How long could you and yours survive at home?

Vortex · Post by **Vortex** » 25 May 2007, 20:44

I live virtually next door to a big Tesco and hope to be able to beat the crowd!

So now I know why you walk around Central London dropping earth out of your trousers ....

SILVERHARP2 · Post by **SILVERHARP2** » 25 May 2007, 20:57

I can't imagine a likely chain of events where the food supply totally breaks down but the utilities are working. however nothing wrong with having basics on hand that can be eaten without having to cook.

who says you need supermarkets to get food, try the sites below.

http://www.pfaf.org/

http://www.wildmanwildfood.com/

Keela · Post by **Keela** » 25 May 2007, 21:05

It was the FREEZER that threw me in this.....

.... I think of a freezer as a short term store... one week to the next for milk , bread and meat....

Long term storage should be electricity independent ... food in the ground... dried stuff..... preserved stuff etc....

Afterall it only takes 24hours or so to destroy everything frozen..!

I've lived in the country long enough - with at least one power cut a year of 2 - 3 days - to never keep much frozen.

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 25 May 2007, 21:40

clv101 wrote:
Totally_Baffled wrote:Chris have you finally gone over the dark side? Are you now a fast crash doomer ? (if so - I'm getting very nervous!)
My answer was "A Week" but I live virtually next door to a big Tesco and hope to be able to beat the crowd!

Do Tescos sell machine guns? You will need one if you are the only bugger with food after a week or two!!!

BTW I am with silverharp - although JIT disruptions are a big issue and would cause shortages - the situation can quickly be managed with demand control measures.

Although there is little stock cover in stores, there is quite a lot in the supply chain/storage before demand management measures. I believe there is several months in storage of petrol/diesel/crude oil , and I suspect a lot of food stuffs are the same (eg grains, rice, sugar, potatoes, etc etc)

The disruption (whatever it was) would have to be several months before the supply of absolutely everything was so f***ed that it was below the minimum amount required to prevent the riots!!

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 25 May 2007, 22:08

I'll be all right - I bought the first edition of this bookin 1989.

MacG · Post by **MacG** » 25 May 2007, 22:30

Totally_Baffled wrote:Although there is little stock cover in stores, there is quite a lot in the supply chain/storage before demand management measures. I believe there is several months in storage of petrol/diesel/crude oil , and I suspect a lot of food stuffs are the same (eg grains, rice, sugar, potatoes, etc etc)

The disruption (whatever it was) would have to be several months before the supply of absolutely everything was so f***ed that it was below the minimum amount required to prevent the riots!!

I hope you are right, you might very well be. Reality might even prove your assessment overly pessimistic. What nags me is that there is no proof, evidence or precedent to support your assumptions. We simply don't know!

There has been no systematic design or testing done on the supply systems assuming cascading failures, and there is no resilience intentionally built into them. There might actually be resilience in the systems, although we did not intentionally build it in them, but we wont know that until we test them. The actual testing could be voluntarily or involuntarily. We simply dont know!

I hope you are right, but I dont trust you completely!

Remember that a starving person can smell food from five kilometers or more.

Erik · Post by **Erik** » 25 May 2007, 23:02

MacG wrote:Remember that a starving person can smell food from five kilometers or more.

Will they have the energy to be able to walk that far though? And when they get there, how many other starving people will be homing in on the same free lunch? At what stage do they start eating each other?

My food-stock answer was a week. In other words we have made no special preparations whatsoever. Maybe once we've moved to our new house (somewhere with more storage space) then we'll start to stock more. But even if we had a month's stock, it all seems a bit futile. I mean if the SHTF in this way, then what happens next when we come out of "hiding", when we're confronted by the last crazy, starving and angry survivors, all roaming around and murdering each other over the last few mouthfuls of pedigree chum (or worse)? In such a situation I don't know what's worse, to survive a week or survive a month...

MacG · Post by **MacG** » 25 May 2007, 23:16

Erik wrote:In such a situation I don't know what's worse, to survive a week or survive a month...

Only a clothed, healthy and fed person ask such questions. I have worked in cancer clinics, and I can tell you this: When realities set in, we have a tendency to cling on to life, even if it's miserable. Most of the time we seem to judge life to be more worth than the alternative to life. Very few people in those cancer clinics asked for deliverance. The absolute majority clinged on to life. Until reality made other arrangements.

YossarianUK · Post by **YossarianUK** » 26 May 2007, 00:37

Totally_Baffled wrote: The disruption (whatever it was) would have to be several months before the supply of absolutely everything was so f***ed that it was below the minimum amount required to prevent the riots!!

I would have agreed if I didn't remember the fuel protests a few years ago. I was fine fuel wise, and with a bit of car sharing, could've travelled to work by car for a month.

