A Modern Prepper has many factors to consider.  And the factors depend on each prepper’s unique situation.  Things like health, for example.  What health issues do your family members have that would be a serious problem after a major disruptive event?

A list of some of the major things to consider might look like this:

1. Heat:  if you live where extreme cold in the winter occurs
2. Security:  protecting yourself and your family
3. Water:  for drinking and cooking
4. Sanitary:  dealing with waste
5. Food
6. Medicine:  depending on health issues
7. Survival Supplies and Go Bags
8. Backup electricity
9. Neighborhood organization
10. Barter supplies
11. Communications (local and distant)
12. Special situations prepping:  nuclear, poison gas
13. Transportation
14. Escape route and hunker-down location

And that, my friend, is NOT a complete list.  If you would like to suggest additions to the list, please comment below.

This list looks pretty intimidating.  If you take it in it will show you how absolutely dependent we are to the civilization we are part of, and how fragile it really is.  All it would take is a small nuke about 150 miles up over the central US and we would suddenly find ourselves in the 1800’s but without the support systems and with way too many people.  End of civilization in an instant (Read the book One Second After by John Matherson if you want to get a better idea of how this would happen).

A bug-out location example

Setting Priorities

The list above is not in priority order.  The priority depends on your situation.  For example, if you live in a city, there is NO WAY you can survive long-term.  Between criminals, gangs, and thugs looking to take anything they find for themselves, raping and killing as they go, no place near a city is truly safe.  No water or sewer, no food, and disease and starvation, along with mass exodus into the suburbs would occur very quickly.  The “burbs” would be no better, just a few days behind in the breakdown and horror.

So, if you live in the city, getting out safely and quickly, having some form of transportation, before realization hits for the bad guys, and your transportation is taken away by force, that is a top priority.  Note:  the bad guys will realize that a gold mine has just been given to them very very quickly, and will act immediately to take advantage to the instant freedom from law and order – much faster than their victims will realize the danger they are in.  Be warned.

But where do you go?  To a hidy-hole you have prepared, your “bug-out” location.  More on that later.

I am just using “location” as an example of how the list is extremely dependent on your particular situation.  For my situation, living in Northern Idaho, with my own well and septic, out of town, the list looks like this (in priority order):

1. Heat
2. Water:  Backup Electric (to power water pumps)
3. Security
4. Food
5. Barter and supplies
6. Communications
7. Medical

Notice my list is shorter.  That is because I have decided I am not going to worry about poison gas and nuclear radiation.  My location is my hunker-down location, so I don’t need that on the list.  Having some transportation out in a worst case might be an issue, but I have an old Suzuki that probably would run even after an EMP attack.  And so on.

In future postings, I will detail how I addressed the situation I am in.  I will also discuss some of the items I don’t have to worry about, such as what a city dweller has to deal with.  But I recommend you read the book above so you get how serious that situation really is – even for small towns, such as the one I live near.

And while it may seem like it might be “too late” (based on our situation in the USA, in Europe, and North Korea), things tend to move slower than we think – until they don’t.  So get started today!  There are lots of prepper websites out there to help you!