How important is it for YOU to have water, flashlights, and survival gear, does everyone really need that stuff?

  The "false spring" is over, truthfully our weather is not bad at all, not compared to my earlier life in the North. We get high winds, high water, every 5 years it rains pretty hard, and smoke-filled air from wildfires during the summer. We had 4 earthquakes this morning, I haven't heard of any more, I've been reading other stuff all day. Now it's a bit cold, we had a frost last night and will for the next two weeks, according to the weather report. The seeds I started in my garden "greenhouse" table have not sprouted, so I made a heater that I set inside the box. It appears to be working, it keeps the temperature above freezing. It's an insanely simple contraption, I placed a 75-watt bulb inside a steel cup that has a diameter of about 4 inches, with thick steel sides to hold the heat. I've used the cup for a lot of things, it's about a pint. I kind of suspect I'm heading for failure on the seed germination, but I have more seeds, and I did jump the gun. This is the earliest I have tried to start seeds, I know better, but that dang old false spring messed me up. (Blame it on Rio, right?)

My drying/seed starting greenhouse table. 

  I came across a question in a forum I read, it's a survival forum, with a bunch of opinions. It's interesting what people's thoughts are about every subject under the sun, I keep in mind the 33% rule, 33% are deeply committed, 33% are indifferent and 33% just flat out don't care on any subject. It's not my goal to change anyone's minds on anything, I like to read the opinions, I do comment on some items but I'm careful. I'm careful about what I comment on and what I say, mostly because I think differently than most people. My son and stepson are like that as well, they think differently than anyone else. I have found I need to measure my words, I don't like to be offensive. In the case of forum comments for some reason, I always find my self to be "off topic" and a number of my comments get rejected, two today were, for being off subject, not offensive.
  So the question was, " Is preparing for wilderness survival just for the adventure, boy scouts, and dooms-dayers, or is it more of a hobby? I had an opinion, but I'm coming from another perspective so my opinion was rejected. It was off topic so I would like to pose a different question. "Doe's preparing for a natural disaster make sense for everyone" (I'm not sold on the idea of a total collapse of society, and civil unrest is so local I believe it to be a non-issue, I will write a blog on Civil disturbances tomorrow).
  My opinion is the amount of planning and amount of supplies to keep on hand depends on where you live, also depending on the natural events that may happen. I live on an island on the California Delta. The threats include wildfire, flood, earthquakes, and high wind damage. The determining factor is we have a 2-1/2 mile walk down a levee to get to our muster station. It would have to be a severe earthquake, wildfire depends on the wind. In the case of flooding, the levee could breach or could experience a dam failure upstream,(I'm 75 miles from the Oroville Dam, I don't think it will breach) the wind would most likely be a power interruption for maybe a few days, but it can sure drive fires. I don't expect any problems but in the event, something does happen I want to have enough water, a few flashlights, and a hand crank radio to charge cell phones. If the levee breached between us and the muster station, we may be here for a few days. As far as earthquakes are concerned I'm more concerned about the resulting fires from broken gas lines and corrupted electrical systems. We keep clothing next to our bed with boots, I've had to get up in the middle of the night to help people with incidents such as boats breaking loose, and three of my neighbor's houses burned down one night, however, most of the time nothing happens around here. But with us at our location it is not a hobby, we are set up to evacuate it's not an obsession, it's just a part of our lifestyle. Living on a remote island we have to expect to support ourselves if something happens. Even if a person has a quart of water, that is enough of a supply for a 2-3 mile hike, then a one day wait to go to a relief station, that is preparing for surviving a natural disaster also. There is a big difference between urban survival, city survival, and wilderness survival. We merely need to be aware of the potential threats and be self-reliant enough to manage them. It's our lifestyle which is a natural reaction to where we live.

There is not that many people on our island, but you get the idea.

  Everyone's situation is different, there are some places where there are no natural disaster threats, or not prominent enough to address. Where those places are, I don't know, I'm thinking somewhere in the middle of Nevada maybe? If you know of one let me know in the comment section below. I remember the huge power outage New York State experienced on November 9, 1965. It shut down the Electrical Power in Ontario Canada, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, and Vermont. The power was out for 13 hours. (Link to the N.E. power outage.) In a rural area, we would lose our water, for the most part in the Cities that were affected the water stayed on because the water plants have emergency generators. That is the keyword, Emergency Generators, they have most likely been activated very rarely since. The pumps in New Orleans are over 100 years old, huge machines that need a lot of electrical power to run, they are used rarely as well. However the key here is, they are ready, all of those areas practice preparing for natural disasters, due to their responsibilities for one thing, and it is essential utilities continue to function for the second. Those Cities and States take being prepared seriously, they may be lax in maintenance (Oroville Dam for example), but none are intentionally negligent. The island we live on has the emergency alert siren which is sounded at 11 am the first Wednesday of each month, we evacuate to our muster station in the event of a genuine catastrophic situation.
  I believe the correct approach for all of us is to ascertain our particular situation and plan or not accordingly, this cannot be covered with one broad brush stroke. If a person lives at the base of a hill that has had mudslides numerous times in the past, well they should be aware of the dangers. It's the same with all natural calamities, residents that experience the same events year after year are experts at being able to deal with them. I'm still amazed by the residents of Florida and how well they understand Hurricanes, as well as the Northerners in dealing with blizzards, or the Mississippi River valley residents and flooding. Each area has unique threats and it is prudent to understand all we can about them, and what our choices are when it comes time to react to them.

Residents of a desert region have unique needs as well, a power
outage stops their world during the summer due to no air conditioning.

Those of us that choose to live in compromised areas (I guess that is OK to say, but I don't feel compromised), need to be aware of one thing, Help will not be here anytime soon, so we have to take care of ourselves for a while, I plan on a week. The unpredictability of it all breeds uncertainty which in turn breeds indifference, that's a tough emotion to overcome.
  Thank you for reading and I'd like for you to share it where ever you can. Give preparation some thought, consider the threats that you may encounter and the extent of preparation you should be making. It can be from having a bottle of water for a hike out as in my situation, or a years supply of everything. There truly is a lot of difference depending on where we live.

jacquesandkate  emergencykitsplus.com