But our local supermarket, on the last big day of the protest, had no milk, bread or eggs, and everything else was disappearing quickly.

Think about it for a second - if you weren't sure when the shops would be replenished, what would you buy to get you through. And if someone had got to the milk, bread, eggs, first - what would you buy?

Everything was selling pretty quickly until the lorry drivers started driving through the picket.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 26 May 2007, 02:18

I'm off to buy 6 months worth of shotgun cartridges to supplement my food supply. Must get the pump action shotgun as well. I'll also need a block and tackle to slaughter my cattle once the fuel runs out, stopping me taking them to the abattoir.

I must get on with building the wall around my garden (anyone want to come to one of my cob building weekends?) and move the diesel tanks and log store inside it. I've already spoken to the like minded friends who I want to share my house with when TSHTF. Nothing like safety in numbers.

SILVERHARP2 · Post by **SILVERHARP2** » 26 May 2007, 09:03

biffvernon wrote:I'll be all right - I bought the first edition of this bookin 1989.

I bought a copy of the book this year. we live beside the sea here and have discovered things in the book that grow in abundance that I wouldn't have realised you could eat.

Erik · Post by **Erik** » 26 May 2007, 15:28

MacG wrote:
Erik wrote:In such a situation I don't know what's worse, to survive a week or survive a month...
Only a clothed, healthy and fed person ask such questions. I have worked in cancer clinics, and I can tell you this: When realities set in, we have a tendency to cling on to life, even if it's miserable.

I agree. Of course people cling on to the end, it's human nature. And I've also seen such realities setting in, up close. We've probably all seen such suffering at some time or another. We'll all cling on as best as we can, and we will no doubt go to extraordinary lengths to prolong our existence.

But if we're talking about a scenario in which some will start to starve after 1 week whilst others will start to starve after 1 month (if they're not robbed of their food by the ravenous hordes beforehand) then really both situations are equally bad! Once everyone's one-month stashes have run out then they'll have to enter the fray like all the others. They'll be in better shape physically (having eaten well for the previous month) but won't they also be at a disadvantage due to having one month's less experience at surviving in the new chaotic world?!

There has been a lot of talk here and on other threads about people's plans to stock up on food and to take measures to defend themselves against, or hide from, the marauding hungry mob when it arrives. Does this mean that we're going to be the good guys in this disaster movie? Hey, I hope so, but for how long? A month? And then will it be our turn to go out pillaging?! I hope it never comes to that but, as you say, when realities set in, we have a tendency to cling on to life. In other words, in such doomer scenarios, we would probably cling on to our own lives (and those of our families and friends) but at the expense of others' lives.

Grim thoughts, I know. I don't think I would make a very good "survivalist" so I really do hope we're in for a slow, smooth and controlled energy descent in which everyone cooperates with each other to make sure the transition back to the stone age (or whatever) is as pleasant an experience as possible!

Andy Hunt · Post by **Andy Hunt** » 26 May 2007, 18:37

I said a week, but it would probably be more like two.

The stuff in the freezer wouldn't last long, it would probably be fresh stuff and dry staples which would keep us going.

Food security would last exactly as long as the least-prepared person's supply. 3 or 4 days I reckon.

Post by **mikepepler** » 27 May 2007, 08:40

I said a month, because that's what it was until recently - we're currently eating up our stocks ready to move house, so hopefully nothing bad will happen in the next two months! Once moved, the stock will be replaced.

We also have "Food for Free", it's a good book.

The other thing is to consider what you will cook on and if you need to provide water. In the house here we've had a Katadyn water filter, Kelly Kettle, and a meths stove with a few litres of fuel. Once we've moved we'll have more dead and dry wood than we can use, and not in a place where there's thousands of people looking for it

Cabrone · Post by **Cabrone** » 27 May 2007, 17:29

How long would I last? As long as it takes me to starve because I keep little food in the house.

If it got to this stage then we're all going down, even if you had food there would be plenty out there ready to rob it off you.

The good news is I don't believe it will come to this though.

Oil won't just disappear overnight, when things get tight the situation will have to be managed. Priority would be probably in order of agriculture, emergency services, heating and public transport. We could save lots of oil if car use stopped, frivilous travel ended, flights were grounded, supermarkets sent food out rather than customers going to them, people with gardens start growing vegetables, people invested in insulation etc etc.

I don't think that a peak in sweet crude is the end of the world even though it may discomfort some of us, unfortunately I do think that our current heating rates indicate to me that GW is.

Also those who think that PO means no more hydrocarbons left to burn ought to consider coal, tar sands, heavy crude and oil shale. In the short term there's a good chance that this is what we'll probably be reaching for as oil goes down.