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Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

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Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#321

Post by quickthrower2 »

bluGill wrote: post #306
quickthrower2 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes sense not to move if you own a home. Property will be hardest to sell right after disaster. Let alone moving means you need to convince your Family and their other family and their other family's family to move etc. Or go it alone but ties like that are strong. Is everyone on HN moving to their optimal place regardless of friends or family considerations?

Your current house is a sunk cost. I have sold a house at a loss and moved to a different city. I didn't like it, but moving was the right thing so I did.

That is true it's a sunk cost. But still gains made on the capital can be high after the disaster. It's like holding stocks after the GFC.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#322

Post by afterburner »

chiph wrote: post #292
tcoppi wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, there is no reason anyone should be on the roof of their homes in Houston other than inability to heed warnings and read a weather report.

The governor told people to leave. The mayor told people to stay. One of them isn't going to be reelected next term... Probably what should have happened (I'm using my perfect hindsight here..) is they should have told people living in low-lying areas to either go live with relatives or friends who were on high ground, or leave town altogether. And everyone else to stay. This would have prevented the mass exodus that…

I agree that the best option was people who had options leaving early enough that it didn't cause traffic snarls. That leaves emergency services with fewer people to handle in the worst case.

Despite what I said before, I agree it's a really tricky call, especially for authorities considering a mass evacuation, which is often not the best thing. Houston has a lot of people, that changes everything.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#323

Post by herewulf »

aedron wrote: post #272

The 'prepping' phenomenon is an expression of the extreme individualism (or less graciously, ego-centrism) of our time and society. Rather than assuming that society will come together in a crisis and help each other out, we need to become an army-of-one, stocked up for every scenario and armed to the teeth against dangerous others who are undoubtedly coming to take our shit. It's sad. I honestly think this another e…

Unfortunately many of us in the United States live in huge urban sprawls that are completely reliant on external resources being brought in to sustain ourselves. If the shit really hits the fan, there are not enough resources to go around. No amount of "coming together" can fix that. Stashing away a bit of water and food is not a hard thing. But we all know that most people will not. It is not a question of economic status, but of ignorance, laziness, and whatnot. The decision of ensuring the survival of my children versus helping unprepared strangers in a dire situation is not a hard one to make. I don't think that it will ever come to that but I make no assumptions and so I must prepare anyway.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#324

Post by PeterisP »

BatFastard wrote: post #33
saryant wrote: post #19

I've been in a number of major natural disasters at this point. Fukushima, Ike, Colorado's 2013 floods. I've also been in two shooting incidents (where fortunately only the shooter was hurt). My point is, I've been lucky so far because none of these posed a major problem for me. I made it out with manageable inconvenience. However, I can only get lucky like that so many times. So now I keep the following at home: * 5…

That will get you thru a week. But a week will get you thru everything but society collapsing, and if it does collapse I am not sure I want to continue.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Sarajevo is a good example of an unexpected situation that lasted much longer than a week, the society halfway collapsed, but it was clearly worth to continue.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#325

Post by 52-6F-62 »

maxerickson wrote: post #283
52-6F-62 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Toronto and I've always said if shit hits the fan, my first stop is probably Robarts Library at U of T. edit: photo -- http://www.blogto.com/upload/2015/04/20150415-Robarts-Side.j... The place is a massive, brutalist compound. And the knowledge it contains would be invaluable! Especially for people like me with limited biological or medical knowledge. The practical resources they knowledge would open up wou…

Just get a copy of something like https://www.amazon.com/Mayo-Clinic-Family-Health-Book/dp/160... 1400 pages of small print, plenty enough information relative to the time you would have to reference it in an urgent situation.

Awesome. Come to think of it, I think my parents may have had a copy.

Beyond that, there would be a ton of information on mechanics and ecology that I couldn't possibly keep in my head. Books on mycology, and other resources that would help in foraging would allow long walks through the countryside to be feasible. As long as one had some way to transport a small library of such materials!

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#326

Post by JshWright »

herewulf wrote: post #319
JshWright wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> etc. You can't just name three places in a very large country and then say 'etc'. There are plenty of places with much lower risks of natural disasters. That's a big part of the reason my family lives in central New York.

Upstate New York has some pretty terrible flooding. I don't know where you consider "central New York" (it is -- after all -- a large state). The corridor along I-86 (Elmira, Corning, Hornell, etc), where I lived for a few years, has built up extensive flood controls to prevent future damage. A lesson hard learned from multiple severe floods. Then there was bad flooding just a few years ago in the Mohawk River valley…

That's an easily solved problem though... don't buy a house in a floodplain...

I live in the hills southeast of Syracuse.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#327

Post by et-al »

arethuza wrote: post #246
smhinsey wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a really interesting episode of the UK show Grand Designs that follows someone in a flood prone area who built a house that essentially rests within its own drydock structure. Worth a watch if you find this sort of thing interesting and the show is fascinating in general. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16scx81p2w4

We spent nearly 9 months house hunting in Scotland - I was genuinely shocked to find out that new houses were often in fairly high risk areas for flooding. Trying to find somewhere rural in the right area with low flooding risk and low risk from mining related problems and with decent internet access was non-trivial.

Depending on where this is, you can think of it as generations of people have already picked out and settled in the naturally safe spots. What's left then are the less desirable, potentially riskier locations.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#328

Post by madengr »

grogenaut wrote: post #73
laydn wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't lived in an area prone to weather-related disasters. But, I feel like, most of these are avoidable (I mean, not the disaster itself but the "riding-it-out" part). Usually, there is plenty of time and warning so you can get out. Earthquakes though, are unpredicatable and they arrive with zero notice. And should the worst happen in an earthquake, you would not need many of the supplies in the list above. Wate…

Tornados are about as unpredictable as earthquakes.

Living in KS for 25 years, I have yet to see a tornado.

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#329

Post by Terr_ »

grogenaut wrote: post #73
laydn wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't lived in an area prone to weather-related disasters. But, I feel like, most of these are avoidable (I mean, not the disaster itself but the "riding-it-out" part). Usually, there is plenty of time and warning so you can get out. Earthquakes though, are unpredicatable and they arrive with zero notice. And should the worst happen in an earthquake, you would not need many of the supplies in the list above. Wate…

Tornados are about as unpredictable as earthquakes.

Aren't tornadoes far more localized, and thus less-likely to be one of those "help can't sauce for a week" scenarios?

Re: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

#330

Post by LyndsySimon »

notsayin wrote: post #40
bupku5 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I have a Glock 17 and a years' worth of ammo, so I don't need to stockpile the other stuff, you are doing it for me. (edit: hopefully it is obvious this is a play on words, speaking in the voice of a hypothetical desperate citizen. obviously I do not own a gun for the purposes of threatening others, only for self-protection) Sounds trollish but my point is that Californians in particular eventually need to square…

I have a TEC-9, thanks for stockpiling the ammo for me!

You only need a couple of rounds for a TEC-9 - I've never seen one fire more than that without jamming anyhow :)
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