Interesting prepper article
 

Pretty cool piece in the New Yorker about high end preppers--lotsa tech guys and hedge fund managers.

I'm wondering how many here have set aside some level of preparation for the apocalypse, in whatever form it may take--civil unrest, nuclear attack, earthquakes, ever larger fires. Here in Killer Quake Country, I think it's a good idea to have a pretty high level of readiness.

Curious about what folks here are doing.

not a whole lot.

If you have enough lead, you can get all the gold you need...

But wtf good is gold in that scenario?


And no I don’t prep...

Have a friend whom got to where his business is doing well enough that currently money is no longer an issue. Got very interested in what to do to keep his lack of need for money to be comfortable in the future. Ended up getting involved in a prepper community in a undisclosed remote location. Think it's more of a last resort community for community based self sufficiency and protection.

Always felt you can't eat gold and it doesn't do you much good if everyone else is hungry too.

The Y2K scare was pretty interesting.

There is a book by James Bruke, The Day the Universe Changed. That starts by examining the more technology we have the more we are dependent on it for our daily needs. And how we are losing the ability to be able to go back if needed.

There is also a book called Mail Evil That is about a guy building a seigeable self sufficient castle with everything it needed like it was when that was possible. An apocalypse happens and the story goes on how he and his friend trying to live in and defend the castle from the marauders.

I'm definitely not a prepper but I can understand why people do it.

I figure if it happens I'll make do.

Same here...might even make some "don't", but whatever it takes.

Not a prepper but has a pretty good supply of can goods. ;)

Paranoid rich people. :rolleyes:

No fantasies of the end times, or an EMP taking out everything electric, or a zombie outbreak, or a asteroid hitting the planet.

Most of my prep and planning is for things that are actually likely to happen and have happened - like a medical emergency (ambulance is 5 to 50 minutes away as is LE response), vehicle break down in nasty weather, or a week or longer of no power after a hurricane. All of which happen to me on what seems to be a far too regular basis. Generator, checking it in May, replenishing 50+gallons of potable water and 20 gallons generator gas when the first named storm pops up, a case of MREs and other open-heat-and-eat foods, etc. In the cars are a tarp, flash lights, cheap air compressor, some rope, etc.

I'm 15 miles out of a a 120k person city, 2 hours by car away from really big cities (Orlando, Jax, Tampa) not so worried about civil unrest. No serious prep on that front, but even eliminating the 22lr spoons and ammo, I have enough to cover all of the adults in my house plus a few guests with a rifle/carbine and a few full mags. If I lived closer to the big cities, or heaven forbid actually *in* one of them, I'd take this side of things far more seriously.

I haven't met a prepper that I'd want to share the world with. One bullet will take care of my needs.

You share it with them now, you realize?

They are diluted in the general population, easy to ignore.

I think he means when it's just him and them.

Id10t is spot on....if/when the shtf, "country folks" will fare much better than "city slickers" imo....

I'll head "back to the country"....

No prepping necessary...

I just can’t imagine that any apocalypse is likely enough to really worry about. If I lived in California or the costal areas where earthquakes or hurricanes are going to happen for certain, someday it might be different.
We have enough food in the cabinets to keep us fed for a few weeks. Maybe a giant unlikely snow storm might keep us home bound for a while. Really unlikely.
Tornadoes, even the biggest one ever in history of the planet that hit several miles away only damage a very small percent of the city. Civilization is just a few blocks away.

I'm off to Mass in a few minutes. I know that's not for everyone (and not trying to make this PARF), but that's my prepping. None of us live forever no matter how much prepping we do. Even rich guys.

Oh, and yes, I have a gun (or two). :)

I just had a full week of a southern apocalypse :(. Heading out the door ..."free at last, free at last..." ;)

The house I bought sits on 5 acres, rural, and has southern exposed open grass (which you could grow stuff on) and running water nearby off the mountain. Although the property itself isn't really defensible, the access road to the neighborhood could be closed and the neighborhood itself would be hard to access.

Skynet, of course, with hunter killers and T1000 terminator units could infiltrate it, but it's out of the way enough ordinary city folk wouldn't bother coming here.

When Kim Jong was lighting off nuclear bombs last year, I did, slowly, and quietly, amass a large supply of ramen pride and canned food. As of present, I only have left a three day supply of ramen pride on hand, and there are plenty of deer in the yard, however, as one neighbor said, if the "end" came, local hunters would have that deer population culled out down to ZERO in less than a week.

He's right.

I don't think you can be prepared for everything. I do know several patients who are preppers and have large tracts of land west of here.

Sincerely,
John (no... Ron) Conner.

Guns.
Ammo.
Water filter.
Bleach.
N95 face masks.
A few canned or packaged food items.

Everything can be loaded into a minivan.

If I had space I would stock up more water.

I think the flaw in logic in "prepper communities" and "luxury bunkers" is that there is a basic assumption that you will be able to get to it when you need to, and that you will recognize that it is time to go when you can still get there.

I think when the SHTF, most of these facilities will be mostly empty.

There's also a good chance that SHTF doesn't happen in my lifetime...

I would think the ability to distill alcohol would come in handy for both fuel and booze. I would imagine long term it would make a nice currency.