UK crisis analogue prepping?

[Kim]

Where you gonna go?

Ob-Marcie: Ipswich?

[Cudzoziemiec]

Where you gonna go?

Ob-Marcie: Ipswich?

Marcie?

[Kim]

Where you gonna go?

Ob-Marcie: Ipswich?

Marcie?

Marcie Hatter, from the Russell T Davies documentary Dark Season.  A subject about which surprisingly little has survived onto the post-2000s internet.  Just imagine The Doctor as a snarky 14 year old with bad hair.  My user icon refers.

[quixoticgeek]

you can keep a pack of them in your go bag

You can keep a lot of things in your go bag – and you evidently do – but you're missing a point.

Where you gonna go?

That very much depends on the event for which I need the go bag.

- gas leak requiring building evacuation for a couple of days - I'll go crash on a friend sofa.
- floods in the are - rest centre, or friend in an unaffected area.
- fire - outside the building in the first instance
- epic disaster - by bike, east probably.

It very much depends on what happens. But doesn't stop it being useful to have a go bag ready.

When I was a volunteer with a large emergency aid charity in the UK I was trained to operate rest centres, and although I only had to put that training into action once during floods, it has given me a good idea what to expect.

J

[cycleman]

West might be better be better if flooding is the problem Kim. Hills tend not to flood 

[Basil]

But only half of the West is hills.  The other half is valleys.   Could get crowded.

[MikeFromLFE]

you can keep a pack of them in your go bag

You can keep a lot of things in your go bag – and you evidently do – but you're missing a point.

Where you gonna go?

That very much depends on the event for which I need the go bag.

- gas leak requiring building evacuation for a couple of days - I'll go crash on a friend sofa.
- floods in the are - rest centre, or friend in an unaffected area.
- fire - outside the building in the first instance
- epic disaster - by bike, east probably.

It very much depends on what happens. But doesn't stop it being useful to have a go bag ready.

When I was a volunteer with a large emergency aid charity in the UK I was trained to operate rest centres, and although I only had to put that training into action once during floods, it has given me a good idea what to expect.

J

Exactly the scenarios I expect.
The bag is for the unlikely event of having to leave the house for several hours / a few days and to make that experience slightly more bearable than relying purely on local authority / emergency service provision.

Someone up-thread mentioned being unwell and unable to leave the house for a while - that's in the general plan as well (along with grocery delivery services).

If any or all of the four horsemen of the apocalypse arrive in Leicester, I'm probably going to be trampled anyway.

[mrcharly-YHT]

We used to live on a barge, on a river that flooded. So, needing a grab bag was not only something we had, it was something we used.

Bare essentials kept in vehicle, important docs kept in bag that could be grabbed if something like barge started to sink.

[Cudzoziemiec]

you can keep a pack of them in your go bag

You can keep a lot of things in your go bag – and you evidently do – but you're missing a point.

Where you gonna go?

That very much depends on the event for which I need the go bag.

- gas leak requiring building evacuation for a couple of days - I'll go crash on a friend sofa.
- floods in the are - rest centre, or friend in an unaffected area.
- fire - outside the building in the first instance
- epic disaster - by bike, east probably.

It very much depends on what happens. But doesn't stop it being useful to have a go bag ready.

When I was a volunteer with a large emergency aid charity in the UK I was trained to operate rest centres, and although I only had to put that training into action once during floods, it has given me a good idea what to expect.

J

Exactly the scenarios I expect.
The bag is for the unlikely event of having to leave the house for several hours / a few days and to make that experience slightly more bearable than relying purely on local authority / emergency service provision.

Someone up-thread mentioned being unwell and unable to leave the house for a while - that's in the general plan as well (along with grocery delivery services).

If any or all of the four horsemen of the apocalypse arrive in Leicester, I'm probably going to be trampled anyway.

Living in a tower block raises you above the floods, but exposes you to gas leaks, fire, and the (apparently, at least) sudden discovery of major construction faults made 60 years ago: https://news.bristol.gov.uk/press-releases/4cc66c75-2d5c-4307-b08a-873a67c80bfc/evacuation-of-barton-house-bristol/

Heading east? That's into the perennial battleground, especially if you're starting in the Netherlands.

[quixoticgeek]

Living in a tower block raises you above the floods, but exposes you to gas leaks, fire, and the (apparently, at least) sudden discovery of major construction faults made 60 years ago: https://news.bristol.gov.uk/press-releases/4cc66c75-2d5c-4307-b08a-873a67c80bfc/evacuation-of-barton-house-bristol/

Heading east? That's into the perennial battleground, especially if you're starting in the Netherlands.

