Overnighting in your car AFTER TSHTF

[NorthernRaider]

Overnighting in your car AFTER TSHTF
NR © 2012

Consider this issue, for reasons beyond your control you have had to bug out by car or van, OR you are away from home when TSHTF. Whatever the reason you need to park up overnight to rest up or watch and see how the situation develops.

(First point is quite simple if you have any say in buying the vehicle try and pick one that is dark brown, boring beige, green, or black and preferably NOT metallic)

You have decisions to make do you try and lose yourself among masses of other vehicles parked up in the city overnight, perhaps in a hotel car park, or hospital car park or residential street, maybe even on an industrial estate. In this case your only camouflage concern is to just get lost in the clutter of being hidden among a mass of other vehicles like hiding a tree in a forest. If you choose that option you just need to park up and lay low ensuring you are parked up ready to simply drive forward out of your parking spot to escape if needed. Naturally if you’re in a group or family one of you must take turns to keep watch for approaching trouble overnight.

You may deem it wise for the person on watch to be located away from the vehicle at a selected vantage spot giving the best all round view, ensure they have suitable foul weather clothing and a radio link back to the vehicle. No one should be on watch for more than two hours at a time if possible.

Some preppers however are more cautious (paranoid?) and will only park up overnight outside the town or city boundaries often selecting as remote a spot as possible. Scenic viewpoint car parks, Nature parks, By-passed old roads, Out of use farm tracks, Set back laybys, Woodland copses, Parks, Bridle ways, Public utility access roads, access tracks to cell towers etc

At this point in the article I wish to remind you that I am talking about parking up AFTER TSHTF when bad people may be about and looking for easy targets. You may be trying to bug in or bug out but either way for some reason you got stuck away from home.

So if this situation is likely, perhaps you work from a vehicle or travel a lot with your work or are employed as a mobile engineer or rep. But whatever the cause as a prepper you choose to lay up overnight out the way.

First of all find a suitable spot as far back off the highway as possible preferably hidden from the road by foliage, REVERSE in so you can drive straight out in a hurry if you have to bug out quick.
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If you plan ahead for this situation you will then use old hessian cloth or brown / black pieces of old cloth to cover over your lights, windows and mirrors / reflectors.
You need to obscure or cover any shiny bits on your vehicle that could reflect light from other vehicles lights.***

If you are super prepped you may have a camouflage net to drape over your vehicle, when you cover a vehicle with a cammo net you do NOT drape it to hug the body of the vehicle, the net should loosely cover the vehicle and be propped up in places using sticks to make the vehicle look like a natural irregular hump not an unnatural straight sided vehicle wearing a net like a tight dress. Extra live foliage from neighbouring trees, shrubs and plants can be collected and used to blend in your cammo net.

Make sure you are parked on firm ground, you don’t want to sink in overnight and be caught stuck when dawn breaks, if necessary keep 4 x pieces of old thick carpet or ½ ply wood to park on to spread the load of your vehicle on the soft ground.

If required or desirable you may choose to cut a switch of a shrub or bush and brush over the track or grass you drove over as you reversed into place, thus sweeping away or disguising at least your tyre tracks.

Same rules apply if you’re a group or family, someone stands watch all night changing round every 2 hours. Make sure anyone needing to relieve themselves knows where to go so they don’t get lost or make too much noise.

You may wish to consider fitting a switch to your vehicles lights that allows you to turn off your brake lights if you need to drive tactically at night without your lights on because the brake lights 21 watt bulb can be seen for over 10 miles on a clear night out in the countryside. It’s no use driving without headlights if every time you press the brake you light up the night sky with the lights on the back of the vehicle.

*** In winter if it’s snowing heavily swap out the brown hessian for some old white cotton sheets.

[Prepper1]

I've been stuck in soft ground before... Its not pretty... especially without a winch...
I can vouch personally for the wood though it does do the job... not tried carpet yet though,.

[Ghost]

I've got hessian and some camo netting for my small Bug out van. The van has a roof rack to allow me to drape both of these over it and brake up its outline.
I'd defo' park away from major cities , preferably in a country lane. I hadn't thought about the possibility of sinking so I'll get some carpet at the weekend and leave that in the back of the van.
As for the rear lights, well I'd just take the bulbs out, they are easy to get to so this wouldn't be a problem. I'd keep the front lights in though just in case.

[Paul]

Good post NR.
I spent time traveling round the UK.
One thing I learnt was the best place to park overnight was on a well lit 24 hr active industrial estate with a simple card in the window saying "working nights in <nearby firms name with night lights on>". That and a yellow spinner lamp on the roof.

Until I learnt that trick, the plod would move me on from lay bys, and even proper car parks.
Dunno how they knew but banging on the window was the usual trick round 2am.
The countryside wasn't immune to interference either.
Park up off the road and local farmers got upset.

As for the lights, I used to have that cut out switch you mentioned on the brake lights. That and a simple card to slot over the instrument panel lights. Some of them pygmy bulbs light up your face a treat.
Don't forget condensation either.
A steamed up vehicle is a dead giveaway of occupancy in autumn.
My cure? Small PC CPU fan blowing out of a roof vent. Just enough to change the air. Negligible current pull and dead quiet.

Learnt those tricks working for a PI office. Them and 101 uses for an empty plastic bottle and plastic bags (Phew).

Cam-net on a vehicle never works for me. I can never seem to break up the basic shape enough. So I don't bother.
Not even Chrome gets the treatment as I've never stopped headlights from reflecting even the smallest of beams as does glass and shiny car panels.

Basically I'm a tree in a woods type of guy.
After all, plain sight in context is a lot better than "oooh look, someone new is there".

[bigpaul]

many years ago-long long before prepping, 1st wife and i broke down in my old Ford Cortina, way out in the countryside near Chagford, had to just "drift" it back onto the grass verge and had to sleep there overnight before finding a phone( no mobiles in those days), every time a car went past it rocked the car and woke us up. in the morning managed to find a farmhouse to ring the AA!