Preparedness for when

[Deleted User]

we have an underground rainwater harvesting tank, it collects from various roofs and we use it successfully for the washing machine and the toilets. The roofs are made from a special smooth fabric so is pretty well washed whenever it rains but bids still poop up there and you should see the airbourne pollutants that gather on top in a drought

We have lidded garden water butts which have a decent turnover. We have put the appropriate amount of bags of ceramic discs into each water butt and into the harvester last year, almost 3 cu m worth but it has been worth it as all the water is now clear. We put the first ones in some water butts 3 years ago and they take a little while to work but the water in each butt is clean and fresh and never gets green. The harvester water was getting smelly after yet another roasting summer, so we had the tank cleaned last summer and disinfected and then put the bags of discs in via strong fishing line. Lovely clear water already and I would buy the rings again
http://www.thefertileearthconsultancy.co.uk/aquafresh_em_ceramic_pipes_for_water_butts.html

In my shtf kit I do have 3 filter bottles that I bought some time ago, they make potable water from filthy water but will only be used in a dire emergency and only for drinking.

similar to but better than
http://www.blacks.co.uk/equipment/63001599-katadyn-mybottle-pur-assorted-0.html/546422/&cm_mmc=googleshop-_-shopping-_-feed-_-all?mkwid=sEGVKoXN_dc&pcrid=51297094702&gclid=CJzM-rC87cECFUTHtAodh3oAqw

general info
http://www.fitfortravel.nhs.uk/advice/general-travel-health-advice/water-purification.aspx

craigywv

I can use the water butts for to water my veg and fruit trees ok cant I? getting a bit confused with talk of poop lol.

jk0

craigywv wrote: »

I can use the water butts for to water my veg and fruit trees ok cant I? getting a bit confused with talk of poop lol.

Oh yes. That'll make them grow better than tap water, as it has added manure.

craigywv

jk0 wrote: »

Oh yes. That'll make them grow better than tap water, as it has added manure.

oh that's good better knowing this before tshtf thank-you x

BettiePage

happydays89 wrote: »

I Just put sky news on and caught the end of a story about a man prepping for Ebola and they said he preps for lots of different disasters and then they had a good laugh about him,then Stephen Dixon said there must be something wrong with the man and the most he would do would be to buy a couple of pot noodles.Why are we portrayed as weird idiots?

http://news.sky.com/story/1369768/preppers-in-a-spin-over-ebola-armageddon

Softstuff

GreyQueen wrote: »

I'm not sure about eccentricity, though? I thought the prerequistite for eccentricity was a certain degree of solvency? As in, I think I may be too poor to qualify as a genuine eccentric and may just be Odd.

Well, I'd say that most of the landed gentry you'd consider to be "eccentric" aren't all that solvent either! I'm given to thinking it can be called eccentric if you're pretty open about it, consider those that aren't to be abnormal and just go about your business regardless.

Need to have a clear out of my wardrobe pantry. Bought a fair few more quick meal things recently, but didn't stash them particularly well. I'm reminded that a stash is only good if items are well rotated and used and replaced before they go off.

daz378

i have a small life straw filter and i have 25 litres of drinking water....didnt i read there is a limit to how often you can use water purification tablets........ society does tend to mock us preppers......as the TPTB dont want "The great unwashed" to be too independant...Just finished my first 5 days back in work... after being on sick a month.....take care

GreyQueen

Glad to hear you're back at work, daz, and hope that the shoulder is bearing up.

The thing about modern society is that it has trained us to oursource commonsense to Them, with a understanding that They will have our back when the almost-inevitable happens (accident, disease, unemployment etc etc).

The trouble for us is that we aren't the people who drew up the social contract and it can be re-written by the other side at a moment's notice. Thus isn't so much a contract (an agreement between parties) as a one-sided dictatorship.

I've lost count of the number of good people I've met over the years who have laboured under the misapprehension that they would get help with this or that from the State, only to find out at the crucial time that they won't. Sometimes they never would have, sometimes an individual is operating on information gained from the school gate or the pub, which is either wrong or grossly out of date, and thus irrelevant.

If you have shaped your decisions based on being bailed out by the State, and that assistance isn't forthcoming, you are deep in the brown stuff.

And all that pre-supposes a functional State and an orderly society. Both of these can and do break down, either temporarily or semi-permanantly. Then you are left with what you have to hand, your skills and attitude, and the skills and attitudes of your associates.

Interesting link to the sky news article. I shall have to watch the clip later but the commentary about Ebola being difficult to catch made me smile. I've read a whole book about Ebola, from the point of view of the scientists working with it as USAMRID. People who really know about this stuff wake from screaming nightmares about it, it literally terrifies them.

In 1983, at USAMRID (the US military's medical research facility) , Ebola crossed a lab from infected monkeys they were researching on to try and find a cure to uninfected monkeys. It may have travelled in the air, it may have somehow been spread by monkeys hurling spittle or feces, but spread it did. The researchers also successfully spread Ebola to unifected monkeys by getting them to inhale near infected ones (no physical contact with bodily fluids). The vetinary scientist Major Nancy Jaxx, who was working on Ebola there, said that she knew in 1983 that Ebola was airborne.

There was also an outbreak of a strain of Ebola at a monkey-holding facililty at Reston, Washington, in 1986. It was spreading all across the facility, to animals which had no contact with each other. They died with the full horrors of Ebola, but the humans infected got only a flu-type illness.

I don't think the scientists know why Ebola Reston, as it came to be called, wasn't severe in humans, but it was definately spreading like the flu. And gawd help us all if this fast-evolving horror gets into an airborne transmission like the flu.

So, I would take phrases like not easy to catch and reassurances that it's in Africa and that's a long way away with a dumper-truckful of salt. And I shall be walking past the plague-pits from the Black Death on my way to work again today- they are still several feet higher than the surrounding ground, and some of the ancient houses where plague victims were nailed in as forced containment are still standing.

DawnW

BettiePage wrote: »

http://news.sky.com/story/1369768/preppers-in-a-spin-over-ebola-armageddon

I think that the guy is daft to agree to feature in the national media :eek:

However, looking at the comments underneath the article, many are pretty sensible and down to earth, ie from people who had taken sensible measures themselves, thinking in terms of what would happen if there were power cuts, bad weather, unemployment etc. Maybe there are more preppers than most people think - after all, for probably all previous generations, some degree of prepping, as far as circumstances allowed, was totally normal behaviour, and those who did not would have been considered irresponsible.

jk0

Well, you know I've been wondering about this 'not airborne' business.

It's said Ebola is spread by bodily fluids. Couldn't those include the fluids in the nose? So presumably if an infected monkey/human sneezes near an uninfected one, he is likely to catch it?