or to keep things clean you’ll be fresh out of bleach and luck.

There is a better option. What if you could make your own fresh chlorine bleach that could be used for both keeping things sanitary and will disinfect water? Here’s how:

How to Make Chlorine Bleach

Before we go into how to make it, I just wanted to point out the differences between this homemade chlorine bleach and your standard household Chlorox variety.

First off, liquid chlorine bleach is a solution made from mostly water and 3-6% Sodium Hypochlorite. This homemade variety is made from Calcium Hypochlorite which you can easily find as “pool shock” at your pool-supplier store or Walmart. Both are used throughout the world for water purification and are the main chemicals in standard household cleaning products.

The Benefit of Calcium Hypochlorite

The major benefit of using Calcium Hypochlorite over Sodium Hypochlorite is shelf life. Calcium Hypochlorite (pool shock) is sold in a solid granular form and has a 10 year shelf life when stored in a cool, dark place. This will easily meet your long-term storage needs.

The other benefit is the amount of available chlorine. The concentration of chlorine is much higher with Calcium Hypochlorite. For example, a small 1-pound bag of calcium hypochlorite can disinfect up to 10,000 gallons of drinking water. That’s around 5 gallons/day for one person for 5 1/2 years! Not bad for only 1 lb of granules.

Making Chlorine Bleach

To make a chlorine bleach solution using calcium hypochlorite, here are some formulas I got from the Army Technical Bulletin entitled, “SANITARY CONTROL AND SURVEILLANCE OF FIELD WATER SUPPLIES” (TB MED 577).

From the Army manual, to make a concentrated chlorine solution that you can use for disinfecting water (or to be used in maintaining a clean and sanitary living environment), you’ll want to use calcium hypochlorite that has around 70% available chlorine.

If you’re buying pool shock, on the back of the bag it will tell you what percentage of chlorine is available. The one I use is called “Zappit 73 Pool Shock, it is pure calcium hyphochlorite that contains up to 73% available chlorine and sells for around $5 for a 1lb bag.

To make the homemade chlorine bleach solution, you’ll need to do the following:

• Mix 2 level Tablespoons of Calcium Hypochlorite to 3 cups of water.

After you’ve made your stock of chlorine solution, you’ll want to follow the formula from the Army Technical Bulletin in determining how much of the above stock chlorine solution you’ll need for your desired number of gallons of water to be disinfected. *Note: I’ve updated the formula to calculate the same concentration that household bleach has. If you have questions, fire me an email and I’ll be more than happy to explain the math.

mL of stock chlorine required = (desired concentration (mg/L)*number of gallons to be treated)/18.12

The desired concentration refers to how much chlorine in mg/L you want the disinfected water to have. A recommended amount is 7 mg/L of concentration. This equates to adding 8 drops of household liquid bleach to 1 gallon of water (the recommended amount when disinfecting water with household bleach).

Given these amounts, if you wanted to disinfect 1 gallon of water with the homemade chlorine solution, the formula would be as follows:

(7*1)/18.12

This equates to .38mL or 8 drops of the concentrated solution per gallon of water. Just like normal household bleach!

So the 3 step process is as follows:

1. Place 8 drops of homemade chlorine bleach in 1 gallon of water
2. Let stand for 30 min
3. If water is still cloudy, repeat steps until clear; otherwise it is ready to drink

Keep in mind, that once the homemade chlorine bleach is made it will follow the same shelf-life limitations as standard household liquid bleach. So be sure to only make amounts you will be using within that time frame.

I see them every year around this time lying in front of their houses, waiting for the trash man to come pick them up. While many of them are junk, there are quite a few whose engines just need a little tune up and can be used to convert into a generator.

Converting a lawn mower into a generator is not a complicated process. Here are the parts you’ll need:

1. Engine
2. Alternator
3. Electrical Wires
4. V-Belt
5. Pully
6. (optional) Mounting Bracket

How to Convert a Lawn Mower Into a Generator

There’s a number of great sites online that details this process. Here is a couple of the more notable ones:

• EpiCenter.com: These guys go into some good detail on how to convert a lawn mower into a generator, detailing setup, build, and wiring. What’s great is that they sell all the parts you need so you don’t have to go digging through the web to find the different parts.
• HomeDNS.org: Some good details into converting a lawn mower into a generator.

