For how long are you ?equipped to survive? with your EDC, PSK, and/or BOB? Just trying to provoke some thought and intelligent discussion. I value most of the opinions here so I am always eager to hear them.

Here?s mine:

Although I don?t think I have ever come right out and said it, anyone that knows me around here and has read my posts and kit contents lists probably realizes that I don't really subscribe to the 72 hour survival theory. Sure I'd love to be in the "average" survival situation and only be stranded for 72 hours but I'm not preparing for it whenever I can help it. I'm preparing for at least twice that amount of time (whenever possible) if not longer. If I?m found in 3 days and have 5 days of supplies left then I'm a happy man. The more prepared I am, the more confident I am and the more confident I am, the less fear I have, the less fear I have the more likely I am to have the proper ?survival mindset? (this is the way my mind works? of course YMMV). I figure there are enough things to worry about in a survival situation without me worrying if I'm under equipped. After all I can find ways to maintain body temperature and stay hydrated with only my brain and primitive skills training and constant practice (and I do regularly practice primitive skills), but how difficult would it be or how long would it take or how much valuable energy would I have to expend? For example, I?m pretty good with fire by friction but in the right (or wrong?) situation would I freeze to death with a bow drill in my hand while making my fire since, although I can do it, it takes a lot longer than with a lighter or matches. In my mind my equipment is there to make me more confident and competent in my ability to survive and with less energy expenditure to boot. The point it is, sure I can survive a lot of situations with no equipment and can survive many situations for 10 days on a 3 day kit or maybe 30 days on a 7 day kit, or as one man recently did, 35 days with nothing (cept some plastic he found in a cave) but just the same I carry as much as possible so that I can be as efficient and effortless (conserving as much valuable energy as possible) in my survival and have the confidence to fight the fear and stay in the right mindset.

Okay so I rambled a little?. Sorry! <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

So, for how long are you ?equipped to survive? with your EDC, PSK, and/or BOB?

Mine goes something like this. These are minimums. Specific situations, environments and varying ability to improvise (based on situation, environment, mindset, etc) could greatly extend these times.

EDC/Mini Pocket Kit (about half the size of an Altoids tin) = 3 days
PSK/Mini Belt Kit (a little bigger than a soup can) = 10 days
Small Backpack Kit (standard day pack size) = 30 days

EDC/Altoids Kit - Basically, 6 days. Assuming water to be purified can be found, whicj it should be in consideration of the parameters this kit is meant to function within. I look at this kit as an assist to "Bugging In" if I am ever away from my vehicle and need to get to it. This would get me there (to a more extensive kit) or substitute while improvising the important items for bugging in if my truck were to be destroyed or out of reach...highly unlikely. This kit would take me to the point where I would run out of a six day supply of water (longer if properly rationed) and suffered an end from dehydration. What's that...8 days, maybe. No food or methods of procurement are included in this kit.
The supplements in my truck are generally as follows...food, a more extensive kit for making it home from work or around town. I am rarely more than 30 miles from home, which I could cover in an easy three days, more likely two if adequatley nurished. Blah, blah, blah, the truck kit addition is there to make this doable in relative comfort. Additions include: MRE's, bottled H20 and more MP1 tabs, more firestarter, raingear, a change of clothes, tarp with guyline and stakes, sportsman's blanket, larger fixed blade, etc.

PSK - This is the kit I take to the woods with me while backpacking or rock climbing. Carried in a small lumbar pack at all times. I could last just about as long as I could without food with this kit although, it is designed to get me out of the woods to a road, mainly.

Unfortunately, there are few places that we can go in the SE where one is not more more than 10-15 miles from a road. I figure this kit would come into play if I were injured (a bad fall or maybe lightning), attacked (beasts two or four legged), or for whatever reason apart from my main pack...which would have to be very serious. Crawling or walking, I estimate that I could go 2-3 weeks. This is probably to the point of death from starvation. This kit is designed to provide fire, water, and food rations or methods of procurement for this amount of time. Bullion, fishing kit, snares, plus a good basic small survival kit.

BOB - Designed for a relatively comfortable 6 days in the woods for my wife and I. The decline after that would be in accordance with rationed food and declining supply of water, however with the size of this kit, procurement of water and food should be sustained for quite some time...weeks. We have a large river less than 200' from our building, and copious amounts of small mammals and fish from which to feed if neccessary. This is a large kit containing more substantial items such as a tent, sleeping bags, etc. It stays in a spare internal frame backpack in the corner of our bedroom.

