This looks like an interesting book for anyone who wants to know more about mechanical side of keeping our society moving.
Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape

From the description:
"This unique and fascinating book covers the parts of the landscape that are often overlooked despite their ubiquity--objects such as utility poles, power lines, cell phone towers, highway overpasses, railroad tracks, factories, and other man-made mechanical marvels. And they are not just in urban areas, but include out of the way "ecosystems" such as mines, dams, wind farms, power plants, grain operators, steel mills, and oil refineries. In Infrastructure, Brian Hayes offers clear explanations of the systems that keep the modern world running, including agriculture, energy supplies, shipping, air transportation, and the various ingenious methods of recycling and managing the waste we generate. "

-Blast

From my stool facing the corner, let me once again pull the dunce cap firmly down over my ears to ask: what kind of things would I learn that might aid my survival and preparedness goals?

Questionus ignorantus secundus: is this the stuff that sabotours (ours) and terrorists (theirs) already study?

Thanks.

Is this part of the Time-Life "Do It Yourself Terrorist" series?

Don't need this for target selection. Look for the big sign saying "water plant", or anything big and complicated looking with a lot of powerlines going in or out. That is where you put the HE.

This just means you can know it's proper name.

That's what sabeteurs do. Terrorist just look for whereever lots of warm bodies are close together.

Jeff

Who's going to do the translating?

C'mon guys, think "MacGuyver"! The key to successful improvising is to know what resources you have available. This book struck me as a way of learning more about those resources. I bet Wildman understands this (his I-spy posts are perfect examples). Plus, knowing how something works helps you understand how it could go wrong, and just maybe how to keep it running again, or scavenge it into something useful in a post-apocalyptic, zombie-filled future.

Like my high school ring says, Knowledge is Power.

-Blast

Agreed.

There are too many of us to go back to living in huts, hunting and gathering.

The one's with the knowledge to rebuild are the ones with power and a survival edge.

Terrorists already know how the stuff works in order to break it.

It's the rest of us (public at large) that don't have a clue so that we can fix it.

(on that note, I need to sign myself up for one of those Home Depot DIY classes on electrical stuff).

Yeah, I'll sort of agree with you on this, but if someone took out the municipal sewage treatment facilities, many of us would be poopin' with shovels.

I would enjoy hearing an answer to question one, and take it that the answer to question two is "yes."

Thanks.

Dweste,

Until I actually get this book I can only make guess based on reviews and publisher comments.

Possible useful information:
1. Ability to make better risk assesments (hmmm, there's a 26-inch natural gas pipeline running eight past that school).
2. Ability to understand an outage (water/gas/electricity/phone) and respond more appropriately.
3. Ability to determine "weak links" in you support structure.
4. Ability to better direct requests for repairs (for example calling the electric company and saying "My power is out" versus saying "the XXX-guage trunk line at tower #37 has been hit by lightening and blew four of the YYY-level transformers")
5. The whole Macguyver angle I mentioned earlier.

-Blast

I have to agree with Blast... Know about your environment and what's in it. For most of us it's this urban or human impacted landscape. Yes, I want to know how to find and know about the underground gas lines and all the other stuff. Here in MN a few years back an underground gas line blew up in a neighborhood.

Paul -

Good enough. Look forward to your review after you get the book. Thanks.

That depends on the level of terrorism they are going for...

I suspect the serious ones are reading "Strategies for Protecting National Critical Infrastructure Assets" by John Sullivant, rather than this field guide.

OIMO