Hey, wow, thanks everyone for all of the great replies! I believe I'll go with the high end grappling hook sold by Triple Aught Design. <br><br>I definitely wasn't thinking of doing serious mountain climbing with this--also, I have zero experience with true mountain climbing. <br><br>I was thinking of the kind of situation I found myself in once. A sudden heavy rain at a literal rate of over 1O inches per hour for 2 hours caused flash flooding while I was out driving [fortunately in a fully insured rental car]. My car was, with almost no warning, floating in 4 feet of water, with water leaking in. The flood water was flowing fast downhill, even though the local slope was only about 1O degrees [there were much steeper slopes further "upstream"]. I decided to get out of the car, and almost made it to "shore" on a retail business street at 9pm. The water was now shoulder deep. Suddenly, I was knocked over by something hitting me flowing under the water, and I was tumbling out of control. It took about 5 minutes before I was able to stabilize myself, and even then, I was just barely staying in the same place in the turbulent flow. At that point, someone "on shore" was trying to throw me an extension cord to grab. The wind was blowing so hard that the cord could never make it to me. Finally, I had the luck to be helped "to shore" by a very talented swimmer who later told me over a meal that he was a competitive body surfer from Costa Rica. Definitely my lucky day.<br><br>Ever since then, I have never driven any car without taking my "emergency kit"--of note here are several life vests and a lot of fluorescent yellow half inch rope. I tied a 5 lb weight plate on the end to give me some mass to throw, but I had always wanted a grappling hook to give me the best chance. <br><br>A grappling hook and rope along with some physical strength [have been a weightlifter for 25 years] would seem to be a universal survival appliance for many situations both foreseen and unforeseen.<br><br>Although being prepared for such emergencies may not relate directly to the national emergency at hand, ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN AT ANY TIME, and once burned, lesson learned. There's no point in me being stoked on weapons, ammo, gas masks, antibiotics, medical supplies [I'm an MD] and food unless I have it ALL together. <br><br>Again, thanks so much, and I'm learning a lot from this forum which I only discovered last week!<br><br>Straightshootin