Difficult Water Purification Scenario

You are in a situation where you have only the following and you MUST find a way to boil a liter (not necessarily all at once) of water within the next 8 hours.

The environment:

-Plenty of non-drinkable (without boiling) water.
-There are no Brich trees so lets not get in to the whole Birch bark container thing. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> The area is wooded with, furs, cedars, maples oaks and cottonwoods and shrubbery common to north america.
-Temp is about 80 degrees and high temp for the day is expected to be about 85
-Its about 11am so you have until 7pm to get your water boiled, cooled and drank.
-If you can find a way to stor the water, great, but this is not a requirement. You can boil, cool, drink a 1/3 of a liter three times in that time period if you want, just as long as you have boiled, cooled, and drank one liter of water within 8 hours

Your Gear:

-Lighter, Sparklite, Ferrocerium Rod, Lots of Matches, Vasoline Cotton Balls (yes this is a bit exaggerated... the point is that starting a fire isnt a problem in this scenario)
-High Quality Fixed Blade Knife w/ 5" blade.
-Photon II Flashlight

Okay so basically the way I am trying to set up this scenario is that youre in a typical modern day north american wooded area in the summer. You have a good knife, good firemaking equipment and plenty of good dry tinder, kindling and fuel for the fire. The only way to get drinkable water is to boil it and you have no container in which to boil and/or drink from. How do you improvise in this situation. The time limit prevents you from wating till morning for the morning dew or extracting water from plants in some other way. You MUST boil your water in this scenario so it would seem that you must improvise a container in which to boil it. How do you imporvise such a container???

One last thing... In this scenario there is no trash of any type left behind by humans that is anywhere to be found. So. no you cant say "I'd pick up the soda can left behind by other hikers and use that to boil in".

Does this seems like an impossible situation? I know it's one that I have pondered and I have yet to come up with a "good" solution. Can you carve a bowl out of a log or weave a backet and boil with hot rocks? Remember you only have 8 hours to get a liter of water boiled and cooled.

Brian:

If you have all the mentioned gear and no filtration devices, chemical purifiers, heavy duty aluminum foil, or container to boil water in, you deserve to dehydrate or drink questionable water and all the ills that befall you.

Digging a hole in the ground and using heated rocks is out as the ground would probably soak up the water before you could process it.

Chipping out a rock to use as a basin would probably be too time consuming and you would need a lot of fire if you were to use the rock as a cooking utensil.

Weave a basket?, come-on now, if you were too stupid for container carry, you probably don't know how to weave a watertight container.

Your only saving grace might be clothes to put the water in and hope to achieve a 5 minute boil before the clothes burn up.

Otherwise do like snipers tell their targets, "Don't bother to run, you'll only die tired". Scratch your vital information on a nearby tree, and lie down at its base and wait for darwinism to take its rightful due.

Bountyhunter

I've pondered the same. That's why I now carry a metal cup! Also heavy duty foil (not the rolled kitchen stuff, a foil turkey roaster pan cut up). But first I'd go for the water I always carry, then the water purification tablets, and finally the mini-filter straw I carry too.

In other words, I thought about your same scenerio, couldn't figure out anything terribly efficient to handle it, so I gave in and decided to carry the minimal stuff that would stop such a situation from unfolding (hopefully)!

easy ......

Open the Photon microlight, remove the batteries and the circuit, leave the LED(so that end is closed) and use this improvised container to boil a few cc (?!) at a time.
Advantage : such a small qty you can drink it hot , no need to wait for cold water ....
<img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

A mixed hardwood/coniferous forest will have complex soil types ranging from decomposing ganite to the fine silts your very water source is in. You can make a serviceable clay container and fire it to useable temper in the time alloted with plenty of time to heat rocks as a heat source to drop inside. If you kill or come across a large dead animal, the stomach makes a water container that will hold water over a fire and achieve boiling temps.

I am going to go out on a limb here. In my mind I see two fundemental requirements for a container which

1) must hold water resonably well. I cannot think of a way to boil water without storing it in something....other than just pouring it on the fire... ;P

2) be fire resistant-ish

So...it must either come in a bowl type shape or be able to be fashioned into one. I agree with the other posts that making a wood container is impractical given the time frame. Weaving one might be possible but I doubt it would hold up to the heat enough to actually boil water.

