Helpful supplies

Now is the time when we should all begin to prepare for the worst. With the unknown rapidly approaching and the ever crumbling state our world is in, a person never knows when their preparation will come in handy. Here are some practical supplies you can get that will come in extremely handy when the hammer falls and the plug gets pulled.
If you visit http://www.become.com you can a variety of items at an extremely discounted rate. When it comes to shopping for the apocalypse it is definitely in your best interest to save every penny you can. I mean after all you still have to survive in this by paying bills and providing for your family.
So I will attempt to feature new items that can be a necessity at a very cheap price.
This weeks feature is a 3 compartment caddy from become.com You can follow this link to view it at http://www.become.com/three-compartment-caddies
These items can be great for organizational needs. Lets say for example you are living in a bunker and have an abundance of supplies laying everywhere. I know it is hard to imagine, but when the time comes your wife will thank me.
So don't say I didn't warn you. Hopefully these times never come to pass, but I do not think we could get so lucky.

http://www.become.com/three-compartment-caddies

Making a dorm room look cooler on a budget

Guest post written by Shelia Brown

I remember back when i was in college, I put up a whole bunch of posters in my dorm room with my roommate to try and make it look a lot cooler. I'm pretty sure there was a Duran Duran poster in there. But I think that for my daughter's tastes, it's going to take a little more than some band posters to make her feel at home.

She's so picky about what she wears and how she decorates, but I want to make sure that we decorate her dorm room accordingly. While I was looking up some stuff online about helping her decorate her dorm room, I ran across the website CLEARTVBUNDLE.com and after I looked through it a little bit, I decided to change over my home internet service to it.

I found some really great resources that she was pretty enthusiastic about, so we decided to order some simllar stuff for her. I know that I have to let her choose the stuff for her to be happy about it, but it doesn't hurt to make some good recommendations.

5 basic survival skills

5 BASIC SURVIVAL SKILLS by Patrick E. McHugh  Fire | Shelter | Signaling | Food & Water | First Aid  There are 5 Basic Outdoor Survival Skills that everyone who ventures into the Outdoors should understand and be fully aware of their potential need and use. This is a just brief outline, not a full explanation of all the requirements and items required in each category.  One of the most important elements to survival is between your ears, your brain.  DO NOT PANIC, use your wits and practice all elements of the 5 Basics before you may need to rely on them.  FIRE can purify water, cook food, signal rescuers, provide warmth, light and comfort, help keep predators at a distance, and can be a most welcome friend and companion.  Each and every person who ventures into the Outdoors should have a minimum of two ways to start a fire with them, one on their person at all times and the other with their gear.  A few small fires provides more heat than one large fire.  Collect firewood you think you will need for the night and then collect the same amount again, experience shows you will need it.  Conserve fuel by making a "star fire" where the ends of large logs meet in the fire only, push inward as more fuel is needed.  