Mine goes something like this. These are minimums. Specific situations, environments and varying ability to improvise (based on situation, environment, mindset, etc) could greatly extend these times.

I think the above is the key. What are the situations, environments and most importantly your ability to improvise. I agree with Dynamo that most things in your EDC are what you might need to get home. As with him, my truck is never too far away unless I happen to be out with friends and they drove. If I have my PSK, who really knows how long I could survive. It has snare wire and fishing line and hooks. A small amout of water purification supplies etc. Can you build a shelter in the woods? Can you find edible plants? Can you catch fish? Ralistically though my PSK is just to try and find my way out of the woods should I get lost or some other calamity. Now, onto my BOB. Yes it has more food, more shelter, more cooking utensils, etc. It makes life more comfortable for a longer amount of time. Does it keep me alive for a month? That all depends on the things I said before. Can I catch fish, snare a rabbit, find edible plants. Now, a little off topic....should TEOTWAWKI happen, let's just say I have supplies laid in. A good Boy Scout is always prepared!

JMTCW YMMV
Charles

im set well for several days of food and water here.
but if i had to bug out though its going to be much less due to weight considerations when carrying and having to move quickly.

Let's see. My PSK would cover me until I got to the nearest strip mall, which are usually situated about 1000' from each other around here. As long as I have some cash, I could ply myself with McDonald's, Taco Bell, pizza and Chinese food while waiting for a cab to take me home. Of course, take me out of my normal stomping grounds, and it's a different story. I better go practice my trap-making skills...

There are just too many variables for me to even guess. For example, in my own backyard I have seen temperatures as high as 110 degrees F. and as low as -12 F. Travel a half hour east into the mountains today or a half hour west into the desert in July and you'll find even wider extremes. A serious injury like a fractured limb could certaintly cut down on your expected survival time. How available is water? Etc., etc. I can think of situations where I wouldn't last 6 hours with just my EDC. That's why my WSK is laaaaaarge. (That's an alternate excercise that might prove fruitful: try to come up with some reasonable survival scenarios where your kits would prove wholly inadequate. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />)

It is an interesting question though, and when you say that preparedness = more confidence = less fear =better mindset you are absolutely right.

Regards, Vince

Then there are the other kind of people who just sit down and wait to die (I have a sister like that).

Many people (most of the people here!) that have a grain of self-preservation probably don't get themselves into poor situations in the first place. But if one is bestowed upon them, they deal with it.

In fact, I wouldn't be a bit surprised that the folks here might welcome a situation where they were able to test their knowledge (and "stuff") to see how they handle it. As a challenge, don't you know! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Sue

Susan:

I once heard an analogy of proving one's love for a woman, the exact wording of which escapes me, but it goes something like this.

If in the course of a normal day, you and your lady come across a lion that attacks you and you die trying to protect your lady, you are a hero. If you bring a lion into your home and die fighting it to prove your love for your lady, you are an idiot.

MY MAMA DIDN'T RAISE THIS BOY TO BE NO IDIOT, AND I DO NOT RELISH DANGEROUS CHALLANGES.

I will do the best I can if the situation arises, but I do not search for lions to prove I can overcome obstacles.

Bountyhunter <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Relish? Maybe.

I do enjoy testing my metal every once in a while. Maybe that's foolish (that is what my mother and wife tell me) but life is to be lived. I like to think that I'm not wreckless. Rock climbing, backpacking,. even driving a little too fast can fall into this category and are generally controlled and not total off the cuff madness...or stupidity for that matter.

Consider the perspective from which everyone's opinion comes from. Some people are more apt to take chances based on a variety of things...personality, responsibilities, etc.

Dynamo:

I am not talking about doing things that are dangerous because they are necessary to achieve certain feelings of acomplishment or to reach a certain destination. If you climb a wall to reach a spot far from the maddening crowd, I understand that. If you climb a mountain; "because it is there", that is bringing the lion into the house. If you feel like going on a pleasant hike for recreation and not necessacity and you prepare based on best available information, I do that too; but if you know it is going to be weather fit for neither man or beast and you do not prepare or cancel, that is bringing the lion into the house.

Some people are so capable and well tuned for things they do which others may consider dangerous that they never give the things they do a second thought, I am not one of them.

Be careful out there as none of us wants to end life in a wheelchair for letting our passions blind us of the consequences of a misstep.

Bountyhunter