Ultimately I submit two possiblities...and I have no experience with either one so don't bother flaming me, I am claiming ignorance from the get go.

Plausible Solution A. 1) Kill a deer/elephant/bear/T-Rex whatever 2)scoop out the brains 3) fill the skull with water 4)make a wooden spit type thing to keep the water-filled skull off of direct flames 5) a miracle occurs 6) the water boils 7) enjoy your brain flavored water over ice with a twist


Plausible Solution B. 1) you dig a bowl shaped hole 2) you line the hole with large leaves 3) you take mud and sand and gunk and leaves and make a mash (think adobe style) 4) then you press the mash into the hole on top of the leaves 5) it drys and then 6) a miracle occurs 7) you take you mud pot and fill it with water 8) you place it over the flames 8) repeat step 6 9) you have mud flavored water..mmmm, good 10) you donate everything you own to the Equipped to Survive Foundation and Doug buys a large RV and tours the World teaching common sense and the PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER. listen 11) everybody goes and buys PSK's and lives happily everafter, secure in the knowledge that they could fashion a waterproof, fireproof container out of the aluminum foil in their shiny new PSK!!!

in your gear list, you don't mention a cheese-burger, don't you ....
hum.... too bad, the paper wrapping could be enough....

The guys are on the right track here.

Scout around for more clayey soil. Dig a pit (cauldron) in the clay. Fill with water. Heat rocks, use tree limbs to handle hot rocks into water. Steam is generated. Hold shirt over steam. Wring out shirt (distilled water) into mouth or container.

Downside:
Need many rocks, large long lasting fire.
Need rocks that won't explode when heated.
Need head examined for going out without correct gear. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

(Tip from Australian Army Survival Wing)

Is this a trick question? <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

CK has the best answer: find some clay. Dig a gallon-size hole, line with leaves, line with clay, build fire inside clay to fire it. Cool. Lift this bowl from the soil/leaves, carry to water source and fill. Meanwhile, you've built another fire & heated some rocks that you didn't collect from along the river/lake. Return filled bowl to camp, use forked green branches to lift hot rocks into bowl of water until boiling.

If you're incredibly lucky (dumb, but lucky), you might find a water-eroded rock bank along the shore that has a ready-made bowl formed in it above the water line. Splash water into it, build a fire as near as you can, heat rocks and drop into the water until boiling.

Sue

In a science class once I boiled water in a cup made from a folded up sheet of paper. The paper won't burn while it is wet. Maybe you can fashion something similar. Anything that gets wet but holds water long enough to boil and cool would work. Waxed cloth might not work, unless the wax melted out before it ignited.

Like Chris and others mentioned you can use animal sources for boiling water. I one saw a tripod with an extra leg (a quatrepod) a fresh rabbit skin was tied by each corner to the pole. This managed to hold water. Rocks were heated and dropped in the filled-up water container (with sticks). Wait for boiling water. Problem solved.

Given that I grew up in northern forests, I'd use what is present: along rivers there are often depressions ( puddles) in the rock. Heat rocks, boil puddles.

Fish while waiting.

Another downside is that I need to get the water from the original water source to wherever I found soil suitable for digging the hole. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Not a bad plan provided ypu have such puddle in rock dpressions.

As usual Chris, you come up with solutions to even the most difficult scenarios. Not only does this sound feasable but it sounds like fun to practice as well. I cant wait to get out in the woods now and try molding and firing my own clay bowl! This of course is one of those situations where I tell the wife I'm going "hiking" rather going to "make clay bowls and attempt to boil water in them" <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

The only thing I can think of would be really thin wood (which is basically paper I guess) but constuction something like that would probably exceed the time limit.

Im guessing (I could certainly be wrong) that the skin would need to be tanned and have the furr removed in order to work properly and this would exceed the time limit.

Why not use a hollowed out stump. There are always stumps in our part of the country that are from hollow trees.