Make a reflector from your SPACE BLANKET on the back wall of a shelter to reflect heat of your survival fire to your back, sit between fire and back shelter wall.    SHELTER is the means by which you protect your body from excess exposure from the sun, cold, wind, rain or snow.  Anything that takes away or adds to your overall body temperature can be your enemy.  Clothing is the first line of shelter protection, have the right clothes for the right environment.  Always have a hat. Try and keep the layer closest to your body dry.   Layers trap air and are warmer than one thick garment.  Do not expend energy making a shelter if nature provides one.  Practice building a quick lean-to shelter in case you can not find your campsite, do not wait until you need to make one.  Use a SPACE  BLANKET to prevent dampness or to insulate your shelter or to wrap yourself up in a sitting or squat position to concentrate your body core heat.    SIGNALING is having available the means and ability to alert any and all potential rescuers that you are in need of HELP.  Fire, flashing light, bright color markers, flags, mirrors, whistles all will help you be found.  Three fires in a triangular form are a recognized distress signal.  Carefully bank your signal fires to prevent igniting surrounding area.  Use regular signal mirrors only when you can see a plane, or people in the distance.  Use EMERGENCY STROBE light at night to help attract attention from those that may be in the area.  Make smoky fire with organic material over the fire during the day to attract attention.  Lay out ground to air signal in open field, S.O.S. from rocks, logs or colored clothing, whatever will be seen against the background.  Most search and rescue parties use aircraft as a primary method of sighting.  FOOD/WATER are vital towards your survival.  Ration your sweat not your water intake.  Try to drink only in the cool of the evening. You can live up to three days without water. DO NOT eat plants you do not know.  Never drink urine.  Always assume that you will need extra food and water when you plan your trip.  Pack energy bars and candy in your pockets at all time, just in case.  If possible boil all water 10 minutes plus one minute for every 1000 feet above sea level.  Strain water through your handkerchief to remove large particles.  Try to drink only in the cool of the evening.  Never wait until you are without water to collect it.  Have some poly zip bags to collect and store water.  Never eat any wild berries that you are not sure of what they are.    You can catch rain water in your SPACE BLANKET by laying it out in a trench.  FIRST AID is not just the basic medical needs, it is the primary way in which you act to survive. DO NOT PANIC, remain calm and do what you have to do to take care of YOU. STOP means Sit, Think, Observe, and Plan.  It is the most intelligent thing you can do when you realize you are lost or stranded.  The most important element is to keep your brain functioning rationally, this is basic first aid for survival.  Analyze your needs before every trip, create a medical checklist and carry a small personal kit with you at all times.  Most survival situations require only dressing for small cuts, bruises and personal medication needs, make sure you know what you have with you and how to use it.  Do not over pack, pack what you feel you will need to carry with you at all times. Concentrate on being found, pack a picture of your family in with your gear to remind you of the reasons to remain calm and to survive.  Prevent hypothermia by insulating yourself in a SPACE BLANKET.  

Sleeping outside without a tent

Livin' Off The Land (American Survival Guide...June 1996) How to Spend the Night Outdoors Without a Sleeping Bag or Tent By Christopher Nyerges  You can let a camper take all the gear they want, but I've learned that four items provide the strongest link to "civilization."  Thus, the hiker who wants to be the most self-sufficient should learn how nature can provide these items:  food, matches, toilet paper, and a sleeping bag.  The availability of these four items provides a psychological link to our ordered, "regular" world we call civilization.  Take away these four and you can start to develop genuine survival skills.  1)  Food-The art of finding food in the outdoors requires specialized knowledge of both plants and animals.  Although this could take a lifetime to truly master, one can begin to reduce the amount of food brought along on outings little by little as new skills are learned.  2)  Fire-Making fire without matches isn't easy, but it can be done utilizing a variety of principles such as focusing or concentrating the sun's rays (magnifying glass, camera, binoculars, the lens of a flashlight, etc), or by friction (various bow and drill devices, flint and steel, etc.) or with any of several other unique methods which might involve a firearm or flaregun, your car, or flashlight batteries. Once you learn the principles involves in any of these, it's just a  matter of time and practice before you can effectively produce a fire without matches.  3) Toilet paper-Of course, it's easy to find leaves to use as toilet paper.  This is primarily a psychological hurdle for many people.  4)  No sleeping bag?-Just what are the ways in which we can go without a sleeping bag?  Several hiking companions once expressed surprise when I told them that I frequently go without a sleeping bag on over- night outings.  To many, the idea of no sleeping bag is incomprehensible, impossible, and miserable.  The first time I went without a sleeping bag was simply because I didn't want the bulk and weight.  It was August and I was on a week-long trip in the Angeles National Forest near Los Angeles.  Although the days were hot and dry, the nights in the canyons were cold and windy.  I hadn't realized how cold the nights would be when I left my bag behind.  I  slept in my hammock, my coat being my only cover.  It was much colder than I would have preferred, but I did manage to sleep, more or less. My feet and toes were the coldest, so I wore three pairs of socks on  subsequent nights that week.  With the addition of a very light tarp and the extra socks I slept well for the remainder of the week.  In part, I accomplished this by allowing my body to go into a shiver whenever I began to feel cold.  I'd let my body shiver for about 30 minutes, and that action resulted in enough warmth to allow me to get back to sleep.  Although my hitchhiking days are over, I did discover many useful things during my wanderings up and down the California coast.  I spent several nights sleeping in hollow trees in Northern California.  A tube tent is an excellent camping companion because it's light, non-bulky, inexpensive and you can also use it as a ground cover.  I've spent many nights under the protection of a tube tent's cover, and have stayed dry even in downpours.  Desiring to travel light, I simply wound never carry a heavy tent, but the small tube tent works fine in most conditions.  I've also spent nights with an emergency blanket for shelter.  Yes, it provides some small level of "shelter" and it does help you to retain some body heat.  But let's not kid ourselves-the emergency space blanket is a notch better than nothing and that means you will still be very cold during the winter.  The first truly primitive method of sleeping outdoors without a sleeping bag that I've practiced is the use of "body hollows" as taught at TWI Survival Training outings.  These are body-sized holes, dug about three to four feet deep, and about a foot longer and wider than your body. The hollow is lined with as much soft grass and leaves that you can find.  Then, once inside the hollow, you pull more material onto your body to provide even more insulation.  There are numerous variations on the body hollow, such as digging the hollows outward from a central fire pit so the coals keep you warm at night.  In the summertime, you can often just sleep by the fire with no shelter at all.  Even in the summer, it can get very cold at night.  In general, three feet of insulating material will keep you warm even in freezing temperatures.  If rain is likely, the walls of your shelter should be more steeply pitched and matted down.  You should mat down the layers of grass and other insulation from the bottom up, much like the rows of shingles are placed on a house roof in order to shed rain.  It will take at least three feet of natural materials to shed rain.  Never cut live trees to make a shelter.  The woods are full of dead material that is excellent for shelter making.  An emergency shelter should always be very small.  They are the ones that keep you warm.  Get into the shelter regularly as you are making it.  Make sure it fits you, but is not too big.  The inside should be snug and up to three feet thick with branches and leaves and grass.  Two or three bodies together will stay warmer than one alone.  A lean to generally begins with a tripod of poles.  The front two poles are shorter and the third pole is a longer ridge pole.  You the  lay poles on the ridge pole until you have nearly covered it and begin adding smaller material, such as branches, leaves, etc.  The space between the two smaller poles of the tripod will be the opening.  

