Great choice on the Honda Element BTW, I've never really heard a bad thing about it. Anyway, I was thinking about this hypothetical situation. While having a evac plan and proper protection is important, I think in a situation where you would need to possibly use (or brandish) a weapon to get out of town, the risks may be too great to be on the road at all. Lots of things can go wrong and those would be carjackers may have weapons too. I may be wrong, but if things were that bad, you'd need a minimum of a 2-3 vehicle convoy (with armed people) to have a chance of getting where you need to go. And then there's the realistic scenario of law enforcement covering some areas better than others. Not sure how they'd react to open carry, etc. There's so many serious unknowns that make evac unappealing, unless of course conditions at home give you no choice but but to leave. And in that case, leaving in a large group may be a better option. Sometimes there's safety in numbers.