When All Hell Breaks Loose: Stuff You Need to Survive When Disaster Strikes

by Cody Lundin

  PROFESSOR BRYANS: First, understand that approaching your vehicle, being in your vehicle, and leaving your vehicle are all vulnerable times and should be minimized during times of unrest. Also, recognizing this fact should make you more aware during times of travel involving an automobile.

  There are some rules for traveling. Whenever you are approaching your parked car, spot-check your vehicle before opening the door. Look behind the driver's seat to make sure no one is in the vehicle. If there is, escape immediately—do not confront the person—and call the police. The second you get into the vehicle, lock the door and then start the engine. Always maintain your vehicle, which is just common sense, and make sure you have at least a half tank of gas. Gas up at convenient times when it's safe to do so, such as in the daytime.

  Should you ever discover that you're being followed, do not stop your vehicle. Keep driving. If you know the location of a police station, go there. Once you arrive, place your hand on the horn and keep blasting it until you get results from the police. Blasting the horn if you're being followed while you continue to drive is an excellent strategy in general, as it will attract attention. Never drive to your home if you're being tailed, leading whoever is following you to your home.

  A carjacker is a potentially lethal assailant, and alertness is the key to avoiding the situation in the first place. Whenever you are stopped at a red light or a stop sign, stay alert to anyone who is approaching your vehicle. If someone approaches, drive away immediately. If an attacker, or a group of attackers, is in front of the vehicle, run him, or them, over.

  CODY: What if someone wants to know more? Does the Combato system have any books or training information?

  PROFESSOR BRYANS: Yes. There's an excellent magazine that Professor Steiner puts out each month called Close Quarters. The carjacking information we just talked about came from Close Quarters Volume 2, Issue 12, as an example. Our Web site has all the contact information regarding the magazine as well as courses at www.americancombato.com.

  The most important attribute necessary to defend yourself is attitude, more specifically, the combative mind-set. The individual possessing this will "attack the attacker."

  Techniques for self-defense must be simple, easy to learn and use, and able to knock out the attacker.

  Be alert to what is going on around you. If something seems "off," leave the area. If this is not possible and you are approached, go to the relaxed-ready position, keep the individual(s) out of arm's reach, and be ready to attack and destroy the attacker if he (they) attack.

  Striking the attacker is highly effective. Four good natural weapons are the hand-axe (chop), the chin-jab smash, the side kick to the knee, and the fingertip thrust.

  The general attack zones for striking the attacker are the band, the line, and the kicking triangle.

  Once you attack, always follow up. Keep on hitting, tearing, ripping, smashing, and cutting as you attack, attack, attack!

  Use any item at hand (improvised weapons) to bolster the attack.

  No sparring. When practicing, attack into strike pads or dummies.

  21

  CRITICAL COMMUNICATIONS

  "The 911 system was overloaded within ten minutes of the outage. Call rates jumped to 500 calls per hour for five hours [2500 calls] when normally 200 calls would come in—which is a ten-time increase."

  —Anonymous witnessed account of the infamous

  1996 power outage that caused a massive cascading

  failure of the power grid in the western United States

  Emergencies rarely occur with any prior warning, and their effects can quickly cripple normal information sources. Even if you have all of your survival bases covered, you'll still want to know what's going on in the outside world. Emergency bulletins will give you extremely valuable information that may directly affect your survival, or at least let you know how long you'll need to eat rice. On the other hand, the broadcast may be full of sensationalism, half truths, or outright lies, perpetrated by networks to gain higher ratings ($) or by outright news-slut reporters desperate for the first and most likely inaccurate story. Cross-reference emergency broadcasts whenever possible to try and get the straight story. Whatever type or types of communications you decide to use, don't put all of your eggs in one basket, and expect the unexpected.

  Comprehensive emergency communications in and of itself is extremely technical, and more than one book has been devoted to the subject. If you feel your family needs more detailed information than what this chapter provides, then practice self-reliance and get off your butt to find the information you need. Remember, there is no one-size-fits-all emergency plan for every home.

  Knowing Your Neighbors

  "WON'T YOU BE, WON'T YOU BE, PLEASE WON'T YOU BE MY NEIGHBOR?"

  —MR. ROGERS

  At first glance, most assume communications refer to mechanical means of sending or receiving a message. While this is true, it shouldn't negate more basic, human forms of communication during an emergency. I have already written about the power of the tribe, of having many people who are all on the same page regarding a certain intention. A well-oiled and disciplined team can accomplish much more than the stoic loner. Any neighborhood that can be cultivated to prepare together for emergencies will be a force to be reckoned with when the chips fly. Although done so after the fact, tight-knit communities in New Orleans did what they had to do to take care of their own after Hurricane Katrina. Taking the bull by the horns, neighborhood "tribes" quickly sprung up to do what governmental agencies had failed to do.