Lawn mower Generator Examples

For some inspiration, here are some videos on Youtube showing some different designs for homemade lawn mower generators:

The following article, A Primer on Situational Awareness is republished with permission of STRATFOR. (STRATFOR — officially known as Strategic Forcasting Inc. — is a private global-intelligence company that provides excellent analysis of foreign and domestic intelligence and which I highly recommend).

The world is a wonderful place, but it can also be a dangerous one. In almost every corner of the globe militants of some political persuasion are plotting terror attacks — and these attacks can happen in London or New York, not just in Peshawar or Baghdad. Meanwhile, criminals operate wherever there are people, seeking to steal, rape, kidnap or kill.

Regardless of the threat, it is very important to recognize that criminal and terrorist attacks do not materialize out of thin air. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Criminals and terrorists follow a process when planning their actions, and this process has several distinct steps. This process has traditionally been referred to as the “terrorist attack cycle,” but if one looks at the issue thoughtfully, it becomes apparent that the same steps apply to nearly all crimes. Of course, there will be more time between steps in a complex crime like a kidnapping or car bombing than there will be between steps in a simple crime such as purse-snatching or shoplifting, where the steps can be completed quite rapidly. Nevertheless, the same steps are usually followed.

People who practice situational awareness can often spot this planning process as it unfolds and then take appropriate steps to avoid the dangerous situation or prevent it from happening altogether. Because of this, situational awareness is one of the key building blocks of effective personal security — and when exercised by large numbers of people, it can also be an important facet of national security. Since situational awareness is so important, and because we discuss situational awareness so frequently in our analyses, we thought it would be helpful to discuss the subject in detail and provide a primer that can be used by people in all sorts of situations.

Foundations

First and foremost, it needs to be noted that being aware of one’s surroundings and identifying potential threats and dangerous situations is more of a mindset than a hard skill. Because of this, situational awareness is not something that can be practiced only by highly trained government agents or specialized corporate security countersurveillance teams. Indeed, it can be exercised by anyone with the will and the discipline to do so.

An important element of the proper mindset is to first recognize that threats exist. Ignorance or denial of a threat — or completely tuning out one’s surroundings while in a public place — makes a person’s chances of quickly recognizing the threat and avoiding it slim to none. This is why apathy, denial and complacency can be (and often are) deadly. A second important element is understanding the need to take responsibility for one’s own security. The resources of any government are finite and the authorities simply cannot be everywhere and cannot stop every criminal action. The same principle applies to private security at businesses or other institutions, like places of worship. Therefore, people need to look out for themselves and their neighbors.

Another important facet of this mindset is learning to trust your “gut” or intuition. Many times a person’s subconscious can notice subtle signs of danger that the conscious mind has difficulty quantifying or articulating. Many people who are victimized frequently experience such feelings of danger prior to an incident, but choose to ignore them. Even a potentially threatening person not making an immediate move — or even if the person wanders off quickly after a moment of eye contact — does not mean there was no threat.

Levels of Awareness

People typically operate on five distinct levels of awareness. There are many ways to describe these levels (“Cooper’s colors,” for example, which is a system frequently used in law enforcement and military training), but perhaps the most effective way to illustrate the differences between the levels is to compare them to the different degrees of attention we practice while driving. For our purposes here we will refer to the five levels as “tuned out;” “relaxed awareness;” “focused awareness;” “high alert” and “comatose.”

The first level, tuned out, is like when you are driving in a very familiar environment or are engrossed in thought, a daydream, a song on the radio or even by the kids fighting in the backseat. Increasingly, cell phone calls and texting are also causing people to tune out while they drive. Have you ever gotten into the car and arrived somewhere without even really thinking about your drive there? If so, then you’ve experienced being tuned out.

The second level of awareness, relaxed awareness, is like defensive driving. This is a state in which you are relaxed but you are also watching the other cars on the road and are looking well ahead for potential road hazards. If another driver looks like he may not stop at the intersection ahead, you tap your brakes to slow your car in case he does not. Defensive driving does not make you weary, and you can drive this way for a long time if you have the discipline to keep yourself at this level, but it is very easy to slip into tuned-out mode. If you are practicing defensive driving you can still enjoy the trip, look at the scenery and listen to the radio, but you cannot allow yourself to get so engrossed in those distractions that they exclude everything else. You are relaxed and enjoying your drive, but you are still watching for road hazards, maintaining a safe following distance and keeping an eye on the behavior of the drivers around you.

