When the SHTF – what do I do? Part 5

What do I do next?

Here we are back again and welcome all of you who found the first four of my When the SHTF series helpful.

What I will discuss in-depth next is going to keep you alive – WATER.

The human body is made up mainly of water and without replenishing it in 3 days time your body will shut down and you’ll quite simple keel over and die.

Me I choose to do what’s necessary to avoid that scenario and I hope you will too.

OK arm chair prepper’s this doesn’t mean reaching into the cooler for your next bottle of beer or adding an extra ice cube to your Jack and Coke.

What it means is learning how to have an adequate supply of clean water to consume to stay alive, focused and functional.

What is clean water? Not what you’re thinking just out of the tap because believe me I have been in places the tap water looked like urine, faintly yellow and with an odor. No I did not choose to have a glass.

emergency-water-filterClean water means safe to drink without giving you a case of the screaming diarrhea or parasitic organisms that will eventually cause you crippling pains writhing on the ground dying in agony.

Why am I being so cheerful in my descriptions because it’s the facts and only the facts impure or poisonous water can and will kill you fast or slow – your choice?

We will deal with finding in everyday life like right now as you read this series and in times when the excrement hit the oscillating blades which is the main purpose of my series.

Tap Water – There are 196 countries in the world today and over 100 of them have contaminated sources of water unfit for human consumption from the tap.

Consider yourself lucky that we have purified clean water sources in over 90% of the USA. What? Did I say 90% or was that a typo? No it wasn’t a typo it’s a fact that 10% of the 54,000 community water sources in the USA have below normal safety standards in place for safe to consume purified treated water.

Yes it’s a fact that the EPA regulates over 80 contaminants—including arsenic, e-coli, cryptosporidia, chlorine, and lead—that may be found in drinking water from public water systems. And with the droughts, oil drilling techniques and leeching pollutants our water sources are dwindling at an alarming rate.

Sounds scary huh? It is scary and you need to know it’s important to have filtration on your home tap and especially a means to protect yourself in case of the SHTF scenarios.

Home Water Filters – This is going to shock you maybe but they are not all created alike. Not all filters available will adequately take care of all contaminants. You can go to any Wal-Mart, Home Depot or Lowes and find enough different types to make you wonder ‘what the hell’.

In Home Uses – There are screwed on to the faucet types, under the counter, pitcher types that can be put in your refrigerator, outside types that require lots of maintenance and products added that will break the bank. So what do you chose?

What will work for your budget is what you choose.

Single carafe-style or pitcher type filters – These work incredibly well but water needs to be filled several times a day. They are all reasonably priced under $50 but consider the average family uses 12 gallons of drinking water a day.

Basic screwed on faucet types – these are numerous as fleas on a dog and priced from inexpensive models (under $25) to ridiculous priced models over $200. What do you need? Buy something that offers a two-stage filtration system to remove contaminants and give a better taste to the water. Chose reasonable and inexpensive for around $30 and you’ll need to replace about every 6 months.

Under the counter water filters – These are the best for use in a home for family use, provide a more effective technology that screwed on or pitcher type filters and is not visible being under the counter easily installed on current plumbing.

These require installation and are more expensive than other types.

Outside filtration systems – I’d go into these but honestly it doesn’t fit my program and they are dam expensive running from several hundred to several thousand dollars.

Now for things that pertain to when the SHTF.

How does this pertain to SHTF? They are all portable.

We have two types of usable portable filters for emergency water filtration and bug out scenarios.

There are great portable systems from MSR, Camelbak, Katadyne, Platypus, Lifestraw, Sawyer and SteriPen for under $100.

Yeah thanks your saying which ones do I recommend?

My personal favorites that I own are Katadyne Hiker Pro ($75) for heavy filtration use when on the go and LifeStraw Personal Filter ($20) for quickie drinks from streams. Here are numerous manufacturers and I definitely urge you to buy heavy use and quick use models and a minimum of five (5) extra filters for both.

That can get expensive your saying, yeah so can dying from being stupid – spend the extra money.

How much water do I need to filter at a time? For daily use you need at least a gallon for drinking and hygiene.

Drinking a minimum of 64-ounces a day for personal hydration. One gallon if you are exerting yourself.

Katadyne-Vario-Water-FilterFirst ChoiceKatadyne Hiker Pro ($80) is my baby. It weighs 11 ounces, will filter 200 gallons of water (6 months normal supply) and extra filters are about $45 and I always recommend at least 4 extra to for last 2-1/2 years of daily use.

I store my filtered water in a 100-ounce Camelbak hydro pack ($30) and two (2) 32-ounce Moosejaw Nalgene Tritan Water Bottles ($10 each) in backpack pockets. This allows me more than enough water to sustain myself throughout the day.

Second ChoiceLifeStraw Personal Filter ($20) this is great for quick drinking needs at a stream or creek to avoid animal feces bacteria and virus. It filters over 250 gallons of water and used like I use mine will last me a year so buy yourself two you’ll be glad you did when you need them. These are great for a bug out bag is lightweight and small.

FYI: I was told that it has been used to filter and drink saltwater but don’t take my word for that – check it out somewhere besides here – saltwater is caustic and should never be consumed no matter how thirsty you are.

Out in the woods, you have no money to buy a dam thing what can you do?

Paper coffee filters are about $5 for 500 of these little lifesavers, less at a $1 store.

You need four (4) things for emergency on the go filtration that works minimally – I said minimally so you’re taking your chances here but better than dying: 12’ x 12” square of plastic with a small 1/8” hole in the dead center, three paper coffee filters, string and four one foot long sticks.

Lay the square plastic sheet on the ground so you’ll see how much working area you need. Tie one stick fastening one end to each corner of the plastic and stick the non-tied stick ends in the ground so the plastic sheet is sagging slightly.

Any running water source is where you find your filter material best media is sand so dig down and get three (3) ½ cups of sand, one for each paper coffee filter and open each filter flat and dump the first ½ cup on the center of the filter spreading it with your fingers to within one (1) inch of the filters edge, do this three times then carefully stack one filter on the plastic sheets center and repeat the process one on top of the next one.

Place a cup or sterile container below the plastics hole and pour water slowly as not too splash sand all over and create a mess. The water will filter through this improvised three (3) stage filter and the water you get below is about 75% clean and won’t kill you but REMEMBER from a running water source and hopefully not downstream from a factory that polluted the water with poisons.

You have a portable tower filtration system you can take with you but always use a new paper filter.

Yep, this was a short one but one you’d dam well best read over and over cause it will save your sorry ass when the SHTF.

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