Batteries + sells a similar unit <$20 and it uses a couple of AA batteries.
Batteries + sells a similar unit <$20 and it uses a couple of AA batteries.
It depends on what kind you want. I had one of those cheap units and it was always getting turned on my accident and running the batteries down.
After being brushed by the May 20 tornado these items seem to be the bare minimum for emergency supplies.
These are the suggestions from my wife and myself. Some of this is what we have in the storm shelter and the rest is what we are going to put in the storm shelter after we reorganize. As we've recently seen, in moments EVERYTHING can be GONE. You may think the list is large but if you need it and don't have it you are out of luck.
I use 5 gallon buckets with lids as they will stack about 4 high without problems and make good chairs when needed.
The Toilet Bucket:
Home Depot had a snap on lid with a center section that screwed out, the rim appears to be strong enough to sit on when it is being used as a toilet, get 2 of these. Brand name (Red Toilet Liners), Brand name (Bio Blue) toilet odor chemical, Cat litter for a separate pee only toilet. Store toilet paper, baby wipes, 1 gal of bleach, baking soda, hand sanitizer and febreeze for odor control. Almost all of this will fit in one can, the pee only toilet can hold clothing that you are going to use, leaving an empty bucket.
FIRST AID BUCKET
Alcohol and alcohol wipes, Ibuprofen and Tylenol (adult and children), antiseptic spray, Neosporin ointment, surgical gloves, scissors, tweezers, tourniquets, large safety pins. Also Band-aids, sterile gauze pads, adhesive tapes. Eye glass repair kit, emergency blood clotting granules (CELOX is the brand name). Or you can use granulated sugar as a combination antiseptic and blood clotter (keep it in a metal tin of some kind). Heavy feminine pads for bleeding wounds. THREE DAY SUPPLY OF YOUR MEDS, 3Inch ACE bandages, hand sanitizer, DUST MASKS, several tubes of lipstick (not red) for writing on forehead of critically injured you have given some type of meds too, you can also explain any blood clotting material used.
At a bare minimum the sugar, 24 feminine pads, three inch tape, ACE bandages, hand sanitizer and lipstick.
BOTTLED WATER AND SNACK BUCKET
Try to have snacks that won't cause more thirst than normal. Fruit rollups, grain and nut type energy bars (chocolate melts and sours),raisins, etc. Bottled water, the electolite mixes to add to the bottled water will help maintain body salts and fluids and should not go bad like Gatorade.
If you have pets, some snacks and dry food for them.
CLOTHING BUCKET
One bucket for each adult or older teenager or one bucket for two small kids. Heavy shoes with thick soles (nails hurt), long pants (jeans) long sleeve shirts (flannel), warm nylon jackets, underwear (2 sets), socks (two sets), baseball caps and nylon watch caps, leather gloves for moving wreckage, rain gear/poncho. If you have access to a vacuum packer unit this is the place to use it. The clothing will take up way less room. A fleece type blanket vacuum packed is the size of a softball. A duplicate favorite toy or teddy bear should be in the can, vacuum packed
Cash, not much but a $100 in small bills or quarters would be a comfort. It could get you into a motel if all your ID is gone and feed you for a day or two till you get more cash.
Always grab your wallet and ladies move your purse to the shelter when it looks bad. May 3rd 1999 after I put my wife, daughter and grandson into the closet under the stairs, I noticed my wifes purse on the dining room table. I picked it up, opened the closet door and dropped it into her lap. A few days after the storm she told me that dropping that purse into her lap was the smartest thing she ever saw me do. She was able to rent a furnished apartment 2 days after the storm with what she had in her purse. The dining room table and chairs went out the front windows of the living room and was never seen again.
A BUCKET WITH FLASHLIGHTS AND LANTERNS
Shakum up flashlights never need batteries (not the brightest light, but when it is all you have), headband LED units empty of batteries, a pack of GOOD batteries unopened will last up to 10 years. AAA, AA and D size will be usable for years, check the use by date on the package. Quality LED lanterns w/o batteries, an Olde Brooklyn Lantern (about $25) lasted 5 nites on 2 D cells and is still putting out good light. Windup radio empty of batteries.
