A few articles caught my eye in recent days. They illustrate eloquently how unprepared Americans as a whole are for a true disaster-level emergency.
First, Brandon Smith looks at mass starvation.
Because we have lived in relative security and economic affluence for so long the idea of ever having to go without food seems “laughable” to many people. When the notion of economic collapse is brought up they jeer and call it “conspiracy theory.”
Compared to the Great Depression, the US population today is completely removed from agriculture and has no idea what living off the land means. These are not things that can be learned in a few months from books and YouTube videos; they require years of experience to master.
. . .
The greater problem in terms of famine is not that individual Americans are not aware of the threat; many of them are. The problem is that our infrastructure and logistical systems are designed to fail and there’s not much the average citizen can do about it.
. . .
Growing food, hunting food and foraging food are all supplemental measures, especially in the first years of any crisis event. Without a primary emergency supply most people will not make it. Food storage has been a mainstay of civilization for thousands of years for a reason – It works. When larger secure communities are established then agriculture can return and self sustaining production makes food storage less important. Until then, what you have in your basement or your garage is the only thing that’s going to keep you alive.
There's more at the link.
Next, Michael Totten analyzes the very real risk of a catastrophic earthquake in the Pacific Northwest - one that may be many times worse than anything any of us have ever experienced.
Roughly 100 miles off the West Coast, running from Mendocino, California, to Canada’s Vancouver Island, lurks the Cascadia Subduction Zone, where the Juan de Fuca Plate is sliding beneath the North American Plate, creating the conditions for a megathrust quake 30 times stronger than the worst-case scenario along the notorious San Andreas, and 1,000 times stronger than the earthquake that killed 100,000 Haitians in 2010.
. . .
Scientists scrambled for core samples of the ocean floor just off the American coast and found turbidites—layers of tsunami debris—that date back millennia and, most recently, again, to 1700, revealing a cycle that repeats itself every 300 to 600 years. The Cascadia Subduction Zone is not quiet, after all: it triggers catastrophic megathrust quakes, on schedule. “A fault that ruptures with this big of an earthquake every few hundred years is ragingly active,” says Yumei Wang, a geotechnical engineer at the Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries (DOGAMI).
A 9.0 megathrust quake is too powerful even to be measured on the now-dated Richter scale.
. . .
“No community on the planet is adequately prepared for a major subduction zone earthquake,” observes Dan Douthit, spokesman for the Portland Bureau of Emergency Management (PBEM). The Northwest, however, and especially Oregon, is nerve-rackingly further behind than it should be. Nothing built here before 1995—which includes the vast majority of all structures, including skyscrapers, bridges, and hospitals, as well as houses—was engineered to withstand it.
Again, more at the link.
However, the really scary part comes when one puts the warnings from the two articles above into joint perspective: in other words, how they interact with and affect each other. A massive natural disaster like a Pacific Northwest earthquake might - probably will - cut almost all transport links from the West Coast to states further inland, and vice versa. Emergency relief won't be able to reach disaster zones, and refugees won't be able to move away from them. We won't be able to get at the vast agricultural and processing resources of our Western states, which together supply more than half of our fruit and vegetables; and we won't be able to help those that produce them, meaning they'll probably be unable to produce more for a significant length of time - years rather than months.
What's more, the sudden need to reallocate transport resources - trains, 18-wheelers, etc. - to disaster relief, plus the loss of transport resources in the disaster zone, will result in a sudden and unavoidable collapse of distribution networks throughout the rest of the country. We may have plenty of food for everyone: but if it can't be moved from field to processing facilities to distributors to consumers, how are we going to get our hands on it?
Too many of us are prone to say, "Well, that's just fear-mongering. There's no guarantee anything like that will happen." Unfortunately, there is such a guarantee. Read the article about the Pacific Northwest earthquake potential, and look at what scientists and professionals are saying about its inevitability. It's scary.
Remember "nine meals from anarchy"? That well-known saying appears to have been first used by Alfred Henry Lewis in 1896. In 1932 a New Jersey newspaper noted:
How nicely civilization has become balanced is shown by the easily perceived fact that we are never more than nine meals away from anarchy. Throw an impenetrable wall around this metropolitan zone of ten million persons, prevent the people from receiving a supply of food and water for three days, and our vaunted civilization goes on the scrap heap.