The next level of awareness, focused awareness, is like driving in hazardous road conditions. You need to practice this level of awareness when you are driving on icy or slushy roads — or the roads infested with potholes and erratic drivers that exist in many third-world countries. When you are driving in such an environment, you need to keep two hands on the wheel at all times and have your attention totally focused on the road and the other drivers. You don’t dare take your eyes off the road or let your attention wander. There is no time for cell phone calls or other distractions. The level of concentration required for this type of driving makes it extremely tiring and stressful. A drive that you normally would not think twice about will totally exhaust you under these conditions because it demands your prolonged and total concentration.

The fourth level of awareness is high alert. This is the level that induces an adrenaline rush, a prayer and a gasp for air all at the same time — “Watch out! There’s a deer in the road! Hit the brakes!” This also happens when that car you are watching doesn’t stop at the stop sign and pulls out right in front of you. High alert can be scary, but at this level you are still able to function. You can hit your brakes and keep your car under control. In fact, the adrenalin rush you get at this stage can sometimes even aid your reflexes. But, the human body can tolerate only short periods of high alert before becoming physically and mentally exhausted.

The last level of awareness, comatose, is what happens when you literally freeze at the wheel and cannot respond to stimuli, either because you have fallen asleep, or, at the other end of the spectrum, because you are petrified from panic. It is this panic-induced paralysis that concerns us most in relation to situational awareness. The comatose level of awareness (or perhaps more accurately, lack of awareness) is where you go into shock, your brain ceases to process information and you simply cannot react to the reality of the situation. Many times when this happens, a person can go into denial, believing that “this can’t be happening to me,” or the person can feel as though he or she is observing, rather than actually participating in, the event. Often, the passage of time will seem to grind to a halt. Crime victims frequently report experiencing this sensation and being unable to act during an unfolding crime.

Finding the Right Level

Now that we’ve discussed the different levels of awareness, let’s focus on identifying what level is ideal at a given time. The body and mind both require rest, so we have to spend several hours each day at the comatose level while asleep. When we are sitting at our homes watching a movie or reading a book, it is perfectly fine to operate in the tuned-out mode. However, some people will attempt to maintain the tuned-out mode in decidedly inappropriate environments (e.g., when they are out on the street at night in a third-world barrio), or they will maintain a mindset wherein they deny that they can be victimized by criminals. “That couldn’t happen to me, so there’s no need to watch for it.” They are tuned out.

Some people are so tuned out as they go through life that they miss even blatant signs of pending criminal activity directed specifically at them. In 1992, an American executive living in the Philippines was kidnapped by a Marxist kidnapping gang in Manila known as the “Red Scorpion Group.” When the man was debriefed following his rescue, he described in detail how the kidnappers had blocked off his car in traffic and abducted him. Then, to the surprise of the debriefing team, he said that on the day before he was abducted, the same group of guys had attempted to kidnap him at the exact same location, at the very same time of day and driving the same vehicle. The attackers had failed to adequately box his car in, however, and his driver was able to pull around the blocking vehicle and proceed to the office.

Since the executive did not consider himself to be a kidnapping target, he had just assumed that the incident the day before his abduction was “just another close call in crazy Manila traffic.” The executive and his driver had both been tuned out. Unfortunately, the executive paid for this lack of situational awareness by having to withstand an extremely traumatic kidnapping, which included almost being killed in the dramatic Philippine National Police operation that rescued him.

If you are tuned out while you are driving and something happens — say, a child runs out into the road or a car stops quickly in front of you — you will not see the problem coming. This usually means that you either do not see the hazard in time to avoid it and you hit it, or you totally panic and cannot react to it — neither is good. These reactions (or lack of reaction) occur because it is very difficult to change mental states quickly, especially when the adjustment requires moving several steps, say, from tuned out to high alert. It is like trying to shift your car directly from first gear into fifth and it shudders and stalls. Many times, when people are forced to make this mental jump and they panic (and stall), they go into shock and will actually freeze and be unable to take any action — they go comatose. This happens not only when driving but also when a criminal catches someone totally unaware and unprepared. While training does help people move up and down the alertness continuum, it is difficult for even highly trained individuals to transition from tuned out to high alert. This is why police officers, federal agents and military personnel receive so much training on situational awareness.