Copies of birth certificates, auto insurance, house insurance, misc documents needed for professional work, CDs of family photos, also documents scanned onto a CD, a list of up to date phone numbers of family, work and friends on paper so you do not need a computer. Leather-man tool, a digital camera, loud whistle, roll of duct tape.
I put a 5 meter long strip of LEDs (600) around the top of the walls in our shelter and set up a charging system to keep some gel cell batteries charged at all times. You walk in, flip one switch and you have plenty of lighting, flip a second switch and you have a fan pushing stale air out a vent. When 6 people used the 4 ft by 6 ft shelter on May 20th you could tell the difference as soon as the fan came on.
I am sorry if this list seems so long, but after losing a house May 3rd 1999 and being missed by 200 yds on the 20 May tornado, I am serious about being prepared for storms and their aftermath.
A few other thoughts about being prepped. Presuming you have a shelter to put things in, a photographic record of what is in your house put on a CD and stored in your shelter and updated about every six months would be invaluable. Make the original photo tour of the house, put it on a CD that you date and label (but save the file on the computer) then in six months photograph any new items you have purchased and add that to the file on the computer and make a new disk, date it and put it with the original. In case you are not familiar with digital photos they have time and date embedded in them that is almost impossible to fake, thus they will furnish a time/date stamp that could prove you had what you took a photo of and when the photo was taken. Depending on the resolution you pick for your photos and the size of the memory card, you might be able to take a thousand photos on the first session and add to that as time goes by and you update the file and make each new CD. Normally the larger the file size on a photo the more detail is available meaning you can enlarge sections and still clearly see detail.
These are the suggestions from my wife and myself. Some of this is what we have in the storm shelter and the rest is what we are going to put in the storm shelter after we reorganize. As we've recently seen, in moments EVERYTHING can be GONE. You may think the list is large but if you need it and don't have it you are out of luck.
I use 5 gallon buckets with lids as they will stack about 4 high without problems and make good chairs when needed.
The Toilet Bucket:
Home Depot had a snap on lid with a center section that screwed out, the rim appears to be strong enough to sit on when it is being used as a toilet, get 2 of these. Brand name (Red Toilet Liners), Brand name (Bio Blue) toilet odor chemical, Cat litter for a separate pee only toilet. Store toilet paper, baby wipes, 1 gal of bleach, baking soda, hand sanitizer and febreeze for odor control. Almost all of this will fit in one can, the pee only toilet can hold clothing that you are going to use, leaving an empty bucket.
FIRST AID BUCKET
Alcohol and alcohol wipes, Ibuprofen and Tylenol (adult and children), antiseptic spray, Neosporin ointment, surgical gloves, scissors, tweezers, tourniquets, large safety pins. Also Band-aids, sterile gauze pads, adhesive tapes. Eye glass repair kit, emergency blood clotting granules (CELOX is the brand name). Or you can use granulated sugar as a combination antiseptic and blood clotter (keep it in a metal tin of some kind). Heavy feminine pads for bleeding wounds. THREE DAY SUPPLY OF YOUR MEDS, 3Inch ACE bandages, hand sanitizer, DUST MASKS, several tubes of lipstick (not red) for writing on forehead of critically injured you have given some type of meds too, you can also explain any blood clotting material used.
At a bare minimum the sugar, 24 feminine pads, three inch tape, ACE bandages, hand sanitizer and lipstick.
BOTTLED WATER AND SNACK BUCKET
Try to have snacks that won't cause more thirst than normal. Fruit rollups, grain and nut type energy bars (chocolate melts and sours),raisins, etc. Bottled water, the electolite mixes to add to the bottled water will help maintain body salts and fluids and should not go bad like Gatorade.
If you have pets, some snacks and dry food for them.
