(10 December 2012, 19:48)Geordie_Rob Wrote: Scythe13. I reckon a phone, cash & if possible, a small button compass so you know you are heading in right direction rather than in circles while moving through city streets. No weapon for me. If I came to a situation where I needed a weapon, I would offer my phone & cash in exchange for leaving me be.
Great answer.
I'd rather run than shoot. But totally agree with your logic. Sweet and simple. No need to do more than get away from the area you're in.
I also agree with David about not needing to offer anything...in all likelihood.
Look at the London bombings, 9/11, the Tsunami in 2005, the tsunami that hit Japan, Superstorm Sandy, Katrina, and the alike. In the first few hours, people were not mugging each other. They were not looting. Hell, even the London riots took a little while (about 1hour and a half) before the looting took place. There was 1 instance of a kid being robbed by other looters!!! Yes, just 1 kid. Not saying it wasn't bad, but it's a RARE occurrence.
All you need is the ability to egress (that means exit) safely. A map will delay me and make me look like I don't know the area. A compass would be helpful, but not really needed, as your only desire is to head out of the area....not really in a specific direction.
Reading by the stars is cool, but again........too complicated, and reliant on low light pollution and clear skies....and it being night, which you said is when you'd move. But if a bomb goes off in the day, you can't use that system, and you wouldn't want to wait around. If a mad gunman is about, you wouldn't want to hang out for a while. If it's a chemical spill in the morning, you're not going to wait it out until a clear night sky arrives, with low light pollution.
The idea of roving gangs and the alike, is HUGELY over rated. If there's a band of looters coming my way.......who gives a crap. I'm not a policeman or carrying anything of value. I'm just a guy walking away or towards them. London riots, NY riots, and the alike. Not many instances of looters killing each other. 9/11 or the London bombings.....same there. No looters or wild gangs killing victims of the catastrophes.
Keep it simple and realistic.
For about 90% of situations, you're unlikely to be catastrophically injured (look at 9/11, people involved, numbers SERIOUSLY injured, or London bombings, or London riots, etc) so you can just walk away from the 'danger zone'...and all you need is to check your family is okay (mobile phone or pay phone), maybe buy some food, water, a trip on a boat to evade an invading army (money/creditcard), and stay safe/protected (handgun).
As David and GR said, you don't even need the gun (but I'm a pussy and would rather have one.......stupid UK gun laws). Complicating some things, simply causes anxiety and pushes an early grave.
Would having some other equipment be nice? No doubt. A map would be good....once you're out of the danger-zone. Star navigation would help once you're out the city area. Prybars would be helpful to pull out nails from a bench (sorry mate, I've always had a gripe with mini-prybars).
You can even go one step further, and just say cash is all you need. Cash and walking.
My principle in this thread was simple.
Get people back to basics and not over complicate EVERYTHING!!!
Can you always stay out of a city? YES, but it would be fricking boring for me and the wife. Can you always stay out of cities you don't know? YES, but it would be fricking boring for me and the wife.....oh, and we would both have much lower paying jobs. Oh wait....I mean, SHE would have a much lower paying job. I've changed career haha.
Truth be told, all the gear and great skills is completely useless in many situations. Am I saying 'don't carry them?' NO!!! I'm not saying that at all. But some things should be kept simple.
I'll use a quick example of keeping things simple.
You've got a car crash infront of you on the road. You see smoke comping from a car. Your natural instinct (if you're a decent human being) is to help the person stuck in the car. You grab your knife to cut the seatbelt, and then remember it has a glass breaker on it. You run over to the car with the unconscious person in it. The first thing you do is........check the door handle. Maybe you can open the door? You can't, it's locked. You break the window, then.....you unlock the door, if it's got the clicky button bits, and open the door. It's much easier to extract a person from an open door, than it is to drag them through a window you've just broken. Are you wasting time checking the door? HELL NO!!!! It takes 1 second to pull a door handle. A total of 3 seconds to pull a door lock up and check the handle to see if the door opens. Dragging a person over broken car window glass (yes it's safety glass, but it's still sharp enough to cut you and the person you're dragging through the window) should be a LAST resort.
People are often blinded by gear. Instead of doing the most obvious thing, they complicate things far beyond what is helpful.
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