It is critical to stress here that situational awareness does not mean being paranoid or obsessively concerned about your security. It does not mean living with the irrational expectation that there is a dangerous criminal lurking behind every bush. In fact, people simply cannot operate in a state of focused awareness for extended periods, and high alert can be maintained only for very brief periods before exhaustion sets in. The “flight or fight” response can be very helpful if it can be controlled. When it gets out of control, however, a constant stream of adrenaline and stress is simply not healthy for the body or the mind. When people are constantly paranoid, they become mentally and physically burned out. Not only is this dangerous to physical and mental health, but security also suffers because it is very hard to be aware of your surroundings when you are a complete basket case. Therefore, operating constantly in a state of high alert is not the answer, nor is operating for prolonged periods in a state of focused alert, which can also be overly demanding and completely enervating. This is the process that results in alert fatigue. The human body was simply not designed to operate under constant stress. People (even highly skilled operators) require time to rest and recover.

Because of this, the basic level of situational awareness that should be practiced most of the time is relaxed awareness, a state of mind that can be maintained indefinitely without all the stress and fatigue associated with focused awareness or high alert. Relaxed awareness is not tiring, and it allows you to enjoy life while rewarding you with an effective level of personal security. When you are in an area where there is potential danger (which, by definition, is almost anywhere), you should go through most of your day in a state of relaxed awareness. Then if you spot something out of the ordinary that could be a potential threat, you can “dial yourself up” to a state of focused awareness and take a careful look at that potential threat (and also look for others in the area).

If the potential threat proves innocuous, or is simply a false alarm, you can dial yourself back down into relaxed awareness and continue on your merry way. If, on the other hand, you look and determine that the potential threat is a probable threat, seeing it in advance allows you to take actions to avoid it. You may never need to elevate to high alert, since you have avoided the problem at an early stage. However, once you are in a state of focused awareness you are far better prepared to handle the jump to high alert if the threat does change from potential to actual — if the three guys lurking on the corner do start coming toward you and look as if they are reaching for weapons. The chances of you going comatose are far less if you jump from focused awareness to high alert than if you are caught by surprise and “forced” to go into high alert from tuned out. An illustration of this would be the difference between a car making a sudden stop in front of a person when the driver is practicing defensive driving, compared to a car that makes a sudden stop in front of a person when the driver is sending a text message.

Of course, if you know that you must go into an area that is very dangerous, you should dial yourself up to focused awareness when you are in that area. For example, if there is a specific section of highway where a lot of improvised explosive devices detonate and ambushes occur, or if there is a part of a city that is controlled (and patrolled) by criminal gangs — and you cannot avoid these danger areas for whatever reason — it would be prudent to heighten your level of awareness when you are in those areas. An increased level of awareness is also prudent when engaging in common or everyday tasks, such as visiting an ATM or walking to the car in a dark parking lot. The seemingly trivial nature of these common tasks can make it all too easy to go on “autopilot” and thus expose yourself to threats. When the time of potential danger has passed, you can then go back to a state of relaxed awareness.

This process also demonstrates the importance of being familiar with your environment and the dangers that are present there. Such awareness allows you to avoid many threats and to be on the alert when you must venture into a dangerous area.

Clearly, few of us are living in the type of intense threat environment currently found in places like Mogadishu, Juarez or Kandahar. Nonetheless, average citizens all over the world face many different kinds of threats on a daily basis — from common thieves and assailants to criminals and mentally disturbed individuals aiming to conduct violent acts to militants wanting to carry out large-scale attacks against subways and aircraft.

Many of the steps required to conduct these attacks must be accomplished in a manner that makes the actions visible to the potential victim and outside observers. It is at these junctures that people practicing situational awareness can detect these attack steps, avoid the danger and alert the authorities. When people practice situational awareness they not only can keep themselves safer but they can also help keep others safe. And when groups of people practice situational awareness together they can help keep their schools, houses of worship, workplaces and cities safe from danger.

And as we’ve discussed many times before, as the terrorist threat continues to devolve into one almost as diffuse as the criminal threat, ordinary citizens are also becoming an increasingly important national security resource.