West would result in wet feet very quickly. As does north. South gets me Belgium. German I have some familiarity with the language and I have friends there.

Last week a friend of mine had to evacuate his apartment by climbing over the balcony to a neighbour. Why? Someone set off a bomb in the door way of a down stairs neighbour. There was fire in the stair well, he lost all his windows. He was allowed back in about 12 hours later. But now has the fun of sorting repairs.

Alas this is become more common. The number of small bombs that have gone off in Dutch cities this year is now in the hundreds. Cos organised crime.

J

[Regulator]

I've got a grab bag prepared (that goes back to my days of working in conflict zones).  We also have a number torches/lamps and a good supply of batteries.  We've also got a couple of oil lamps in the shed.

We probably have several weeks worth of food in cupboards/freezers and about 20lts of bottled water - but I also have two filtration systems that we can use to clean water if needed.  We have two large first aid kits and a couple of smaller packs.  We also have quite a large selections of various medications.

We have copies of key documents kept off site (including one of my passports).

And we have access to three guns, with quite a few pheasant and rabbits around...

[phantasmagoriana]

you can keep a pack of them in your go bag

You can keep a lot of things in your go bag – and you evidently do – but you're missing a point.

Where you gonna go?

I was far too tempted by this bunker when it was on the market last year (it's a bit far from Edinburgh without a car, and I expect the buses won't run in the event of apocalypse). I didn't bid in the end, and I hope I don't regret that decision in the future.

[Cudzoziemiec]

you can keep a pack of them in your go bag

You can keep a lot of things in your go bag – and you evidently do – but you're missing a point.

Where you gonna go?

I was far too tempted by this bunker when it was on the market last year (it's a bit far from Edinburgh without a car, and I expect the buses won't run in the event of apocalypse). I didn't bid in the end, and I hope I don't regret that decision in the future.

The listing states: "The bunker was not required to fulfil its nuclear war role.

Just in case anyone hadn't noticed!

The mecca of nuclear shelters must be the one under Box tunnel on the GWR – with rumoured SEKRIT RESERVE STEAM TRAINS which might or might not be as old as the shelter, if they exist, which of course they don't because if they did, they would have to be denied. What with that and the supposed alignment of the tunnel such that the sunrise shines through it on Brunel's birthday (or maybe his sister's) it's got to be the Stonehenge of shelters.

[Kim]

Objection - the Stonehenge of shelters is shirley the one under Stonehenge that the Illuminati control the weather from?

[Cudzoziemiec]

Yebbut they don't have steam trains, only a fusion-powered maglev monorail.

[Regulator]

Objection - the Stonehenge of shelters is shirley the one under Stonehenge that the Illuminati control the weather from?

Now you know why some of TPTB are angry with other parts of TPTB about the plan for the road tunnel under the henge...

[Morat]

It’ll be like the 70s when we had regular power cuts. It never did us any harm, but this time it’ll be like the Kraken wakes:

In the final phase, the aliens begin melting the polar ice caps, causing the sea level to rise. London and other ports are flooded, causing widespread social and political collapse. The government moves to Harrogate.

I do sometimes wonder how much more wailing there would be if we had 70s style powercuts nowadays. I think for a generation raised on Hive-Mind levels of instant communications it could be very disturbing.

Anyway, this thread reminds me I need to dig out the dipole antenna from the garage so I can stick it on the side of the house and get some 11m freebanding going

[Kim]

If we had regular power cuts we'd just be better prepared for power cuts.  Cellular networks would be able to attract customers by having 1990s levels of backup power, for example, rather than just seeing it as a wasted cost.

Rich people with houses would have island-capable solar systems, generators and transfer switches.  Perhaps auto-transformers if brown-outs were a regular occurance.

That sort of thing.

It's only the poor people who'd freezing their arses off in analogue hell.


The future is not evenly distributed.  You can look to the global south to see how regular power cuts work in the modern world.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Kim has spake my mind or pretty close to. It'd be very noisy and smelly.

[Morat]

If we had regular power cuts we'd just be better prepared for power cuts.  Cellular networks would be able to attract customers by having 1990s levels of backup power, for example, rather than just seeing it as a wasted cost.

Rich people with houses would have island-capable solar systems, generators and transfer switches.  Perhaps auto-transformers if brown-outs were a regular occurance.

