Water is the most important!

[jyo]

As the title says, WATER IS THE MOST IMPORTANT thing you need to have on hand---a supply of clean water to drink, cook with, wash up, etc. is first on the list before food even... I've stashed away a pile of canned goods, FD foods, pasta, beans, lentils, etc., but if you don't have water to cook these with, what's the point...? So, I've recently decided to increase my clean water supply---this requires clean, handy, storage containers and a safe place to store them... I've found commercial storage bottles have dramatically increased in price! But 5 gallon bottles from delivery services can be purchased used from various private sources---put in a want-to-buy ad in local digital neighborhood info postings and I find that that somehow people have a stash of these 5 gallon bottles lying around and can often be bought for around $5 each or less! And if they need caps (often the case), you can buy replacement caps on Amazon cheap... Don't be thirsty---stock up before you need it!

[sonofeugene]

I have a 55 gallon barrel of water in my garage. And a 50 gallon water heater.

[twinfin]

Indeed. If you were paying close attention to the folks in North Carolina's disastrous wind and rain storm, access to potable water in the aftermath and recovery was (or quickly became) a critical issue. On a more sinister front, attacking access to water has always been a go-to method of controlling people by the enemy.

The best solution is to start working on getting out of the city and move to a more rural location where you have your own well or spring to draw from. Even if you have to work in the city, there is always rural land to be found within commuting distance where you can have some land and your own well along with space to grow a decent garden.

Good tip on sourcing 5 gallon storage bottles. 👍

[jarhead714]

My older boy came home from school last week all bent out of shape because his mamma put a Fiji water in his backpack and he got clowned at the lunch table. I let him know that I would be sure to have a talk with her and I in fact did. I told my son to keep hanging out with those same kids.👌🏻

[ldsnet]

Most people don't even consider how water gets to our homes... Electricity... if the power goes out for any extended period of time, the water will stop shortly. Modern sewers are in a similar situation... they will work for a while longer, they are mostly gravity flow, but for some areas, they require pump movement too. That is how Cholera outbreaks happen. If you are in an urban environment, even if YOU have a sewage plan, does your neighbor? Any surface solution will make the entire neighborhood sick in days.

[user120312]

I can look out the back bedroom window and see water a few yards away; a sandpoint well in the pump house by the creek, and the creek, which runs all year and gets quite impressive during our very rainy winters, about six feet below the retaining wall. I lost at minimum a few hundred gallons Sunday as the roof gutters dumped it all through the capture system into the creek instead of storing it.

I've been making my own drinking and household water at my various properties since the 80's and even before, being on a private municipal system that was entirely deep well, back to the 50's.

Working in ag land for life, and servicing industry for work, water was probably the most important commodity I ever interfaced with.

Thanks for the reminder OP.

I suggest practice. Forex, during my training ops, the power goes off, water is brought from the creek in buckets to flush the toilets and heated in a cast iron pot over a fire to wash dishes, and stored water supplies are used and the pumps go onto battery backup power. Hand pumps and filters are tested.

I use and test hydrogen peroxide and potassium iodide as sanitizers/stabilizers for stored water since my water is raw with only minimal treatment and filtering at the pump with a chlorine injector, settling tanks and calcite filtering, a near necessity with the shallow well and iron bearing soils in the area.

Defense in depth. What do you do if/when turning on the faucet and nothing comes out?

[Duck Killer]

Water is probably the most difficult item to be prepared on. It is heavy, difficult to move, difficult to purify and takes a lot of energy to boil. Water should be handled in certain sections.

First is drinking water. Having several cases of bottled drinking water on hand rotated out is probably your best bet.

Second cooking water. Maybe larger one gallon bottles.

Third is cleaning water. Still needs to be potable. Larger 5 gallon jugs.

Last is bulk water. Stuff that can be easily filtered if needed. 55 gallon drums. You can use it to bath and flush toilets.

Water is a lot of work. Breaking it up helps with the work load. Doing the minimum work required for its needs helps a lot.

Having a well or better yet springs gravity fed to your home is the best possible solution

[IronsightsRifleman]

550 gallon koi pond. Easily filtered for drinking water, or used raw for sanitation.

[madland]

(2) 55-gallon drums outside.
(1) 55-gallon drum in the garage.
12-15 cases of bottled water constantly on hand getting rotated thru always.
Pool in the backyard.

In the next month or so the barrels are due to be emptied, re-sanitized, and refilled along with water stabilizer.

[jben]

I have a 330 gallon tote and 2 55 gallon drums on the side of the house. There are 12 5 gallon containers under the house. Given warning I have a bladder that fits in the bathtub that can be filled. I know where to find several year round, clean springs within walking distance. I can get by for a while.

[Spyder]

I've got a well that is very productive and can plug into my truck to run it if needed. Fuel is important, but I also keep ~250g of kero on hand, an 8k gallon fish pond, and a hundred or so gallons of clean sealed drinking water. If things go bad for a long time I'll still be in trouble but I can weather any localized emergency that I and my house survive the beginnings of.

[user120312]

What's fun is to shut off the pump or water main for a day and run the scenarios. For more realism, shut off the grid too, if one is on the grid (I am).

The last time I did that I added one item, a five gallon bucket on a rope hanging on the back of the pump house. I'd had the rope and had the bucket but they were in the garage in seperate places. Water and power go out at night; fewer steps the better.

The back of the pump house is literally two feet over and six feet above the creek (retaining wall) and that's where dishwashing, toilet flushing and shower/bath water come from as backup. During the op I actually do use the water that way, heating it over a wood fire in a cast iron pot if required.

Because it's so rainy here I don't do mass storage like in CA, plus the creek is a lot more handy than the irrigation ditch was in CA. By the time the rainwater off all the buildings goes through the system and settling traps it's actually pretty clean. I test that catching some in the bucket where it discharges into the creek through the retaining wall. During a good rain that 6" pipe gushes pretty stout. Of course it's all lost, at this point anyway.

[user120312]

Project Farm did a comparison review of commonly available consumer water purifiers yesterday and the review caused me to do some re-thinking about backup options in the water department since I extract and make my own potable water.

[OlderThanDirt]

550 gallon koi pond. Easily filtered for drinking water, or used raw for sanitation.

I have about 6,000 gallons in koi ponds. I don’t think I would trust filtration enough to drink it, but would use it for toilet flushing.

[IronsightsRifleman]

I have about 6,000 gallons in koi ponds. I don’t think I would trust filtration enough to drink it, but would use it for toilet flushing.

look up Sawyer filters.