Do you have the resources to make the trek back home by foot? Or are you going to remain where you are, hoping for the government to come help you and possibly risking an attack by looters or worse? This is where you need your Get-Home Bag.

What is a Get Home Bag?

The purpose of a Get-Home Bag is to get you to your home or to some other shelter-in location safely and as quickly as possible.

A Get-Home Bag is different than a Bug-Out Bag in that it is designed to be carried with you at all times (or at least readily accessible) any time you’re away from home. While a typical Bug-Out Bag is stocked full of items to support you for at least 3 days, a Get-Home Bag should contain the minimal amount of items to support you in getting home within a 24-hour period.

What Type of Bag Should I Choose?

If you are caught in a situation where looting and other forms of lawlessness is breaking out (remember Katrina), the last thing you want to do is stand out from the crowd. It’s at those times that you want to be the Gray Man and fade into the background.

If your Get-Home Bag screams “tactical” or looks like you’re carrying a load of preps, you could be a target. For that reason, the main thing you want to ensure is that the bag is discreet.

If you’re female, you’ve already got it made. A purse is discreet but also the larger handbags are often seen being carried by women so not only do they blend in well but they can carry a bunch of stuff.

For you guys, a simple messenger bag works wonders. Especially in the cities, messenger bags are seen being carried by guys more and more so they blend in real well.

I carry 5.11′s PUSH Pack everywhere I go. It’s not overly tactical looking, it has a small footprint (it looks like a camera bag) with multiple compartments and has strategically placed MOLLE webbing so that it can carry a bunch of stuff for its size. Since half the time mine has a baby bottle in one of the outside water-bottle compartments, it looks like a glorified diaper bag — perfect for blending in.

If you can’t deal with the Man Purses, go for a standard back pack. Just be sure not to abuse its size with a crap load of gear. Keep it under 15 pounds. Anything over that and you’ll soon give up carrying it around on a day-to-day basis.

In most cases, try to stay away from the Alice Pack or MOLLE Pack type of look. If it’s overly military looking or you have a bunch of MOLLE webbing with all sorts of gear riding on it, you’ll attract undesired attention since it looks like you’ve got a bunch of supplies on you (and they’d be right).

Just keep it simple and go for what blends.

What Should Your Get-Home Bag Contain?

What you pack in your Get-Home Bag is obviously dictated by personal preference and what your needs are. However, if you’re unsure as how to organize it, perhaps I can share what I carry in my Get-Home Bag and hopefully it’ll give you some ideas on how best to organize yours.

As with all my preparations, they are organized into what I call the 5 Pillars of Survival: personal security, shelter, water, fire, and food.

Personal Security

The Personal Security portion of your Get-Home Bag has to do with those items which will keep you safe and keep you alive (in the case of injury).

If you have the option to carry a concealed firearm in your state and you are comfortable with that, by all means I would recommend that. Otherwise, if it’s not an option, you can carry a knife, pepper spray, stun gun or any other item that can protect you from animals of both the 4-legged and 2-legged-walking-upright variety.

Here’s what my GHB contains:

• Glock 22 with 15 rounds of hollow-point 40 caliber ammunition
• Benchmade RSK MK1 folding knife (this, I clip to my pants)
• stripped-down version of my trauma kit containing: Quick-Clot (combat gauze), Israeli bandage, pain-killers and nitrile gloves

Shelter

The Shelter portion of your Get-Home Bag includes those items that protect you from the elements. Since you will most likely not be carrying a tent around with you at all times of the day, your limited with regards to size and weight.

My GHB contains one of the simplest and lightest shelters available: a space blanket. These ingenious devices are waterproof, windproof, and can reflect up to 97% of the radiated heat your body throws off. The down side is, since they are so reflective they aren’t very discreet.

If you are worried about being observed, then you’ll want to be sure to cover up the space blanket some how. Or if you can afford the space in you GHB, the military has a field version of a space blanket (often called a “Casualty Blanket“). The casualty blanket is olive drab on the outside so it’s a bit more discreet. It also provides greater durability and warmth than a basic space blanket, but at the cost of greater bulk and weight.