That sort of thing.

It's only the poor people who'd freezing their arses off in analogue hell.


The future is not evenly distributed.  You can look to the global south to see how regular power cuts work in the modern world.

You are, as ever, correct. My previous employer owned a large rural house that was open to the public. I installed UPS on every desktop, till,
rack and bit of network gear. I was on first name terms with the UPS dealer. By the end of my time there, we had auto-switching standby generators. No Solar though, just diesel.

[quixoticgeek]

I wonder if we're gonna start seeing things like ADSL routers, cable modems, and fibre CPE coming with usb-C rather than DC barrel jacks. When we had work done on our mains power. It would have been very useful to just plug the router or modem into a usb power bank and keep it working. It's not like they are hugely power hungry...

On a semi related note, anyone else noticed lots of gootubers videos are sponsored by companies making big battery packs with integrated inverters of late? The units they are plugging often can do a kilowatt or 3 of output power, and store typically >1kwh of energy. One channel had about 4 of them plugged together to driver a welder...

I'm not sure how great they would be for emergency backup. Keeping it plugged in all the time is gonna knacker it. But at 2-3% self discharge per month. You'd lose a quarter of your charge per year. Assuming LiFePo4 chemistry. Beats lugging extension cables out into the garden tho...

J

[Tod28]

Keeping it plugged in all the time is gonna knacker it.

J

Not at all, the BMS in the kit is controlling the state of tharge, ratjer tjan the act of plugging it in.  My LiFePO4 batteries' loss is very, very, low when stored with the BMS turned off.

[Tod28]

I wonder if we're gonna start seeing things like ADSL routers, cable modems, and fibre CPE coming with usb-C rather than DC barrel jacks. When we had work done on our mains power. It would have been very useful to just plug the router or modem into a usb power bank and keep it working. It's not like they are hugely power hungry...

On a semi related note, anyone else noticed lots of gootubers videos are sponsored by companies making big battery packs with integrated inverters of late? The units they are plugging often can do a kilowatt or 3 of output power, and store typically >1kwh of energy. One channel had about 4 of them plugged together to driver a welder...

I'm not sure how great they would be for emergency backup. Keeping it plugged in all the time is gonna knacker it. But at 2-3% self discharge per month. You'd lose a quarter of your charge per year. Assuming LiFePo4 chemistry. Beats lugging extension cables out into the garden tho...

J

[Kim]

On a semi related note, anyone else noticed lots of gootubers videos are sponsored by companies making big battery packs with integrated inverters of late? The units they are plugging often can do a kilowatt or 3 of output power, and store typically >1kwh of energy. One channel had about 4 of them plugged together to driver a welder...

I'm not sure how great they would be for emergency backup. Keeping it plugged in all the time is gonna knacker it. But at 2-3% self discharge per month. You'd lose a quarter of your charge per year. Assuming LiFePo4 chemistry. Beats lugging extension cables out into the garden tho...

I reckon they'd be excellent if you were regularly using them for something.  Much less so if you aren't.

I bought a cheap 48V -> 220VAC inverter so we can power things from barakta's trike battery (~800Wh of LiFePO4).  It's been useful in a couple of actual power cuts, and has allowed us not to use a infernal combustion generator for a few BHPC events^[1] where there isn't mains power at the track.  One of those large power bank things would be ideal for this sort of use case.


_{[1] Our timing setup needs something of the order of 70-150VA, depending on whether there's a race in progress and how many digits are lit up on the LAZER DISPLAY BOARD™, so it can reasonably power the lot for over 6 hours.}

[Afasoas]

We don't have 'go bags' but we have lots of tourches; lots of rechargeable batteries charged. Camping stove and gas. Dry foods. Lots of blankets. 20 litres of water.
It seems we just experience a significant plumbing or utility failure in the run up to Christmas each year. Currently without heating until a new condensate hose (the one that runs between the actual boiler and condensate trap) is delivered.

I think we'd be able to grab the essentials pretty quickly. I've got quite one HF and several VHF/UHF radios that will run on batteries. Haven't gone so far as to store one in a faraday container yet.
I also have all the bits together to build a portable solar power generator that will run a radio, charge a mobile and/or laptop. Primary purpose of this, when I find time to put it together, is radio operating out in the field (camping trips) but it is nice that it potentially does double duty during zombocalypse.

The thing that will knacker us though, is that if societal breakdown does occur, someone will just bludgeon us both to death with a blunt instrument in order to take our provisions.