Trap and Snare diagrams

Basic Trap and Snare Diagrams

For more info visit
http://www.eseeknives.com/traps.htm

Army Ranger Handbook - coordiators checklist

2-7. COORDINATION CHECKLISTS. The following checklists are items that a platoon/squad leader must check when
planning for a combat operation. In some cases, he will coordinate directly with the appropriate staff section, in most cases this
information will be provided by the company commander or platoon leader. The platoon/squad leader, to keep him from
overlooking anything that may be vital to his mission, may carry copies of these checklists:
Figure 2-7. Intelligence coordination checklist
Figure 2-8. Operations coordination checklist
Figure 2-9. Fire support coordination checklist
Figure 2-10. Coordination with forward unit checklist
Figure 2-11. Adjacent unit coordination checklist
Figure 2-12. Rehearsal area coordination checklist
Figure 2-13. Army aviation coordination checklist
Figure 2-14. Vehicular movement coordination checklist
Figure 2-7. INTELLIGENCE COORDINATION CHECKLIST
INTELLIGENCE COORDINATION CHECKLIST
In this coordination, the leader is informed of any changes in the situation as given in the operation order of mission briefing.
He must keep himself constantly updated to ensure the plan is sound:
1. Identification of enemy unit.
2. Weather and light data.
3. Terrain update.
a. Aerial photos.
b. Trails and obstacles not on map.
4. Known or suspected enemy locations.
5. Weapons.
6. Probable course of action.
7. Recent enemy activities.
8. Reaction time of reaction forces.
9. Civilians on the battlefield.
10. Update to CCIR.
Figure 2-8. OPERATIONS COORDINATION CHECKLIST
OPERATIONS COORDINATION CHECKLIST
This coordination occurs with the platoon leader/company commander so that the platoon/squad leader can confirm his
mission and operational plan, receive any last-minute changes to his mission or plan, and to update his subordinates or issue
a FRAGO, if required:
1. Mission backbrief.
2. Identification of friendly units.
3. Changes in the friendly situation.
4. Route selection, LZ/PZ/DZ selection.
5. Linkup procedures.
6. Transportation/movement plan.
7. Resupply (in conjunction with S4).
8. Signal plan.
9. Departure and re-entry of forward units.
10. Special equipment requirements.
11. Adjacent units operating in the area of operations.
12. Rehearsal areas.
13. Method of insertion/extraction.
Figure 2-9. FIRE SUPPORT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
FIRE SUPPORT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
The platoon/squad leader will normally coordinate the following with the platoon forward observer (FO):
1. Mission backbrief.
2. Identification of supporting unit.
3. Mission and objective.
4. Route to and from the objective (include alternate routes).
5. Time of departure and expected time of return.
6. Unit target list (from fire plan).
7. Type of available support (artillery, mortar, naval gunfire, and aerial support to include Army, Navy, and Air Force) and
their locations.
8. Ammunition available (to include different fuses).
9. Priority of fires.
10. Control measures.
a. Checkpoints.
b. Boundaries.
c. Phase lines.
d. Fire support coordination measures.
e. Priority targets (target list).
f. RFA (restrictive fire area).
g. RFL (restrictive fire line).
h. NFA (no-fire areas).
i. Precoordinated authentication.
11. Communication (include primary and alternate means, emergency signals and code words).
Figure 2-10. COORDINATION WITH FORWARD UNIT CHECKLIST
COORDINATION WITH FORWARD UNIT CHECKLIST
A platoon/squad that requires foot movement through a friendly forward unit must coordinate with that unit’s commander for a
safe and orderly passage. If no time and place has been designated for coordination with the forward unit, the platoon/squad
leader should set a time and place when he coordinates with the S-3. He must talk with someone at the forward unit who has
the authority to commit that unit in assisting the platoon/squad during departure. Coordination entails a two-way exchange of
information:
1. Identification (yourself and your unit).
2. Size of platoon/squad.
3. Time(s) and place(s) of departure and return, location(s) of departure point(s), ERRP, and detrucking points.
4. General area of operations.
5. Information on terrain and vegetation.
6. Know or suspected enemy positions or obstacles.
7. Possible enemy ambush sites.
8. Latest enemy activity.
9. Detailed information on friendly positions such as crew-served weapons, FPF.
2 - 37
10. Fire and barrier plan.
a. Support the unit can furnish. How long and what can they do?
(1) Fire support.
(2) Litter teams.
(3) Navigational signals and aids.
(4) Guides.
(5) Communications.
(6) Reaction units.
(7) Other.
b. Call signs and frequencies.
c. Pyrotechnic plan.