Unfortunately my GHB can’t afford to give up that space, so for now — until something better comes along — I’m stuck with a standard space blanket. (Update: 9/15/11 – I was able to find an olive drab space blanket here)

Water

The Water portion of your Get-Home Bag includes water itself or those items that allow you to hold, filter, and purify water.

If you were forced into a 24-hour trek back home, dehydration will quickly become a very real issue. That’s why it’s so important that you have either water on you or some means of getting and purifying it. The benefit of living in New England is water is always a stone’s throw away, however it may not always be the cleanest. For this reason I carry the following:

• small hydration bladder
• iodine crystals (Polar Pure) for purifying
• bandanna (for sediment filtering and many other purposes)

If you live in a more arid environment, consider carrying at least a small water bottle along with you.

Fire

The Fire portion of your Get-Home Bag includes those items that you need to reliably start a fire.

I wouldn’t recommend packing some obscure “cool” fire-making implement like a battery and steel wool or a fire piston. Remember, this isn’t about impressing your friends but about survival. Instead, pack something you know you’ll be able to start a fire with (especially in wet conditions) like a lighter or waterproof matches.

Remember, redundancy is a good thing so pack in a firesteel and some Vaseline-coated cotton balls while your at it. These implements hardly take up any space so if you can carry more than one option, by all means go for it.

Here’s what’s in mine:

• lighter
• matches
• firesteel and Vaseline coated cotton balls

Food

The Food portion of your Get-Home Bag includes enough food to carry you through a 24-hour period.

Food is the last on the list of importance in a survival situation (in this case, getting home). You can actually go for quite a bit without food (~ 3 weeks) however, in a high-stress situation liking humping it though a disaster area, you’ll be burning up calories like crazy so having something on hand will give you that needed boost.

For the food part of your Get-Home Bag you’ll want to avoid any high-water-content containing foods like canned goods or fresh foods. Instead pack some simple, dense, calorie-rich foods that save space and take no extra preparation beyond tearing open a wrapper. Dehydrated foods and dense candy bars are more along the lines of what you want.

For my bag I carry four 400-calorie emergency bars. It’s not gourmet but it will carry me through until I get home.

Beyond the Essentials

The elements of your GHB that make up the each of the five Pillars of Survival above should be the minimum required to get you home, but if your bag still has some room in it, may I suggest a few more things which can greatly aid you in the getting-home process.

What I Currently Have in My Bag

Beyond the basic items listed above, here are the other items I am currently carrying:

• Maps: I carry foldable topo maps (homemade from MyTopo via Google Maps) of my area. This encompasses where I work, my home, and the areas in-between. This way, I can figure out how best to navigate around potentially unsafe or inaccessible areas.
• GPS: This would be my primary means of navigation if satellite coverage is available.
• A compass: Since I have experience and training in orienteering (navigating by compass), I carry a small compass that can provide a back-up in case my GPS were to go down (via EMP or otherwise):
• Survival Knife: I carry a Bark River Bravo 1.
• Paracord: Too many reasons to list here.
• Lock-Pick and Bump-Key set: You never know what types of buildings you may need to get into or through in your attempts to get out of an area or into a safer shelter-in location.
• Surefire E2D LED flashlight: Flashlights not only light the way in darkened areas but provide a tactical advantage.
• Leatherman Wave multi-tool: The name speaks for itself.

What I would like to carry if I had the room

Given my current configuration, here are some items that I would like to carry but do not quite fit:

• Breaching tool: A crowbar or modified Stanley Fatmax makes for an excellent breaching tool for getting into and out of areas in an urban environment.
• Alternate footwear: The chances are good that the stuff could hit the fan while I’m at work. A 45-mile hump in a pair of dockers is not my idea of fun. Unfortunately at the present time I can’t fit a set of running shoes in my GHB. I am currently looking into a pair of Vibram Five Fingers as a potential solution to this issue.

The Importance of Planning Ahead

The key to safely and successfully getting home is to plan ahead. Since your situation is probably different than mine, you need to figure out what potential hazards and obstacles you’d face given the area you’d likely be egressing from. This will dictate what types of things you’ll need to equip.

As with any form of survival training, be sure to practice with the tools you carry. Getting caught in an emergency situation is not the time to try out a new tool/technique for the first time. Be prepared ahead of time with both equipment and training.

