It's not easy putting together a kit and carrying it every day. With every thing I have going on in my life right now I could easily not plan for the "what ifs" in life but I just can't take that chance.

But I was amazed that we didn't have any outbreaks of violence in the city during the blackout. When I think about the blackout I wonder how people would have fared if the blackout happened in the winter time instead of a nice warm summer day.

I appreciate your gesture of not flipping the bird when your out east I'll do the same when I head west. <img src="images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Don't get me wrong, I'm a kithead too, but I think I might understand the mentality behind this lack of preparedness. To me it seems like a kind of optimism - blind optimism to be sure, but the kind of optimism that can carry people through troubled times.

I mean if everyone truly believed that our planetary ecosystem was collapsing and it was caused by our modern energy hog lifestyle, would they still participate in that destruction? I think not. They take the weakly crafted assurances from government that everything's going to turn out just fine, and build their lives around it.

If everyone believed they were truly targets in the bomb sights, would they just keep on, keepin' on? I think not. I believe it is one valid natural response to block from our minds the things in our lives we feel we have no control over.

So, I'm not surprised about the 3 out 4 NYer's stat - to me it seems like a very valid psychological survival strategy for people living in such a vulnerable place. I mean an Altoid tin kit's not going to save each every one of all 10+ million of them...

I go by Murphy's law of optimistic preparedness i.e. if I don't have the tool/gear I will need it but if I have the tool/gear I won't. I figure I have about tools stashed in my truck that it will go a million miles before a breakdown <img src="images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I would never help anyone who suffered conditions I was prepared for if they had "yucked" up my preparedness to humiliate me or demonized my honest concerns.

The way I figure it, if they live, I won't have to tell them "I told you so", and if they die, it was of their own choosing.

This feeling is only for the jerks as I still would help those who were just to dumb to know better.

Bountyhunter

Joegreen:

What makes you think someone like that is smart enough to even have a flashlight handy, let alone fresh or replacement batteries?

Bountyhunter

Wildcard,

If the circumstances were something like a blackout or something not too serious, the jerk would be on his own. If the braying jackass were in danger, I guess I would pull his worthless rear outta the flames - unless it put ME in mortal danger.

After 9/11, the Red Cross, NYC Emergency Agencies, and Ad firms came up with some very soft toned (and mildly humorous) public service announcement TV commercials that ran locally. They were titled "What's in your Go Bag"? The "Go Bag" commercials were essentially "teasers" which cajoled viewer into calling a toll-free number for a printed Ready NY Guide, or to visit the city's emergency website.

The commercials were sensitive to local viewer’s reactions. They had to be, especially in the NY local market. Maybe they were too sensitive. I think the message was watered down. To be fair, though, the producers had to be very careful not to scare the public either.

Here is a link to the info they recommended:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/oem/html/readynewyork/ready_guide.html

After 9/11, I considered how I could prepare for my family and myself. I gravitated towards the Red Cross website, then the NYC website, then was amazed at all the info I stumbled upon after Google brought me to this site.

I would be shocked if 1 in forty of my fellow New Yorkers was minimally prepared. I know that many of the helpful people in these forums carry flashlights, and pocketknives everyday as part of their preparedness plan. Some go further with mini-kits etc. I think, however, that if more people in NY and elsewhere were to make even the smallest steps of collecting a few necessities it would go a long way if something serious happened again. Some water, energy bars, radio, and flashlight tucked in a drawer would be a great start for most.

I could not believe how poorly some of my neighbors were prepared during this summer’s subsequent blackout. I was even more surprised to see all the people spending the early hours of the blackout in bars.

I simply help as much as they wish - no more. It only generates bad-blood to throw on a dose of "I told you so". Often, folks don't want as much help as they need and in those cases I walk away when they think they are done with me. Unless of course I'm on duty then I make them sign a refusal of treatment form first. I became prepared so that I could survive and so that I might be part of the solution rather than part of the burden. For me it is about makeing the society more resilient. If we are all ready to get on with our lives without disruption in the face of blackouts and terrorist attacks and hurricaines and .... then we have disarmed both the terrorists and the fear-mongering politicians (who wish to strip us of our liberties and dignity at the first opportunity) with one stroke.

Sorry, I slipped into a rant there at the end. Anyway, my point is that if someone needs help then that is just what I have prepared for. I help them and then go about my business. If there are more that need help than there are that can provide help then MCI triage rules come into play. Learn them, use them. Walking wounded - walk, dying - die, the rest get busy with the rest!.

When the crises is past some will ask how I came to be so prepared - I handle this as a simple request for help and I am prepared to tell them to the extent that they want the help (The logic becomes recursive here so start reading from the top again).

Some don't care about my level of preparedness but are grateful for the help - I tell them they are welcome and if they wish to act upon that gratitude they owe it to the next guy down the line to become prepared to help him.

Some aren't even grateful but simply benefit from my help and move on through live un-changed - I know I will be seeing them again in need - The opportunity to help these folks will present itself again and they may be a little more open minded after they have smacked their head into the brick wall of unpreparedness again. If they keep doing the same things they will keep getting the same result.

Some are downright astonished and angered that I didn't prevent this from happening to THEM since they are soo important and I was obviously responsible for them since I was prepared. These will be triaged differently next time.

Well said. The psychological value of denial is high. As well we must look at the stats. ~3000 people out of 10 million killed by 9/11 vs how many mugged, raped, assualted, killed in NYC / year. Not to mention the casualties due to traffic "accidents" (most of which are totally avoidable if folks would hang up their cell phones, put out their ciggarettes, put down their coffee, finish putting on their mascare before getting into the car, finish reading the newspaper before getting in the car, etc) The global collapse of our environment is something that may be happening but most of us alive will perish from heart disease or cancer long before it becomes a problem that is killing folks. What should the average NYC resident prepare for percentage wise? Should they hit the gym and stay fit enough to outrun the mugger or should they worry about the micro rapelling gear needed to rapell out of the top of a burning tower after a terrorist attack? They are statistically way more likely to need to out run the mugger. We, on this forum, like to consider the scenarios that include us buying some equipment so that we may become equipped to survive. We enjoy assembling gear into little kits. Some of us keep this in perspective and also prepare for the more mundane scenarios and some don't . But to dismiss folks as unprepared because they are unprepared for a 1 in 10,000 chance of being in the wrong place during the next terrorist attack is perhaps a little out of perspective. The folks in France who died because of the blackouts during last summer were verifiably unprepared. The folks in NYC who peaceable went about their business as best they could during last summers blackout may have stumbled in the dark because they didn't have flashlights but they were optimistic enough to get through and perhaps that optimism is all the preparation they needed. After all the preparation of the mind will go further than any gear. I don't mean any nationalistic chest beating here just calling it as I see it. If the blackout in NYC had lasted as long as those in France we very well may have seen the worst of the NYC character show up as riots and other types of lawlessness. Thankfully the power company and the police and other public workers were prepared enough to prevent that.

Preparation must be started at the individual level but an individuals choices need to be guided by the preparations of those around them and the likelyhood of the events for which they are preparing. Am In unprepared, living in rural NH, to not have a gass-mask and a positive pressure, filtered saferoom? It may look that way if someone flies overhead in a crop-duster full of VX but I don't consider that likely enough to worry about. OTOH in my sleepy little town, last year a fellow who wasn't getting along with his wife took off from the local airport in his little cessna and kamikazeed it into the roof of his home while his wife slept. So terrorism from the skies is not unheard of here either.

Bountyhunter,
You're right, I'm giving him too much credit. <img src="images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />