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Post by Ausprep on Oct 28, 2013 10:43:07 GMT 10
Howdy Members! Most of you would have known, but recently i was affected by the NSW bushfire crisis. This got me thinking, whilst i was "somewhat" prepared, how many of us actually have a bushfire survival plan? Or for those affected by flooding, by quakes? Im talking outside of our SHTF scenarios and into everyday threats? On the NSW RFS site, i found a great little guide. Had to share it. www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/file_system/attachments/Attachment_BushFireSurvivalPlan.pdf |
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Jason
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Post by Jason on Oct 28, 2013 22:31:40 GMT 10
Good call, often folks can get caught up on the big SHTF stuff without thinking about the smaller things - I know I do.
Would you mind sharing what it was like for you, I for one have never had any close calls etc, it might make it a bit more real to understand what it was like now you are on the safe side of the whole thing.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2013 22:39:32 GMT 10
Yeah I haven't really had any close calls either. Even though bushfires have come down these parts.
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Post by Ausprep on Oct 29, 2013 8:04:43 GMT 10
Sure. Firstly, I was watching the news, listening to the updates on the radio and following a few key pages on Facebook (will link below) Fires were close, but no real threat. Smoke got quite heavy in and around our area and we could now see the flames from work (could really only see smoke prior) Fire was getting closer, still no immediate threat apart from heavy smoke. Out of no where, there was a second fire BEHIND us, across the road (4 lane highway) about 200-300M into the bush area. Within minutes, due to very hot, high gust winds it was at the road….Then in the centre dividing strip THEN at our fence line. Time to evacuate. The only pic below of our new showroom I got was just after it jumped, all the trees you see here are now gone. Flames were massive. At this time I left for home and there was a genuine concern that our place of work may not be there tomorrow. That’s pretty much it guys, all happened REALLY fast.  |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2013 8:38:36 GMT 10
Gees - Makes you think how brave all the fighter-fighters are and how many blazes they must have to attend. I really do feel that this is only the start of things to come. I hope that we're not shorthanded moving into Summer.
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Jason
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Post by Jason on Oct 29, 2013 16:29:36 GMT 10
Thanks for sharing mate, I always wondered how quick these things were. Thats pretty dicey that it got so close, I assume the roads were pretty bad with people all trying to get away?
What made you stick around for as long as you did? Was there any discussion of closing up and leaving sooner?
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Post by Ausprep on Oct 29, 2013 18:14:59 GMT 10
Thanks for sharing mate, I always wondered how quick these things were. Thats pretty dicey that it got so close, I assume the roads were pretty bad with people all trying to get away? What made you stick around for as long as you did? Was there any discussion of closing up and leaving sooner? Nah, no talk of leaving earlier, mainly because this actually come from behind us AND this, believe it or not was deliberately lit (11yo & 15yo boys, both caught) Whilst we were watching the blaze in front of us, one was sneaking up the rear. |
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Jason
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Post by Jason on Oct 29, 2013 19:17:23 GMT 10
Nah, no talk of leaving earlier, mainly because this actually come from behind us AND this, believe it or not was deliberately lit (11yo & 15yo boys, both caught) Bloody hell! I tell you what if that was my lad he wouldn't know what hit him, then again I do spend time with him explaining fire safety and consequences from the lack of it, so fingers crossed it shouldn't come to that! |
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Post by bigredtomatosauce on Oct 31, 2013 23:10:56 GMT 10
Flames got to about a kilometre from my place. My partner agrees now it was wise to have digital backups of all of our documents, a filing folder ready to go and our BOB's. Was amazing having a fresh change of clothes after a nervous-sweaty day.
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Post by Ausprep on Nov 1, 2013 6:52:21 GMT 10
Flames got to about a kilometre from my place. My partner agrees now it was wise to have digital backups of all of our documents, a filing folder ready to go and our BOB's. Was amazing having a fresh change of clothes after a nervous-sweaty day. My BOB simply has two 16G flash drives, both identical in what they are holding, both in different sections of my bag. We have everything on these from bank acc no's, credit card numbers, TFN, important phone numbers, medicare & healthcare details, and most recently IP address of important web sites and pages. Photos is something we have a bit of, but not alot. I will be working on this down the track. Such a cheap and easy form of insurance. |
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Post by bigredtomatosauce on Nov 1, 2013 9:04:42 GMT 10
Flames got to about a kilometre from my place. My partner agrees now it was wise to have digital backups of all of our documents, a filing folder ready to go and our BOB's. Was amazing having a fresh change of clothes after a nervous-sweaty day. My BOB simply has two 16G flash drives, both identical in what they are holding, both in different sections of my bag. We have everything on these from bank acc no's, credit card numbers, TFN, important phone numbers, medicare & healthcare details, and most recently IP address of important web sites and pages. Photos is something we have a bit of, but not alot. I will be working on this down the track. Such a cheap and easy form of insurance. You might already do this, but take photos of everything you have. If something does happen, for insurance sake, you have photos of exactly what you owned and what they need to replace. I have pictures of anything worth more than about $20 including serial numbers for the expensive items to make it as easy for the idiots in the insurance office to process a claim if I ever need to make one. The most important thing about natural catastrophe survival is making sure everything you need to grab is packed and just needs to be picked up, and you don't feel bad about leaving things behind. When we got evac'd I never once thought about anything in my house after I grabbed my essentials. Everything that couldn't be replaced was ready to go and then I can always get another lounge and flat screen so lets get out of here. |
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Post by Nex Socius on Nov 17, 2013 21:21:50 GMT 10
I never thought about scanning my important docs and things and putting on usb drives - great idea! I currently have all my essentials tossed in a safe place that I can just grab - it needs to be upgraded, but I can still just get up and go. Hmmm, I might even work on that next weekend  |
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Post by bigredtomatosauce on Nov 18, 2013 11:37:15 GMT 10
I never thought about scanning my important docs and things and putting on usb drives - great idea! I currently have all my essentials tossed in a safe place that I can just grab - it needs to be upgraded, but I can still just get up and go. Hmmm, I might even work on that next weekend That's what this place is about - sharing neat ideas! Even if the documents are just photocopies, I think if there is for example a bushfire that razes your home, you are probably going to be able to recover all of those documents easier if you at least have a photocopy rather than nothing. |
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Post by pheniox17 on Jan 18, 2014 16:32:19 GMT 10
a little late, but a suggestion, with your mobile phone take photos of the important documents, and store them on a memory card (phone accessible) phone should store the date photo was taken, and in a pinch will be a perfect copy that you can show relevant people to prove who you are, just don't loose your phone  |
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wolfstar
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Post by wolfstar on Jan 19, 2014 15:03:37 GMT 10
ive been through bush fires before, it was like it followed me! first near parkes, went to stay with my dad in western syd, they broke out a couple of k's away ( we had burnt leaves and huge pieces of ash all over the yard) so we went to stay with my stepmums family in shellharbour, well, they started there too! got to the point that we were straight across one creek from a blaze, then watched it jump over to another area of bushland, but not towards us any further. my own stepbrothers were in the ses, at the base, and it got surrounded all of a sudden, very lucky nobody was hurt or worse :/ n trust me, im with ya Jason, if it was one of mine, id belt them six ways to sunday then make them donate everything they own to the victims of the fire >:/ ive got a very low bs tolerance level, and stuff like that makes me see red
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wolfstar
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Post by wolfstar on Jan 19, 2014 15:11:16 GMT 10
btw, big tip for bushfires, if youre caught in one on the road, do not by any means stop driving. ever. that saved my mum when she was evacuating. another good idea is what a friend did on her familys farm, they set up a sprinkler system on the guttering to wet the roof and the ground surrounding the house. failing that, blocking the downpipe and flooding the gutters works wonders for preventing the roof from catching. and, when evac'ing, if you can choose between a petrol and a diesel vehicle, go diesel. its far less likely to ignite. i gotta say, living in the bush is good for awareness of natural disasters and what to do, no such thing as innocence or ignorance out here if you plan on surviving. nor if you see neighbours and friends/family lose everything in fires or floods, lol. thats a big reason why om relatively content where i live right now, it would have to be a doozy of a fire to get in the township, and im far enough back from the river to be out of the flood zone  (and thats been put to the test a few times in a handful of years, lol) |
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saalian
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Post by saalian on Feb 20, 2014 22:17:24 GMT 10
I personally will flee if faced with a fire that threatens my home.
A better option than a USB (in my opinion) is cloud storage. It is cheap and can store considerable data (DropBox is about $100 for a year for 100GB I think). A tablet, smart phone etc. can all access cloud storage.
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Post by Ausprep on Feb 21, 2014 6:07:46 GMT 10
I personally will flee if faced with a fire that threatens my home. A better option than a USB (in my opinion) is cloud storage. It is cheap and can store considerable data (DropBox is about $100 for a year for 100GB I think). A tablet, smart phone etc. can all access cloud storage. Great thinking. only things I would suggest you look into is: 1.The security and reliability of cloud storage. 2.Accessability if shtf without satellites or phone coverage. usb seems to be the most simple and common way to cover this, not to mention more secure. This way your relying only on a flash drive, not a server and/or company that may not be around once society falls. just my 2c |
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saalian
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Post by saalian on Feb 21, 2014 10:06:59 GMT 10
I was merely talking about a bush fire scenario. I am grabbing my whole lap top which I backup regularly on a portable hard drive (that doesn't require a power source), and back up on cloud storage.
USB has a higher chance of being corrupted and damaged compared to cloud storage. Also if not a portable hard drive you may need multiple USB storage sticks (which are not ideal).
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Res-Q
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Post by Res-Q on Feb 21, 2014 15:59:49 GMT 10
I've implemented most of the suggestions above. What I've also made is a laminated copy of my phone contacts list as a foldable strip which sits in my wallet. Mobile phones lose charge, get dropped on the ground or in water. Having a laminated phone list allows me to access my contacts list when using public phones or someone else's mobile in an emergency.
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