In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, many predicted, because of “climate change” more and more violent hurricanes.
Thankfully, they were wrong, but smart folks living in a hurricane zone prepared and continue to prepare as if they were not; the same has to be our mentality when it comes to an EMP – whether it is localized or massive.
The first thing you have to do is to get back home quickly and safely. You and your family should have all previously established this as the number one priority. Ensure that everyone is accounted for.
The biggest problem will be finding a means of transportation; as you know, most cars will not work anymore. A lot of preppers overlook this aspect because they have a faraday cage and think they have everything covered. But if the EMP is powerful enough, a faraday cage is not 100% reliable.
Immediately convert any cash into useful assets like food, water, medicines, and supplies like clothing and fuel. Your money will become worthless very quickly, so use it up at nearby shops. A can of meat will cost thousands of dollars in a few days.
After your family is safe, you should contact neighbors and establish regular meeting times (at sunset for example). Together you can make an inventory of skills and supplies. Brief everyone on security, from traveling in pairs to avoiding walks at night. Establish regular patrols and danger signals if attacked. Don’t underestimate your neighbors; maybe they are not preppers, but considering we don’t know 100% what will go down after the EMP hits, you never know what you might need, and they could have it. It’s better to be in contact with them—so long as you don’t brag about your stockpiles.
Begin to ration food and water, and consider how to deal with human waste, dirty water, and trash. If necessary, dig a pit at least 100 yards from the nearest food or water store and a minimum of one foot in depth. Trash should be buried or burned on a daily schedule and moved away from your home to keep rats away.
Secure your home before nightfall, checking the perimeter for breaches and ensuring that doors and windows are locked. Empty tin cans on a string are a simple early warning system for intruders, and broken glass can act as a barrier to entry.
To me the scariest thing about an EMP strike is the lack of communications. You might not realize how dependent we are of electronics but imagine a day without your phone and no way of contacting your family, no way of knowing if they are ok. A phone gives you a sense of security. The only thing that will work in that moment is a HAM radio or a two-way radio. Every person in my family has a faraday cage in their car with a radio in it, so we could communicate the moment an EMP strikes. I actually made a device that you can attach to your radio. This will enhance your communication range and you could reach people almost 70 miles away. Because this option will be known by fellow preppers, you should choose a frequency and a time of day. The best hours to talk will be in the middle of the night, plus it’s always a good idea to use disinformation tactics like in the military. This will prove very helpful because you would reach people a town or maybe two towns away. You can find out what is going on, how the EMP affected them, the supplies that they have and how you can use your resources to help each other out.
Immediately secure all the water in your home, filling bathtubs and any other container with the remaining water via the municipal supply, within pipes, and from storage and rainwater tanks. To flush pipes, turn off the water at the shutoff valve, put a container under the lowest faucet in the house, and then open the lowest faucet and then a second faucet higher up.
Prepping for this kind of disaster takes a lot of time and work and involves every area of prepping. You start with the basics: supplies, bug out bags, solar panels, etc., but the more you learn about EMPs, the more you realize how complex and convoluted is. You won’t have Internet access and your computer will fry, so you won’t be able to google your way out of the problems that will arise. So having a physical EMP guide by your side that helps you deal with all EMP effects will prove crucial.
How likely is an EMP to wreak havoc over our way of life?
Naturally, the same likelihood of a massive meteor along the lines of what wiped out the dinosaurs striking earth – it happened before, why not again?
Man made is a different story – for it to happen would require a lot of systems to break down utterly, but again, it is still possible and because it is, preparation, at least having a basic plan is key.
To learn more about EMP's, please visit Ask A Prepper.
I am ex Australian infantry, done just about every type of terrain in Australia, hunted, fished and trapped, spearfish and bowhunted , I got plenty of skills from combat field trauma care to rigging demo charges, I am a survivalist, not a prepper per se, I don’t hoard, I have my gear protected, and my gear protects me, so, what skills do you have? Or do you just have a gun and an attitude?
I can see from the responses that there is a significant disconnect from what is an emp and how you would protect equipment from it.
What you say will happen HAS NEVER HAPPENED IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND !!! (true or false) TRUE !!!! NEVER HAPPENED… Dont mention the carrington event decades ago but an actual emp.. so your THEORY is based on whatever govt scientists or RESEARCHERS put forth to the public… You have No Basis for your claim because IT HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE… its a theory that everything would shut down… chances are if something like that did happen it would be over a MAJOR METRO area which is over 100 miles away then they say they are set off 10’s of miles into the atmosphere, so if your saying something set off that far away would affect my alarm clock on my night table the. You can take your faraday cages and use them as coffins because every living thing from here to there would die if it was that powerful (again its ONLY A THEORY BECAUSE THERE IS NO PAST PRECEDENCE) Your heart and every living thing with a heart would stop also…
from what i can gather, when not in use, unplug from the grid everything and it can’t hurt it.again, just hearsay
How many nukes simultáneos exploding would it take to knock out the entire grid? Think we need a new boogeyman.
Love all the Rambo$#%&!@* Go get laid will ya.
Jordison Neil Foster
Anthony Pastorelli https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish_Prime
“After your family is safe, you should contact neighbors and establish regular meeting times (at sunset for example). Together you can make an inventory of skills and supplies. ” HAHAHA!!! Let people know what you got, that’s a bad idea. Only the people you trust should know that, not just random neighbors, unless you trust them
I was told more. Thanks though.
Depends on the size
Storage container works if you seal the gaps and holes
Hey Karl Krause, it seems your knowledge on this subject is sound. I have a question if you will be so kind as to give me your thoughts……if I were to build an underground garage for a bug out vehicle how deep would I have to go to avoid EMP damage without a F.Cage?
Anthony, i wasnt measuring dicks, why are you. My first skill is youth, i can run circles around your age group. We’re all badasses, calm down and do your thing.
I wasn’t measuring dicks mate, and youth is great if you have the skillsets. Knowledge is power, that is as true now as ever, and you are right about hoarding, having a lifetime’s supplies in one location is a high risk venture. I have my tech because with it I can educate generations with the vast collection of books that I have in PDF format, and entertainment is crucial for sustaining high morale. The most important thing to have and maintain is an unwavering will to survive and to protect those you care about, even to the point of putting their survival before your own.
Communication as you know it now will be destroyed for months or years! Faraday protection of radio equipment is a good idea but will be limited to line of sight so it is important to plan and train with friends and family. Get used to walking, riding a bike, an old vehicle or tractor with no technology
Ryan Johnson It’s a good read. Sicka English read this
Yeah there will be chaos, thousands will crawl out of their cement and wooden holes into the sun for the first time when TV and movie streaming is no more.
It is interesting how people will point out that a car is a faraday cage but then point out that it will not protect even its own electronics. Well, the reason is because cars are a very poor faraday cage (heads up, a faraday cage is an enclosure that will direct em emissions around it but not let it pass through it). A good faraday cage will stop transmissions of any kind from getting in or out. So, can you talk on your cell phone from inside your car? Yeah, so it isn’t going to protect crap from an EMP.
There are a lot of good instructions on how to build a faraday cage storage container out there. Basically you want something that conducts em waves around and not through what you want to protect. Aluminum foil works well, anti-static bags work fairly well, and there are other options. The military has metallic foil bags with anti-static bags inside to protect electronic cards from damage in storage. My guess is that they tested a bunch of stuff before settling on that.
Oh, and if anyone wants to add a little something to their conspiracy theories, computer part manufacturers are shipping components in less and less anti-static bags, opting instead for non conductive plastics. Maybe the man has caught on to the excellent uses for anti-static bags… like protecting electronics from EMPs.