d. Challenge and password, running password, number combination.
e. Emergency signals and code words.
f. If the unit is relieved, pass the information to the relieving unit.
g. Recognition signals.
Figure 2-11. ADJACENT UNIT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
ADJACENT UNIT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
Immediately after the operation order of mission briefing, the platoon/squad leader should check with other platoon/squad
leaders who will be operating in the same areas. If the leader is not aware of any other units operating is his area, he should
check with the S3 during the operations coordination. The S3 can help arrange this coordination if necessary. The
platoon/squad leaders should exchange the following information with other units operating in the same area:
1. Identification of the unit.
2. Mission and size of unit.
3. Planned times and points of departure and reentry.
4. Route(s).
5. Fire support and control measures.
6. Frequencies and call signs.
7. Challenge and password, running password, number combination.
8. Pyrotechnic plan.
9. Any information that the unit may have about the enemy.
10. Recognition signals.
Figure 2-12. REHEARSAL AREA COORDINATION CHECKLIST
REHEARSAL AREA COORDINATION CHECKLIST
This coordination is conducted with the platoon leader/company commander to facilitate the unit’s safe, efficient and effective
use of rehearsal area prior to its mission:
1. Identification of your unit.
2. Mission.
3. Terrain similar to objective site.
4. Security of the area.
5. Availability of aggressors.
6. Use of blanks, pyrotechnics, and ammunition.
7. Mock-ups available.
8. Time the area is available (preferably when light conditions approximate light conditions of patrol).
9. Transportation.
10. Coordination with other units using area.
Figure 2-13. ARMY AVIATION COORDINATION CHECKLIST
ARMY AVIATION COORDINATION CHECKLIST
This coordination is conducted with the platoon leader/company commander and/or S3 Air to facilitate the time, detailed and
effective use of aviation assets as they apply to your tactical mission:
1. SITUATION.
a. Enemy Situation.
(1) Enemy air capability.
(2) Enemy ADA capability.
(3) Include in Weather: Percent illum, illum angle, NVG window, ceiling, and visibility.
b. Friendly Situation.
(1) Unit(s) supporting operation, Axis of movement/corridor/routes.
(2) Friendly ADA status.
2. MISSION.
3. EXECUTION.
a. Concept of the Operation. Overview of what requesting unit wants to accomplish with the air assault/air movement.
b. Tasks to Combat Units.
(1) Infantry.
(2) Attack aviation.
c. Tasks to Combat Support Units.
(1) Artillery.
(2) Aviation (lift).
d. Coordinating Instructions.
(1) Pickup Zone.
• Direction of landing.
• Time of landing/flight direction.
• Location of PZ/alternate PZ.
• Loading procedures.
• Marking of PZ (panel, smoke, SM, lights).
• Flight route planned (SP, ACP, RP).
• Formations: PZ, en route, LZ.
• Code words:
-- PZ secure (prior to landing), PZ clear (lead bird and last bird).
-- Alternate PZ (at PZ, en route, LZ), names of PZ/alt PZ.
• TAC air/artillery.
• Number of pax per bird and for entire lift.
• Equipment carried by individuals.
• Marking of key leaders.
• Abort criteria (PZ, en route, LZ).
(2) Landing Zone.
• Direction of landing.
• False insertion plans.
• Time of landing (LZ time).
• Location of LZ and Alternate LZ.
• Marking of LZ (panel, smoke, SM, lights).
• Formation of landing.
• Code words, LZ name, alternate LZ name.
• TAC air/artillery preparation, fire support coordination.
• Secure LZ or not?
2 - 39
4. SERVICE AND SUPPORT.
a. Number of aircraft per lift and number of lifts.
b. Refuel/rearm during mission or not?
c. Special equipment/aircraft configuration for weapons carried by unit personnel.
d. Bump plan.
5. COMMAND AND SIGNAL.
a. Frequencies, call signs and code words.
b. Locations of air missions commander ground tactical commander, and air assault task force commander.
Figure 2-14. VEHICULAR MOVEMENT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
VEHICULAR MOVEMENT COORDINATION CHECKLIST
This is coordinated with the supporting unit through the platoon sergeant/first sergeant to facilitate the effective, detailed, and
efficient use of vehicular support and/or assets:
1. Identification of the unit.
2. Supporting unit identification.
3. Number and type of vehicles and tactical preparation.
4. Entrucking point.
5. Departure/loading time.
6. Preparation of vehicles for movement.
a. Driver responsibilities.
b. Platoon/squad responsibilities.
c. Special supplies/equipment required.
7. Availability of vehicles for preparation/rehearsals/inspection (time and location).
8. Routes.
a. Primary.
b. Alternate.
c. Checkpoints.
9. Detrucking points.
a. Primary.
b. Alternate.
10. March internal/speed.
11. Communications (frequencies, call signs, codes).