In a more recent article titled with that well-known saying, Jeff Thomas pointed out:
Importantly, it’s the very unpredictability of food delivery that increases fear, creating panic and violence. And, again, none of the above is speculation; it’s a historical pattern – a reaction based upon human nature ... At that point, it would be very likely that the central government would step in and issue controls to the food industry that served political needs rather than business needs, greatly exacerbating the problem.
There's also the question of the duration of an emergency. If it's [a major nation-wide catastrophe], then the effects will be felt for not just years, but decades. There's no way we can stockpile enough supplies to cater for something like that. Those who can farm, growing their own food, will have an edge: but everyone else who survives will be doing their best to raid farms for food, so keeping it is likely to be a very serious problem. Certainly, if we are not already growing at least some of our own food, we're very unlikely to be able to grow enough from scratch to survive. We lack the knowledge, tools, seeds, and experience to do so. Tempting advertisements to buy a certain brand of seed, or a particular tool, or land on which to establish an "emergency farm", are likely to benefit only those selling them. Realistically, most of us can afford to plan, and stockpile supplies, for an emergency lasting from a few weeks to a year. Anything beyond that . . . well, it's unlikely we'll live through it. That's just the way it is.
Nothing in the articles linked above leads me to think differently. Perhaps all of us should re-evaluate our own emergency preparations with that in mind.
Peter
16 comments:
Peter, we do have considerable experience with large scale disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes. We have been mobilizing to react to them for decades. While a NW earthquake of that magnitude would be catastrophic for those impacted, we Americans are very industrious and ingenious when push comes to shove. Every time one of these mega disasters hit the media tell us how long it will take to recover. We always beat their doomsday predictions. As you say, being prepared for a few weeks or months is only prudent. Barring a worldwide cataclysm, the doomsday bunkers are expensive therapy for chronic worriers. Even then, your underground bunker is just as likely to become your tomb. Can you protect it? Can you protect your crops and livestock? What's preventing them from dying in the cataclysm? Let's be honest, most people can't have a remote bunker stocked with years of supplies, and even those who do have to be able to get to it when the balloon goes up.
Texas Mike
The last big Cascadian subduction zone earthquake was big enough it was detected and recorded in Japan, and their records had enough detail to determine the time of day of the event, not just the date.
And yes, the time of day predicted by the data from Japan was consistent with the the memory stories the local natives told about the event.
Our food security depends a great deal on transportation and to a lessor extent refrigeration. But almost any disaster that hits food will hit water. You can go 3 weeks without food, but only 3 days without water.
Let's say California slides off into the ocean and we lose its production. Quit turning corn into alcohol and we have tremendously more grain, and more fuel since it is a net negative energy contribution. We could also quite grain feeding our livestock and go grass only. 50% of greenspace in the US is mowed lawns - i.e. waste. We have capacity to spare. EXCEPT, non GMO core is 1/3 as productive, add in loss due to insects with no pesticides. But wait, monoculture production (raise 1 thing) has led to depleted soils and a dependence on fertilizers.
Logistics is the issue. Lose the web or modern communications and put us back to a local level. Drop bridges (road and rail road) and what happens? Our biggest worry is not a natural disaster, but a man made one. I.e. our own govt. Cousin in PA has already seen announcements that in the event of an emergency the metropolitan grasshoppers should flee to the country where they will be taken care of. No one asked if the rural population is willing to do that. Not all places are equal or prepared. Would an urban grasshopper be prepared to work for their meals? And working for your meals means you need to consume 5K calories a day, not 2K.
Most farms are now monoculture, i.e. raise one thing. OUr forefathers raised multiple livestock and plants because diverse sources of food prevent disaster if we have a disaster, such as bird flu, that takes out all poultry. So you end up on a corn farm where all there is to eat is corn. How will the govt help manage the situation - will we eat our seed corn? Will we deplete our herds and flocks? Do it for the children, we must save them all no mater the cost.
Even if you are prepared, I expect the govt to call you a hoarder and confiscate your food or quarter grasshoppers who will eat your preparations. Our current crop of politicians never pass up an opportunity to weild power in the most thoughtless manner possible. Such a situation would require traiage. Who should be saved?
