If you are like many people today, you are very busy. It doesn’t matter if you’re busy running a multi-million dollar empire or busy watching Survivor. Either way, you are busy and would rather not take the time to put together an emergency preparedness kit. There is nothing wrong with this, and fortunately for you, there are a lot of good commercial kits out there that will serve your purpose quite well. That being said, I will also warn that there are a lot of kits out there that aren’t so good.
So, what do you need in a kit? First, you will need the basics: food and water. Enough for each member of your household for 72 hours. The type of food is very important. Fortunately, most of the commercially available kits have food appropriate for most climates and situations. It is not always the tastiest, but it will keep you alive. Look for food with a long shelf life (you don’t want it to spoil) that is easy to eat and requires little to no preparation. It should also be very high in calories. Nutrition is also important, but in this case, as we are not planning a long term diet, it takes a back seat to utility. As long as your kit is not full of candy and crackers, you should be ok here. You will need about half a gallon of water per person per day as well. More is better, but water is also very heavy and takes up a lot of space.
First aid is also very important. It is very likely that you will need to treat people for minor injuries, and you should be equipped accordingly.
Besides that, a light source, a portable am/fm radio, some type of shelter, and a signal of some sort are also very important. You may also want to include a few personal hygiene items, some extra clothing and something to entertain yourself with. With this in mind, you’ll want to make sure the kit you purchase has a little extra room to put these things in (you likely won’t have room for the clothes – I like to keep these by the kit in a small plastic bag or pouch of some sort).
That’s really all there is to it. Of course, you can add or remove items to personalize your kit, but the whole point of buying the kit is that you don’t want to spend too much time on it. You can purchase pre-made kits from many places, and I have seen several good ones. Costco and Walmart generally have good kits, and you may want to look there. Another great kit that I highly recommend is available on Amazon.com. It has almost everything you need in it. The only thing it lacks is a flashlight, which fortunately they have a good one that I can recommend as well. It has enough food and water for 2 people for 3 days, with extra room in the pack to add some of the other items you may want to bring along.
Click here to buy the Quakehold! Grab-n-Go Emergency Kit on Amazon.com.
Click here for the Kaito KA404 Emergency Hand Crank Dynamo 5-LED Flashlight with AM/FM radio.
Once you have your kit together, put it in a closet, and check it once a year to make sure everything is still good. Other than that, forget about it. And rest assured that if you need it, it is there.