]]> http://www.tacticalintelligence.net/blog/get-home-bag.htm/feed 28 http://www.tacticalintelligence.net/blog/mr-heater-big-buddy.htm http://www.tacticalintelligence.net/blog/mr-heater-big-buddy.htm#comments Thu, 20 Jan 2011 04:50:58 +0000 Tactical Intelligence http://www.tacticalintelligence.net/?p=1546 For those looking for a great emergency heating source this winter, check out the Big Buddy Heater by Mr. Heater.

To give you some background, my house is currently heated by a pellet stove. Even though it’s very efficient and heats the house nicely, the obvious issue is that it doesn’t work if there’s a power outage. As a backup I do have a wood-burning stove that I could install if there were an extended grid-down situation, but I wanted to have something that could be set up quickly and easily for short-term emergencies as well as a temporary solution until I would need to install the wood stove.

There were four things I was looking for: 1. It had to be propane fueled. 2. It needed to be portable. 3. It had to put out at least 10,000 BTU and 4. It had to be safe enough to use indoors. What I found that met all these requirements was the Mr. Heater Big Buddy heater. Here’s my review:

Setting up the Big Buddy Heater

Out of the box, the Big Buddy sets up very easily. It’s a simple matter of hooking up two disposable 1lb propane bottles (the ones that are typically used for camping applications) on either side of the heater, turning on the pilot light and firing up the heater.

Fitting a 20lb propane tank

Along with the Big Buddy, I also purchased a propane-tank adapter and hose. It actually accommodates two hoses to be fitted to the heater, allowing you to hook up two 20lb (or larger) propane tanks. The obvious benefit is extended run time. For example, two 1lb bottles will give you around 3 to 12 hours of heat (depending on what setting it’s on), whereas the two 20lb propane tanks last for 50 to 220 hours (again depending on the setting).
If you’re considering purchasing one of these hoses be sure to read my recommendations below.

Testing the Heat Output

Since I haven’t had this heater for that long I haven’t been able do any extensive testing but my initial impression is that this heater seems to put out a good amount of heat. There are 3 heat settings — low, medium, and high — which give off 4000/9000/18000 BTUs respectively.

With last night being in the early 20s (Fahrenheit) I thought I’d test it out for a few hours; so I ran this in a medium sized room (around 200 square feet) and it kept the room at a comfortable 73 degrees.

Features

• Battery or A/C powered blower fan for versatility
• Low, medium, and high heat level control knob for steady temperatures
• Key-shaped rear mounting holes for wall mounting
• Built-in Piezo starter for easy starts
• Automatic shut off for accidental tip-over and fume safety

Likes and Dislikes

Here’s a list of the good and bad:

Positives

• Propane Fueled: Propane is one of the most stable fuels around. The great benefit of that is that it will store for many years without degradation.
• Portable: Since this heater is lightweight and can be carried quite easily, it makes for a great bug-out heater. Also, it simplifies moving it around in different areas of the house in an emergency situation.
• High Heat Output: With a maximum output of 18000 BTUs, the Big Buddy puts out a lot of heat for such a small unit. It easily fits my requirements for an emergency heater.
• Can Be Used Indoors: For the most part, this heater is safe to use indoors. Even though the heater comes with a low-oxygen sensor that will shut the unit off if the sensor is activated, I would still recommend using a Carbon Monoxide alarm in the area where you are running this heater.

Negatives

• No AC Adapter: I don’t understand why they don’t provide the power cord for the blower fan. Instead it’s another “accessory” that you have to shell out money for. What a waste.
• Can Clog if Not Careful: See my comments under the advice section

Some Words of Advice


The most common issue I’ve read about that people have found with this heater is that the regulators and control valves get clogged when running a 20lb tank. As one reviewer mentioned, this can be avoided when you ensure that you always shut the tank off first, then let the heater run until it burns off all the fuel in the lines.

If this procedure is not followed, the high PSI coming from the propane tank will get trapped in the accessory hose causing it to chemically react with the rubber and leech out an oily residue. This oil will clog both the regulator and control valve essentially ruining your heater.

In case you happen to forget to follow the above procedure, I highly recommend you purchase either the gas line filter that will catch the oily substance or a hose that comes with a regulator which lowers the PSI and prevents the chemical leeching (this is what I did).

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