  These tribes had the courage and wisdom to effectively communicate their needs to others. This initial communication was fostered months and years before the hurricane struck by people who talked with each other on a daily basis. Even if they weren't friends, they damn sure knew who was in their neighborhood and their basic patterns and habits of movement. When the elderly lady who lived alone with her cat didn't put the cat out as she did each morning, her neighbors noticed and came running to check up on her. Everyone took the responsibility for being the eyes and ears of the neighborhood, before and after the disaster. The flip side of this is the elderly gentleman in New York state who spent an entire year in front of his TV, even though he was dead. Plumbers responding to damaged water lines due to frozen pipes found his literally mummified corpse sitting in front of the television, which was still on. When questioned by news crews, neighbors had assumed that he had been taken to a care home, regardless of the mail that piled up and spilled into the street from his mailbox.

  I know it's difficult to know your neighbors in our fast-paced, individualized society, where cyber-friends are more common than human friends. Being an instructor and leader of people under great psychological and physiological stress in remote wilderness areas, I understand fully that getting people on the same page in a stressful time is similar to herding senile cats with three legs. You must try. You must try as hard as you can to put your personal agendas behind you and bend for the common good of the whole. Once the situation goes the way of Lord of the Flies, you will be hard-pressed to restore any useful communication or cooperation with others. The "other people" variable, in other words, human nature under pressure, is perhaps the biggest wild card in your urban emergency. It may be one of the biggest challenges you will face as a leader as you try to piece your neighborhood back together one home at a time. (Whether you are conscious of the fact or not, the material in this book is priming you for your leadership role during emergencies.)

  Neighborhood block watches are helpful, as at the very least you'll meet your neighbors. Wanting to know who lives near you and communicate basic plans and precautions does not mean you need to spill the beans about everything your family has stored to prepare for a crisis. Use caution, common sense, and let your intuition be your guarding guide as you sift through how you'll interact with neighbors. Although I want you to try to bridge the gap and put yourself out there to others, I'm well aware of the unfortunate fact th
at in this current day and age, loose lips can sink ships.

  "All in the Family" Signals

  [The Emergency Game Plan]

  The knowledge of knowing where your family members are after a catastrophe is pure gold. If applicable to your situation, agree upon a prior plan or plans of action about what to do when a crisis hits and you have no other means to communicate with each other. A form of this advanced game plan is common in the realm of the modern survival scenario where the outdoor enthusiast, before they leave for the outdoors, leaves a detailed game plan about where they are going and when they will be back with at least two loved ones. This 5-W game plan is composed of the following parts:

  Where you will be going

  When you will return

  What vehicle you're driving (or whatever means of transportation you're using)

  Who is in your party

  Why you're taking the trip

  If this seems extraneous for an urban situation, a minute's pause will confirm that most family members automatically do this anyway before they leave for work or school. Brother Jim (who) goes to his job (why) at the gas station (where), after which he'll return home a bit after 5 p.m. (when), and he's driving his blue and gray Toyota pickup truck with California license plate oU812 (what). If something happens to Jim, or Jim needs to be contacted for whatever reason, the rest of the family is not totally in the dark about how to get a hold of him.

  I strongly recommend that your family have a game plan about what to do and where to meet should a major disaster occur. All forms of communication, even smoke signals and signal mirrors, are composed of moving parts, and moving parts can fail under the real-time stresses of a survival scenario. If everything else goes to pot, your family game plan will give you a tangible goal upon which to focus your attention.

  Using Your Home as a Signal to Emergency Response Personnel

  There are times when using a simple signal from your home, whether you are in your home or not, can dramatically reduce the bureaucracy inherent within disaster mitigation. Each summer in the dense ponderosa pine forests surrounding Prescott, Arizona, the talk always turns to fire danger due to the prolonged drought in the Southwest. Many mountain communities are shoved deep into the hills, and the access and communications required to evacuate certain neighborhoods is sketchy at best.

  Cooperating with local fire agencies before a potential deadly wildfire, many neighborhoods worked out a simple communications plan to alert the authorities as to whether they were still in their home or had evacuated to safer ground. This common-sense, no-frills system revolved around hanging a white towel from the front door as a signal that the home was empty. This simple yet effective idea saves precious time and resources, as emergency response personnel are relieved of having to knock on every door to alert homeowners of the need to evacuate. Firefighters know from the street whether homeowners have safely left their homes or not.

  It would be very wise to get together within your family or community and do something similar; coordinate with local disaster response personnel to have a commonly understood and acknowledged system of communications before the next crisis.

  Reverse 911

  Some law enforcement agencies are using the "reverse 911" method to relay emergency information to households. The concept is to notify homes within the path of a pending disaster by using a prerecorded phone message. If your home lies within the corridor of an approaching tornado, for example, you would get a heads-up phone call providing information to help you mitigate its effect, whether you seek shelter or evacuate the area. Although some privacy advocates are bitching about this, I would much rather get a phone call about an approaching killer hurricane than not be pestered about buying car insurance or vitamins. If used responsibly, this is a great asset to get the word out about a potential disaster, but it's only effective if the phone lines are intact and you're home to take the call.