No matter how low the possibility is eventually one or more of the possible disasters will happen. Look at the solar storms that the earth recently and then look up the Carrington event. This actually happened less than two hundred years ago and if it happened today we would all be living in the eighteen fifties.
Social collapse is more likely than a outside event, but both are eventually inevitable. I have curtailed
Eh, folks like Totten are not really helping when they blatantly lie when trying to motivate people by making things sound worse then they are. Both sides of my parents families were in the area and lived through the Good Friday Earthquake which was measured at 9.2, there are three other 9+ measured earthquakes.
Also, sure, a lot of Haitians died from a 7.0 quake in 2010, that's because it was in Haiti, in 2018 Anchorage Alaska had a 8.2 and no one died. There is a difference between countries that have, and follow, building codes and those that do not.
Sure, there are events that can devastate the country or worse and most people should be better prepared but a lot of the prepper community have been getting hysterical lately, sure the economy sucks and the gov is corrupt as hell but the odds of Yellowstone erupting, the SMOD finally showing up, or the radiation from Betelgeuse going supernova finally arriving hasn't change. Still a rounding error from zero point zero.
couldn't help but think when reading this section:
"...our Western coastal states, which together supply more than half of our fruit and (nuts)/vegetables..."
As I read, per Amazon, 300 books each year but that doesn't count the stories I read elsewhere. Like ERJ's blog. Like your books I've read all of his stories. But also TB AKA Toirdhealbeach Beucail AKA The Forty-Five. He's had a story line going about the 'happening" and running out of food and all the other "Stuff" that make up life. He publishes one chapter a week on Thursday. I don't know what year it started but I've read him for at least 4/5 years. It's excellent.
Also another blogger put up a link to a story he read and was impressed with. I concur with all his thoughts of the story. Well written and believable. It's published at https://pawfiction.proboards.com/thread/779/repacious-creditor.
One of the issues with earthquakes more than most other natural disasters is their disruption to transport networks - a bad one can shut down roads, airports, and even ports.
When the earthquake hit Haiti, the only transport that worked was feet, helicopters, and beach landing capable equipment.
If we have a big earthquake on the West Coast, trucks won't be able to get through until the roads are fixed - and the bridges over them will take a long time to fix.
Jonathan
A major catastrophic event will turn the clock back to the Dark Ages for the whole continent possibly the entire world. Our modern civilization is extremely brittle
almost totally lacking in resilience. The result could be a 90+% fatality rate within the first year in many places. Science Fiction has tried to guess at what the results will be. I expect the reality will be worse. Even for the very well prepared survival will be unlikely and in large part a matter of luck.
If / when such a disaster happens that puts us back to a vase of 19th Century tech in agriculture, this may also restrict us to supporting a 19th C population. A LOT fewer people than we have now.
Thanks to the commenter from PA about what / how the major blue cities intend to export their grasshoppers if a disaster strikes them.
From here, it looks like there are at least "difficulties" scheduled for later this year.
After all, there is an election scheduled.
John in Indy
For reference, after the 1994 Northridge Quake, there was no power whatsoever in Los Angeles for 11 days, and when they re-booted the grid, TPTB had no idea if it was going to come back up, or not.
We were on "boil all tap water" orders for a full month, and there were tens of thousands of leaks in sewer lines and water mains, leading to an unwelcome mixing of one with the other, for quite some time even beyond that. (They still haven't found and repaired all those breaks, thirty years later, which is why, from time to time, you'll see a news story about a giant sinkhole opening up somewhere in L.A. and eating a house or a couple of cars. Erosion is a subtle thing.)
If you're not prepared, right this minute, to be fully self-sufficient in every possible way - water, food, shelter, power, medical, etc. - for at least 1-6 months, with no help or outside input, you're not prepared. Period. Full stop.
A year would be a far better benchmark to shoot for.
Doubling up on grocery purchases, and taking advantage of sales, gets you one year's surplus in...one year.
Nota bene that your caloric requirements will go up mightily after a problem begins, both from stress, and increased expenditure of energy, whether from standing watches, or from actual physical clean-up and rebuilding.
Your stocking up can always go slower, or faster, as budget and storage space dictate.