CLOTHING BUCKET
One bucket for each adult or older teenager or one bucket for two small kids. Heavy shoes with thick soles (nails hurt), long pants (jeans) long sleeve shirts (flannel), warm nylon jackets, underwear (2 sets), socks (two sets), baseball caps and nylon watch caps, leather gloves for moving wreckage, rain gear/poncho. If you have access to a vacuum packer unit this is the place to use it. The clothing will take up way less room. A fleece type blanket vacuum packed is the size of a softball. A duplicate favorite toy or teddy bear should be in the can, vacuum packed
Cash, not much but a $100 in small bills or quarters would be a comfort. It could get you into a motel if all your ID is gone and feed you for a day or two till you get more cash.
Always grab your wallet and ladies move your purse to the shelter when it looks bad. May 3rd 1999 after I put my wife, daughter and grandson into the closet under the stairs, I noticed my wifes purse on the dining room table. I picked it up, opened the closet door and dropped it into her lap. A few days after the storm she told me that dropping that purse into her lap was the smartest thing she ever saw me do. She was able to rent a furnished apartment 2 days after the storm with what she had in her purse. The dining room table and chairs went out the front windows of the living room and was never seen again.
A BUCKET WITH FLASHLIGHTS AND LANTERNS
Shakum up flashlights never need batteries (not the brightest light, but when it is all you have), headband LED units empty of batteries, a pack of GOOD batteries unopened will last up to 10 years. AAA, AA and D size will be usable for years, check the use by date on the package. Quality LED lanterns w/o batteries, an Olde Brooklyn Lantern (about $25) lasted 5 nites on 2 D cells and is still putting out good light. Windup radio empty of batteries.
Copies of birth certificates, auto insurance, house insurance, misc documents needed for professional work, CDs of family photos, also documents scanned onto a CD, a list of up to date phone numbers of family, work and friends on paper so you do not need a computer. Leather-man tool, a digital camera, loud whistle, roll of duct tape.
I put a 5 meter long strip of LEDs (600) around the top of the walls in our shelter and set up a charging system to keep some gel cell batteries charged at all times. You walk in, flip one switch and you have plenty of lighting, flip a second switch and you have a fan pushing stale air out a vent. When 6 people used the 4 ft by 6 ft shelter on May 20th you could tell the difference as soon as the fan came on.
I am sorry if this list seems so long, but after losing a house May 3rd 1999 and being missed by 200 yds on the 20 May tornado, I am serious about being prepared for storms and their aftermath.
A few other thoughts about being prepped. Presuming you have a shelter to put things in, a photographic record of what is in your house put on a CD and stored in your shelter and updated about every six months would be invaluable. Make the original photo tour of the house, put it on a CD that you date and label (but save the file on the computer) then in six months photograph any new items you have purchased and add that to the file on the computer and make a new disk, date it and put it with the original. In case you are not familiar with digital photos they have time and date embedded in them that is almost impossible to fake, thus they will furnish a time/date stamp that could prove you had what you took a photo of and when the photo was taken. Depending on the resolution you pick for your photos and the size of the memory card, you might be able to take a thousand photos on the first session and add to that as time goes by and you update the file and make each new CD. Normally the larger the file size on a photo the more detail is available meaning you can enlarge sections and still clearly see detail.
I keep my kit simple. One tall cat litter bucket. Multi-tool, adjustable wrench, gloves, first aid kit, batteries, flashlight, a couple protein bars, wet wipes, and a bottle of water for everyone. The bottom of the bucket has a plastic bag with a layer of cat litter in it. Done.
it's a hidey hole, I'm not living in the thing. I live on the edge of town, my shelter is registered, and my neighbors and friends know where the shelter is. Worst case is we spend a day inside playing cards and sweating...quality SMS family time LOL.
it's a hidey hole, I'm not living in the thing. I live on the edge of town, my shelter is registered, and my neighbors and friends know where the shelter is. Worst case is we spend a day inside playing cards and sweating...quality SMS family time LOL.
???????????? the unit I have plugs in just like your regular charger. If it's not plugged in, it's not 'turned on' to run the batteries down. It doesn't recharge your cell phone battery, it's is an accessory battery pack. Put a couple of Energizer Li-Ion photo cells in it and it will last as long as your regular phone battery.
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