10 Emergency Prep Insights

“Hey, you know how we bought a bunch of stuff to make sure we’re good in case something bad happens? Well, how do we know we’re actually good? Just buying stuff doesn't tell us how much we need, or if something doesnt fit, or if we secretly needed some other thing nobody told us about”

And so our Test Prep Saturday was born. 

We tested a small portion of our assumptions and preps on a single Saturday. Enough to give us useable information and build a thirst for even bigger preparedness tests. Below are 10 insights we had from that day.

#1 Reduce Water Usage - Less dishwashing

Anyone who's been following preparedness long enough knows that water is an extremely valuable commodity, one that we prioritize even above food itself.  Naturally, the ability to conserve your water usage and reduce waste will be important in keeping that resource around for as long as possible. As I was doing the morning dishes, it dawned on me precisely how much water I was actually wasting and I thought, why wash dishes at all? Paper plates and utensils would go a long way to maintaining not only our water preps but also our sanity. After several different brands, we’ve settled on these plates and these utensils. 

#2 Reduce Water Usage - Better dishwashing

Eventually, you will run into cookware that needs to be washed and can't be tossed out. Things like like pots and pans. In those cases, you can use the classic two basin method of washing dishes. It’s an old technique of using two wash basins, one for dirty dishes and the other for rinsing. 

#3 Reduce Water Usage - Canned goods

Canned goods can have water in them right? Sure but how much? Obviously every canned good will have a different amount of water but I started with cans of whole corn for the mashed potatoes I was making. Interestingly, while I used 2 regular 15.25oz cans of whole corn from different manufacturers, they both contained the same amount of water - ¾ cup. Not enough for the mashed potatoes, but not nothing either.

#4 Cooking Fuel Usage

Obviously the family has to eat so this was a perfect opportunity to measure how much fuel a meal for 2 adults and 1 toddler actually takes. These numbers are for non-freeze dried foods, cooked outside in 30 degree temperatures. 

I set up our Coleman camping stove on the pack porch and used a 1lb propane tank for all our meals. 

I weighed the tank before and after each meal. Here are the numbers:

• Breakfast
• 8 Breakfast sausages and 2 eggs
• 32 grams of fuel
• Lunch
• 6 cheddar bratwursts
• 22 grams of fuel
• Dinner
• Family size dehydrated mashed potatoes, 2 cans of corn, 4 cups of water
• 22 grams of fuel

Averaging about 25g of fuel per meal is way less then I was expecting. Even if you tack on an extra 20% safety factor and say its 30 grams, that means a 1lb (454g) propane tank is enough fuel to cook 15 meals. Again, a “meal” in this case is defined as feeding 2 adults and 1 toddler. Assuming 3 meals a day, that's 5 days of food. Not bad at all. 

Even better is a 20lb tank (9,072g) will last 302 meals. That's over 100 days of meals, meaning 3x20lb tanks will last you almost a year of cooking fuel. That's a lot of fuel in a relatively small area. Personally, I keep 4 tanks since I regularly grill and use propane for other uses.

It should be noted however that my Coleman cooking stove doesn't directly take 20lb tanks, you need to buy an adapter, which I had previously and it worked wonderfully.

Out of curiosity, I decided to repeat this test with my Jet Boil, and I was even more surprised at how little fuel it actually used. To heat 16 ounces of water from room temperature to boiling with the fuel throttle all the way open it took 4g of isobutane fuel. 

#5 Know Your Power Usage

I always knew that the two functions that use the most amount of electricity were motors and heating elements but wow, you really don't get a sense of just how large they are until you test them on a portable battery.

Understanding how much power your devices consume is vital, especially when relying on batteries or generators. Some numbers from random usage around the house:

• TV: Peak usage was 280W. Interestingly, the power consumption depended on the screen's brightness. Lots of white pixels increased usage, while darker scenes reduced it, but it never went below 170W.
• Bissell Carpet Cleaner: Used 315W consistently.
• Shark Vacuum Cleaner: Hovered well over 1000w
• Nebulizer: 50w continuous
• Slow Cooker: On "warm" it used 45W, "low" was 167W, and "high" reached 200W.
• Dometic Cooler: Drew between 50w to 80w, but once it reached maintenance temp, it hovered at 1 watt.