"Another downside is that I need to get the water from the original water source to wherever I found soil suitable for digging the hole."

Clay is often found near riverbanks (etc). Otherwise, it often isn't even recognized as clay when it's dry.

Sue

The fur side is turned towards the fire. The inside holds the water well enough. Just add hot rocks.

In theory you can make the container from any thin fabric: duct tape, paper (eg dollar bill), animal skin, or even a leaf. Last night I tried with a large leaf secured with some paper clips. It collapsed on the fire - I think the paper clips may have softened in the heat, enough to lose their grip.

It's tricky. The water is what stops it burning, so anything above the water line is liable to burn (or melt or whatever). But if you put holes in the fabric below the water line, the water leaks out. You need to support the container over the fire somehow. Some kind of scaffolding around the outside of the fabric might support it and provide anchor points, but if it's too thick the water won't cool it.

If you have some snare wire in your PSK, you could probably use it to fashion the support of a small basket, then line it with a large leaf for water-proofing.

Okay I played around with Chris' idea this weekend while on a very casual, day hike with my wife and son. I unfortunatly didnt have 8 hours to devote to the project but I did pay close attention to the environment (particlarly the various soils) throughout our hike. We were on a very short (2mile) hike (because my son is only 22months old) and in that time we crossed everything type of soil from moist dirt, to sand, to rock. Widely varrying terrain is the one of the attractions of these particular trails. We mostly do these short hikes to give the kid a chance you play with twigs and flowers and throw pebbles in the river and creeks (which is his favorite). Needless to say, with a curious 2 year old boy we stop several times even on a 2 mile hike. What we are doing cant even really be called hiking but rather more accurately "playing in the woods". Anyway, one thing I did was sharpen a small stick on our first stop and then use it to dig a small hole everywhere we stopped along the trail. It didnt take long to prove true what Susan has already stated which is that the best place to find the right soil (atleast when only digging shallow holes) is near the water. My next project now is to see if I can actually construct and fire a natural clay pot with only firemaking supplies and a knife. I'll let you know how it goes.

'Hiking' reminds me of all these silly troops passing in parade. I thought the prussian goosestep was exausting until I saw a recent clip of North Koreans and then some former Soviet Bloc troops pass in review. John Cleese in his 'Ministry of Silly Walks' couldn't do better and I wonder if they were watching last year's Rose Parade when some of our African American marching bands boogied down Pasadena. Dawdling along the trail is the mark of a experienced outdoorsman. You SEE things. Our friends over at www.bushcraft.uk.com have a recent tutorial on pottery. Their scottish regiments know how to march properly too <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Thanks for the info Chris. I will check out that thread over at BCUK to see what I can learn. BTW: If dawdling along the trail is the mark of an experienced outdoorsman then my son an I are experts. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Maybe the old solar still might come to save the day in this situation. However, I'd imagine that anything you could use to roof over the still, and anything you could use to collect the water that is distilled, could also be used to hold the water for boiling.

If I were in this situation, and were in dire life-and-death need of drinking water, I'd just drink it. I'd look forthe clearest water I could find, in a pond surrounded by green vegetation, strain it through a piece of cloth to remove particulate matter, and drink it. It's not a foolproof, or even all that reliable, a system, but you might get lucky, and that probability is increased by the above steps. Even in the worst-case scenario you'd likely have at least 12 hours before any serious symptoms set in.

Then when I get back to civilization I'd have a doctor hook me up with broad-spectrum antibiotics.

The assumption here is that you will be rescued within a matter of hours, perhaps a day at most.

But the reality is, if you are so woefully unprepared (you didn't bother to bring *anything* capable of storing water or even acting as a water barrier, of any size, nor did you bring water purification tablets, so chances are you're dreadfully unprepared on other fronts as well), you probably wouldn't survive much longer than that anyway.

So if it's come down to life-and-death, drink up, whatever you can find.

Actually, this is a possibility.

Take a large piece of cloth - the heavier, the better. A leg from a pair of jeans, or a heavy shirt, would work.

Form it into a pouch, and fill it with water, which you begin heating.

The water will strain out, but maybe it'll be slow enough that there'll be some left in the end.

