I sure as hell don't want to end up as a crispy critter in the event of a nuclear "false-flag" attack. Some of you already have a shelter that you can run to. The rest of us will have to improvise a shelter as best we can out of whatever materials we can can muster. Cresson Kearney, the author of "Nuclear Survival Skills," advises digging a trench underneath a car and then duck-taping some plastic sheeting around the outside. I like this idea because it is simple, easy, and practical: all it takes is a car and a shovel and a few other materials that most of us will be toting around anyway. Now, a car-over-the-trench shelter isn't going to help very much if you find yourself anywhere near the epicenter of a nuclear blast, but then again, the same is probably true for just about ANY type of shelter that isn't buried deep underground and isn't made out of hardened concrete. The first rule of thumb, then, is that you don't want to find yourself anywhere near the epicenter of a nuclear explosion! OK, but what are you going to do if you suddenly find yourself at a fairly safe distance away from the explosion, which is perhaps a thousand miles or more AWAY from the epicenter, and you learn, thanks to the presence of your emergency radio, that you have only a matter of hours in which to prepare for the inevitable fallout ? It is precisely this kind of scenario that you will need to think about and prepare for. You already know what it takes to survive a nuclear attack because you've read the book about nuclear war survival skills. It isn't going to be a problem to ventilate yourself while inside your shelter because you already have all of the materials you'll need for constructing a hand-held ventilator right in the trunk of your car. You have food, water, a decent gas mask, and all of your bug-out gear.

The only problem is that you'll need a place where you can bug out to !

My own inclination is to pry open a preordained manhole cover and to jump inside with my "bug-out" gear and with a few weeks worth of food and water. I have never pried open a manhole cover, so I really don't know if that would be a suitable place for an improvised fallout shelter or not. Does anyone know ?? I would hate to get arrested by the police for prying open manhole covers.

Many of those covers run a good 400 pounds. Increasingly many, at least the ones they need to get in regularly, are locked. many localities have taken to welding them closed.

This is also what they do when dignitaries are scheduled.

We seal them shot to prevent terrorist from placing bombs in there. It looks like a clear seal around edges that is easy to spot if broken.

If you are 1000 miles away from an epi center than stay inside and take prescribed dose of KI (potassium iodite) pills. I lived 200 miles from Chernobyl when I was a kid and nobody herded us into the shelter.

You'll need a crowbar to get the manhole open. Close it behind yourself and stay as far away from manholes and openings as you can. If it rains, you'll have contamination problems because of water coming into the drainage system.

It would be better than hiding inside a culvert open at both ends...

Better idea would be to search around local public buildings to see if any are labeled as a certified fallout shelter. I haven’t noticed any around where I live now, but several of the buildings at University of California, Riverside (near where I used to live) had the signs right on the outside of the buildings. One of these buildings may be close enough to you that it takes less time to just get there than to build your own shelter.

Assuming that it is not locked/welded/whatever, those manhole covers are heavy! Getting one open from the top, assuming that you have a proper/workable tool, is difficult, sliding it closed behind you (assuming that you want to do that), would be really really hard. Not like you see in the movies. And once inside, it can be nasty down there...

ant then, you have to find some way to open it up again eventually

If the explosion was 1000 miles away you likely have time to dig a narrow slit trench and cover it over with the earth you dug out. It might be possible to stay in it for several days or more but it wouldn't be comfortable.

you can also use house doors to put over the trench before you pile dirt on top.

Make sure they are exterior doors. Interior doors have a weight load of precisely squat. I learned that one back in my young days when all of us bike-riding friends decided to use an interior door as a bridge across a six-foot-deep ditch in a dirt field. I was the first and last person to use that bridge. Boy did my friends laugh… which would have really sucked if I was hurt.

I actually have some very heavy duty shelving made out of plywood and reinforced with 2x4's to cover a slit trench, in the event a bug out is called for. I also have 2 solid wood doors that I've kept for that purpose also.

Bonus points to the first one here to reply that knows why manhole covers are always round...

Jim

Because they are not square???

because a round cover won't fall through the hole like a square or rectangular one would.

Darn bsmith... you got it before I read the post...

Yup, a round one can never fall through the hole...

Ding! Ding! Ding!

Since a circle is the most geometrically efficient shape (i.e., provides the greatest surface area for a given perimeter) it is the only shape that cannot pass through an opening of equal size.

Jim

If I had time to worry about a nuclear event, the number one tool I'd want, short of a bona-fide fallout shelter, is a fallout radiation meter.

You need it to tell how bad the fallout is, how well your improvised shelter is working and if it needs to be improved, how long you can spend outside it, etc.

While those keychain radiation detectors or an improvised "KFM" meter would be better than nothing, they do not respond quickly enough to do an effective radiation survey. Although, it would serve to keep you busy.

If I was writing a novel, I think I'd have some of the characters take shelter in a warehouse. They would use a forklift to stack some skids of massy product into a very effective shelter. Better make it a canned food warehouse...

Fallout Shelters
Nuclear War Survival Skills
The best but big at 6 megs.

Fema Nuclear War Survival

11 Steps to Survival

How Fallout Shelters Work
Factors for Protection From Radioactive Fallout

Captain Dave The Nuclear Threat
Has several links to shelter plans.

State Maps and Information for Nuclear Survival

The Granddaddy Of All Underground Storage Areas

Domestic Nuclear Shelters

Just so everyone is aware, JCWohlschlag mentioned looking around for buildings in the area that were certified fall out shelters, I went to a few around where I live(not saying it's the same everywhere)and checked them out, one was in a school basement, it was converted to a class room, windows were added....no protection there, Another was in a office building basement, it was sealed shut, as in welded, so unless you carry a pocket size cutting torch, your out of luck there. I guess my point is don't always believe the signs, be sure to check them out prior to having to use them. Oh yea the third I visited was packed so full of junk you couldn't even get into it.