Writing these numbers on some tape on the device itself allows me to never have to think about these numbers again, the less I have to think/calculate in the moment, the better.

#6 Portable Battery Surprise

Last year, Preppingdeals.net notified me of an over 50% battery deal from ROCKPALS. I never heard of the brand but I knew I didn't need anything fancy and it seemed to fit the bill. It worked great as a general use camping battery but I wanted to put it to some more interesting tests.

It provided stable power and worked great except in one key area that I’m glad didn't surprise me in a moment of need.

The battery allows passthrough charging, but only partly. If you charge the battery via it’s input ports, you can't use the AC ports at the same time. You can use the DC ports with no issue, but the AC ports deactivate. This could be an issue if you want to charge the battery, say from a generator, and have the battery supply AC to other devices. Not world ending, but now an additional factor to consider.

#7 Portable Battery Backup….Backup

I only had one large camping battery. Lugging it around the house all day to power the different items was annoying but also a single point of failure. Multiple camping batteries will allow you to not only have redundancies, but also power different objects in different parts of your house without having 100ft extension cords (safety hazards) all about the house.

This also increases the priority of getting a manual transfer switch and generator setup. A setup that will require it's own set of testing.

#8 Water Storage: The WaterBOB & Physical Exercise

I set up a WaterBOB in my bathtub, and it took about 20 minutes to fill. While pumping water was smooth, I noticed leakage where the pump bulb met the housing, leading to wasted water.  despite the leaky pump bulb, it's still functioned as it was supposed to.

I was then reminded of stories of survivors of hurricane Helene and how they had to carry their daily water in 5 gallon buckets over miles. Personally I know I'd have trouble doing that on foot, but maybe I'll need to one day.

Water is surprisingly heavy, about 8lbs per gallon. That means a 5 gallon bucket is 40lbs of water. Put one in each hand and the distance you can carry that decreases significantly. But what is that distance exactly? Another prep question to answer....

 

Another question to answer is where exactly is that source of water located? A lake? a river? a creek? 1 mile? 5 miles? I recommend looking at a map to find your nearest water source and calculating the distance. Practice walking that distance with a 40-pound pack—the weight of a single 5-gallon water bucket.

#9 Keeping Spirits High: Entertainment Is Essential

One thing that amazes me is how much of our day to days are taken up by a TV or a phone, neither of which will be available in the same capacity as our every day.  Without adequate entertainment, boredom sets in, and we felt it. That boredom can become destruction especially if you have a three year old, ask me how I know. 

So while we kept our phones and the TV off all day, we needed non-electronic entertainment that would keep a 3 year old busy in the dead of winter. Some things to buy to help you are:

• Balloons for playing keepy uppy
• Blankets for blanket forts or hide and seek
• Craft & art supplies

#10 Always Have Fire

EDC is the gateway drug to prepping. While I often used my FlameCap lighter for every day tasks, it really came in handy during the prep test. Lighting candles, sealing paracord ends, lighting the fires for our meals, etc was all made easier knowing the lighter is on me and still has fuel. No secret dead lighters ruining my day. 

Final Thoughts

This exercise was an eye-opener. It highlighted the importance of testing our assumptions and equipment before an actual emergency strikes. The thing about assumptions is that it can work in both ways. You can assume you have more than you need but you can also assume that you have less than you need and while it will always be a nice surprise to have more than you need, money isn't infinite, and we need to spend it on the other priorities as well.

For example, the money I would have spent on more cooking fuel I can now allocate towards more redundant electrical preps.

I encourage everyone to conduct their own preparedness drills. You might be surprised by what you learn—and better prepared when it truly matters.