Until you cannot get anything, any more.
Then it's too late for "coulda, woulda, shoulda".
Once calories go to zero, you're dead in 3 weeks.
Forever.
Folks should always bear that knowledge well in mind.
Ok, first of all, we are as a society woefully under-prepared for any large scale disaster. This is because over the last 35-40 years municipalities, counties, and states have pushed disaster preparedness off with the expectation that FEMA will take care of it or fund the recovery. And my timeline is conservative, just what I have first or second-hand knowledge of, it's entirely possible it's been happening longer. This means we're much worse off than the everything-is-dandy crowd thinks.
That said, we're better off than the doomsayers make it seem. Most of the most-likely disaster areas have been dealing with low-level disasters for decades, meaning local governments and community organizations have figured out they can't rely on big brother for help and have at least begun planning and doing mock exercises for larger scale disasters. And then you have the unofficial aid groups - the Cajun Navy that responds entirely on their own to flooded areas, the rednecks with pickups and chainsaws who start clearing roads after big storms so emergency services or the power company can make it in, and hundreds of other examples that we almost never hear about because tragedy & disaster sell while wholesome news doesn't.
We all need to be prepared to care for ourselves and our own, but getting involved in the community can and should be part of our preps as well. I can pretty much guarantee that everyone on here has a county-level Emergency Management Agency, those often have boards staffed with whoever they can get to commit to showing up to a meeting every month or two. If you're not up to being a firefighter or paramedic or anything like that due to age, injury, or schedule, the EMA likely has a board that would let you help your community prepare so you don't need to start figuring out how to deal with the families and little children showing up asking for food.
As you said, it is just about impossible for modern society to prepare for this kind of event. Die offs happen and usually all of a sudden. Even if you make the effort and your preps are sound you can absolutely count on the government and Karen's stepping in to confiscate every single resource you put away for your family. I wonder what the computer model would look like as rats leave the urban cores to reach the food they imagine whitey has socked away in silos just over the hill and down the road. As I see it the low trust will first encounter the other no trust/low trust and start reaping their bitter harvest. It will probably not be even a tenth that get to the hard suburban shell. I wonder if towns that got beltways will do better holding the line or will government force them to simply surrender.
Somebody could write some interesting fiction along those lines. Maybe throw in a zombie apocalypse!
Hi Guys! Long time reader, first time commenter.
Two things about the SHTF. First that many people I talk to about this think that they will be able to hunt for food. Everyone else is thinking the same thing so in a matter of days most wild animals will be taken. When that happens domestic animals are next.
Which brings me to my next point: Whatever resources you have, be it gardens, livestock, supplies, medicines... you must be prepared to defend it. And the longer your area is isolated the more likely you will have to use deadly force to do so. I know, if you're reading this blog you already know that. But others don't. Ideally, you are in a small community where you can count on others for mutual support.
Also, Matt Bracken wrote a series of books, the Enemies Trilogy, about a civil war. Forget about all the Deep State conspiracy stuff...He also brings up the New Madrid Fault. It's real and if you believe you're immune to the effects of earthquakes because you live in the East, you're not.
Two good sites about it, but notice both are old so YMMV.
https://dnr.mo.gov/land-geology/hazards/earthquakes/science/facts-new-madrid-seismic-zone
https://web.mst.edu/~rogersda/nmsz/National%20Impact%20of%20a%20New%20Madrid%20Quake-CUSEC-Mar14-2007.pdf
As a person who has spent the last fourteen months doing a carnivore/ extended fasting diet, you will not starve to death in three weeks if you built like the standard American. I have done a twenty one day fast with no ill effects, I burned about twenty four lbs but was still active and capable of living my life at the end of it. I only stopped because I chose to not because I felt a physical need to eat.
Bear in mind that when a real disaster hits a large area, the biggest threat to the average citizen will come from the politicians.
This is due to two factors; 1) most all of them have a mentality that drives them to be in control of everyone in their sphere of influence,
and 2) that they have a police force or similar group of armed people who will do whatever they are told to do.
There is no natural disaster that they can't, and won't, make worse. They think they know better than you and there is no practical way to change their mind. Even the ones that aren't actual idiots can be convinced by well meaning(maybe) idiots to do things that will be counterproductive.
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