This thread reminds me of the opposite state of affairs in a SAR operation conducted some years ago in Arizona. We were called out for an overdue hiker on Mt. Lemmon. It was a dark and stormy night, with heavy mist dampening everything down.

We took the trail on which our victim was thought to be and in due course came upon the gentleman, sitting immobile and slipping into the early stages of hypothermia...next to a very large and bulky pack, weighing around fifty pounds.

"Howdy! What would you say to us starting a fire?" said we. We, too, were a little cool and would appreciate some heat.

"Can't be done - the woods are too wet" replied our guy.

It so happens that we have a couple of techniques that guarantee a fire in just about every situation short of a roaring blizzard - #1: light a can of jellied alcohol and pile the tinder around it; #2 do the same thing around a lit carbide lantern. Suffice it to say that we soon had a cheery campfire and were roasting marshmallows, etc, getting ready to march back up the trail about three miles to civilization..

The trip was enlivened by our victim's attempt to shoot our a yard light along the trail as we approached the road. He did have a pistol in his pack and at least he did some concept of what it could do. Nothing else in his pack was evidently of any particular use.

It turned out he was attempting to locate a "bamboo bomber" that allegedly had crashed on Mt. Lemmon, carrying a cargo of gold, of course, during World War II. Pure, absolute fantasy.....

If you don't know how to use it, just leave it at home and save your aching back....