If not, start piling stuff up on the perimeter of the pocket - fine clay would work, although some kind of animal fat or grease, or even vasoline, would probably be better. This would prevent the water from dribbling out the bottom.

And if that fails, like I said before, drink whatever you can get.

>>But the reality is, if you are so woefully unprepared (you didn't
>>bother to bring *anything* capable of storing water or even
>>acting as a water barrier, of any size, nor did you bring water
>>purification tablets, so chances are you're dreadfully
>>unprepared on other fronts as well), you probably wouldn't
>>survive much longer than that anyway.

That's not entirely fair. When the Lockheed Electra that Juliane Koepcke was a passenger on broke up in midair over the Peruvian jungle, she lost everything but the clothes on her back, and still managed to survive against incredible odds. She even lost her shoes (according to some sources, the shirt she was wearing was ripped off so even if she had some survival gear in her pockets she would have lost it.)

Yeah, if it's a simple case of "Oh jeez, I knew I shouldn't have made that left turn at Albakoiky", then yeah - you should have all this stuff. But this is a hypothetical scenario, and it is not 100 percent valid to assume you would have all your normal survival gear in an emergency.

Personally, I think that digging a depression in the ground and lining it with wet leaves would form a waterproof container, although I haven't tried it.

Juliane Koepcke was wearing a white confirmation dress and high heels when her plane exploded. She found a squashed birthday cake and some cigarettes. She took the cake with her and ate it, drank from the vines she knew contained water, and used the tobacco as an insect repellent. She also had a knee injury.

This girl made a lot of good decisions and was also lucky. None of the other people who survived the crash managed to survive the jungle.

Sue

I think my point about "probably" still stands, as all the other survivors died before rescue, and by the fact that this story is notable enough in its outcome.

But did she have any source of clean water? If not, did she find a natural source of water?

I'd imagine if the latter were the case, she'd have to have drunk it without purification, and just got lucky.

The whole point of this exercise is to put our heads together and see if we can find a good method of boiling water with only a knife and firemaking tools. Lots of good ideas so far. I think as it stands, Chris' idea is in the lead though based on the primitive pottery tutorial I read yesterday at BCUK, it would probably require every second of the 8 hour time limit. I'm hoping to have time to try this on Sunday so if I do I will let you guys know how well it works and how long it takes. I'm thinking it will take me 1 hour to construct a good container for boiling then it's about 4 hours minimum firing time (hopefully not more). That leaves 3 hours to cool the pot a little and fill it with water (that I will probably strain through a t-shirt) then boil and cool that water for drinking (maybe another hour?).

So... if it takes 1 hour to make the pot and 1 hour to boil and cool a liter of water then I have 6 hours to fire and cool the pot. The earthenware pottery tutorial that made the most sense to me (there are many such tutorials at BCUK and I didnt read them all) suggests firing your pot in a "huge" fire for 3 hours then letting the fire die out naturally and letting the pot continue to sit in the coals overnight as the fire/coals dies/die out naturally. This obviously has to be modified to meet the 8 hour time limit. Also the author of this tutorial states clearly that although the resulting pot will hold water, it will also sweat as well which is why I am suspecting that boiling a liter of water may take a little longer than it would in a completely waterproof container.

I assume you're going to boil the water by dumping hot rocks into this makeshift container?

If so, a word of advice: You'll need a LOT of rocks.

Water has a *ridiculously* high specific heat capacity, so whatever weight of water you wish to boil, you'll likely go through a number of times that weight in rocks.

Therefore you need to have a way to both put rocks into the water, and to take them out. Over and over and over and over again.

You could try making the rocks hotter, so each has more heat to give up to the water, but then you just get a lot of steam as the water in contact with the rock boils instantly, and all that "extra" heat escapes.

I think this whole scenario demonstrates just how friggin' important it is to have something, anything, that's capable of holding water.

While I can appreciate the experimental nature of this quiz, I think in that situation I would probably just make a natural water filter out of my sock with available grass, dirt and hope for the best.

