Urban Survival: When everything falls apart
The fundamental difference between urban and rural survival
When most people think about prepping, they typically think about rural survival skills. This is mainly due to the fact of the bushman and other such content which streams across the media. And where this is good for those which can get to a rural area, it does not leave much room for the urban prepper to learn real urban survival skills for a catastrophic event. There are some fundamental differences which must be considered. Here are a few:
The Urban Prepper must have tactical gear
Because you are in the concrete jungle, so to speak, you will need to have tactical gear. This does not mean that you are going to bust out of your door with guns blazing to take on the government or the poor guy that is looking for a loaf of bread. That is Hollywood hype. What you will need to have is:
1. A map of the current and surrounding neighborhoods identifying the areas which can meet your basic needs (food, water, shelter, clothing).
2. Offensive and Defensive weapons which are realistic.
In other words have a knife, have a Taser or pepper spray, and have a hand-held gun. You do not need to have a full assault rifle to get the job done. In fact, in urban survival it is a bit ridiculous unless you are defending a post. Think about it. A hand-held can be tucked in the pants as you forge while the assault rifle must be propped somewhere (thus leaving you vulnerable).
3. An urban bug out bag
The urban prepper should understand the ripple effect to survive urban disasters.
Regardless of what causes a catastrophic event, the urban prepper needs to understand that it will cause a ripple effect to other catastrophic events. Take for example Katrina. Where this was a natural disaster, the government got involved and regulated guns, food was scarce, water was ruined, electricity was cut off, etc. Now, consider if an even happened to your local area. If the disaster is an EMP then the government will step in and regulate the guns quickly. As food cannot be preserved if there is no power food would ruin and there would be a rush on the grocery stores and such. When people start to starve or their kids go hungry then there would be massive robbery. You get the point. You cannot plan for survival in a city for just one emergency. Urban emergency preparedness must include a broad scope in the preparations.
The Urban Prepper must not store all their supplies in one location
Rural survivalist can find a spot and bunker down and defend it. This is primarily due to the fact that when you are outdoors, you have a range of vision and the strategic edge (if you picked your bug out spot well) to see what is coming your way. However, the urban prepper cannot put all his or her faith into one location. There are several problems with this:
1. If your building collapses due to a catastrophic event, then you are out of luck
2. You may be away from your house/building when a disaster happens and you will need to get to supplies quickly. Kind of hard to do that if your commute is over an hour.
3. Depending on where you live, your building may be seized by the government for emergency assistance of tactical purposes. It would be a real shame to spend all our money and time prepping just to have it handed over to someone else.
Ensure that you have at least two secure spots to store your supplies. Do not broadcast to anyone where you have these supplies but do ensure that you have both places up to date. If storing in a rental space or on a property that you do not own, ensure you will have a means of getting to the supplies even if the building is locked and/or shut down from the public.
The urban prepper must have several bug out plans and practice them
Because you are preparing for surviving urban disasters, you will have to take into consideration that there are a number of “I did not see that coming” situations which can hinder your plans. As such, you will need to have a few different plans ready to go. For example: if you are planning on bugging out by cutting across park and then hiking to the state park where you will bug out and you find out that the bridge to the park is congested or destroyed, you need to have an alternate plan. I would recommend that you have two major bug out spots in mind and at least 5 contingency plans in place.