  The [Disaster] AM/FM Radio

  (Important Note: All of the following means of communication require a power source. For obvious reasons, always opt for battery-operated models or other forms of alternative power that are not subject to the whims of the conventional power grid. For this reason and portability issues, television is not recommended as a sole means for retrieving emergency information after a disaster.)

  The more you can control the receiving end of a broadcast, the better off you may be. In other words, although satellite radio has more news channels than you have fingers, if the company that broadcasts them into your living room is down, you're left in the dark. Every home should have a basic AM/FM radio on hand that does not require conventional electricity to operate. AA battery-operated radios are the most obvious choice and there are a plethora of them to choose from. If you live in a more remote suburban or rural area, you might need a stronger radio that can aggressively pick up weaker signals. People living in heavily wooded or mountainous terrain may also suffer from broken, static-filled radio signals. The chances are high that you already know if your radio cuts out or not; but maybe not. With the advent of music technology from satellite radio to iPods, conventional AM/FM radios are becoming a thing of the past. Test whether your AM/FM radio works for your location. Don't worry so much about crystal clear reception as you're not concerned with listening to Mozart. Many AM broadcasts will trump FM broadcasts for disaster news, and some can be picked up from a very long distance, especially at night. If a widespread emergency occurs, civil defense-affiliated stations are set up to broadcast survival information on the AM broadcast band.

  There are several battery-operated radios that also feature a built-in hand crank to generate power. These models are wonderful as you'll always have power, and the crank enables you to save stored batteries for other uses such as flashlights. Beware of cheaper hand-crank models that flood the market, especially in dark and dingy military surplus stores. I've also seen radios with a built-in solar panel for self-charging during sunny daylight hours. I can't overemphasize how important this piece of gear can be to your family's survival, so spend the money to purchase a brand-name, reliable radio. Free-playing radios such as the "crystal radios" composed of a coil of wire, a tuning capacitor, a crystal diode, and an earphone are also a possibility. World War II soldiers improvised crystal radios from their trenches by using coat hangers, the lead from a pencil, and a razor blade, among other parts, to keep up with the daily news.

  Cell Phones

  While cell phone coverage and quality has improved over the years, it still has much to be desired. The motto of one well-known provider, "Can you hear me now?" is all too appropriate at times. I know people who have cell phones on steroids complete with directional antennae, the thickest antennae wire available, and an amplifier, and yet during times of rain still have a problem getting reception, even when dropping from digital to analog.

  Cell towers rely on regular AC power for their operation. During times of mass hysteria even those towers with backup power will be compromised, as everyone and their pet will be attempting to use their phone. Cell phones can also, like anything else involving complexities with many moving parts and people, simply fail to work when you need them most. Satellite phones are available if you have the money to pay for the minutes, yet even these phones could be taxed beyond their limits if everyone decides at the same time to pull an E.T. and phone home.

  Cell phone batteries at the current time are hopelessly short-lived and sensitive to fluctuations in temperature, especially the cold, which sucks the power from the battery even when the phone is turned off. It's now common knowledge that the cell phone battery itself is a "bug." It can be used as a listening device by certain agencies, whether it's in the phone or not, to listen and record conversations unbeknownst to the owner of the phone. At least we can be assured that this power won't be abused. . .

  While cell phones are cool, and they have saved many lives, they have also inadvertently killed stupid owners who put all of their welfare and self-reliance into a fickle, b
attery-powered machine with finicky reception in geographically challenged locations. Many places out West still don't have any hope of getting a signal. Ever try to make a cell phone call on the flats of the Painted Desert on the Navajo Indian reservation. . .can you hear me now?

  Internet

  Internet access to news, weather, and e-mail, like everything based upon electricity and phone lines, is vulnerable to chaos. Even satellite Internet powered by independent solar power can have problems. You may fail to get online due to a storm near your provider, hundreds of miles away, while the weather around your computer is sunny with blue skies.

  * * *

  SUPER-SIZED SOLAR FLARES AND YOU

  "Our increasingly technologically dependent society is becoming increasingly vulnerable to space weather."

  —David Johnson, director, National Weather Service

  Technology junkies take heart. According to scientists, many forms of electronic communication and navigation, such as Global Positioning Systems (GPS), are vulnerable to solar flares. So what, you say? GPS is far from a glorified compass used only by people navigating the great outdoors. It is integral in newer cell phones to allow emergency personnel to find an owner after an accident and is responsible for navigating airplanes, automobiles, and ships, transferring currency to and from banks, and many other government and commercial activities.

  According to a recent news report, a jumbo solar flare last December influenced every GPS device on Earth that was experiencing daylight at the time. Some GPS systems only burped and were reduced in their accuracy while others were completely knocked out of commission. Even more troubling and baffling to the experts is that the flare also affected some satellites and fiddled with the electrical grid. The ramifications of a more powerful solar flare are sobering; one could affect the entire way most countries conduct business, from the sale of fuel to food.