About the only idea I've seen that seems worth an attempt is finding, digging a hole, building a fire, heating rocks to drop in, catching the steam with shirt and wringing out. Although firing the clay pot seems like an interesting idea...what would happen to me is that I would spend 6 hours working on a clay pot that wound up not holding water. <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

The way I understand it a properly fired earthenware pot (which is only fired to about 500*c) when done over an open fire) will go fine over an open flame for cooking, boiling, etc. This is not like ceramic coffee cups in the cubbord at home (fired at around 1000*c) which would in fact crack when in contact with any uneven heat like cooking or boiling over an open flame. This is based on what I read at BCUK... I have not test it yet. We'll know for sure soon enough. Hopefully I will find the time to try this experiment this Sunday but if I dont, I have a camping trip planned for May 30th through June 3rd and will certainly have the time to try this then.

Ok, so what's wrong with making a filter that uses the clay we have discussed and the only other thing we have...fire.

http://info.anu.edu.au/mac/Media/Media_Releases/_2005/_January/_190105filters.asp

Thanks to TWheless for the article...very neat concept, should be a wonderful find for third world countries. My only question would be, does it have to be terracota clay? or will any clay that can be heated work?

Think you could contruct that and get a liter of water trough it in eight hours? If you did, it still won't kill all possible nasties. There are not even any commercial non-chemical filters that do. That filter also requires coffee grounds and cow manure.

I know that viruses are smaller than bacteria, but are cryptosporum & giardia cyst larger or smaller than bacteria?

And can you imagine some dingbat dumb enough to carry coffee but nothing to heat it in???

Sue

Larger then bacteria.

Pete

For some reason that I have not figured out yet, many PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER.-types don't consider boiling a viable means of water purification. I have talked to more than one person while strolling through the isles at REI or some place similar and I get the striking impression that if their pump action water filter clogged they would die of dehydration. These are people that for whatever reason, don't carry chamical purifiers as a backup and don't even consider boiling, nor do they carry any equipment with which to boil water even if they wanted to.

She followed the river downstream until she found a shack, because her father had once told her "If you follow the river downstream far enough, it will always lead to civilization." So yes, she did have plenty of drinking water available, if nothing else.

There's no question that she was extremely lucky, in many ways; but like many survivors, she made the most of it when it came her way. The others had the same luck, if not better; and they squandered it.

I'd probably try using clothes. Maybe make a fire, put a "dry" rock in the coals, and let it heat up. While I'm waiting, I'll try to make a container out of the sturdiest cloth I have on me, fill it up with water, and set it on the rock. I'd hope the rock would not burn the wet cloth, and would get the water up to temp. I don't know if it would work, but I'd have to try something.

Well I tried it. Molded and fired a couple clay pots. One cracked badly during firing. I think due to me being a little rough when adding more wood to the fire on one occasion. No way this one would hold water. The other had a slight crack in it and would hold water, but not long enough for boiling. I was also able to do the whole thing within the eight hour time frame. Though smaller pot leaked too much to hold water long enough for a boil, I got close enough that there is no doubt in my mind that if I were a little more careful I could have had pots capable of boiling a liter of water in under eight hours. A couple things I learned (besides being careful not to crack your pots when adding wood to the fire) is that the type of clay you pick is not so important but is helpful. The less gritty/sandy the better. My clay was more like mud and although this would have been fine (if I hadnt cracked them) for boiling a liter or two or three of water, I dont think they would have held up to extended use. The other thing I learned is that unless youre extremely careful (which I was not) it helps a lot to let the clay pots air dry a little before firing. This gives them a little added strength to keep them from colapsing under the weight of firewood. For me on a 90+ degree dry Texas afternoon this didnt take long. However on a cold humid day this might make staying within the eight hour time frame impossible. Also if youre making a large pot you have to build half, let it air dry, then build the second half. Otherwise it will collapse under its own weight. In a survival situation I'd say 8 small pots beats two big ones any day. One more thing. Forget hot rock boiling with these babies. You fill em with water and stick em right on top of your open flame for boiling.... no problems. I was real impressed by this. I read over at BCUK that this was how they worked but seeing it for myself, I was still impressed. A more info plus pictures will follow in a couple days.