Utah Preppers » Events

Group Stove Test: First Thoughts

Jayce — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 20:53:42 +0000

Several of the stoves getting setup

Last weekend several of the UtahPreppers got together with some friends to begin doing some hands on tests to start preparing for winter. Recently several of us have acquired new stoves and we wanted to give a conduct some tests to compare how well they worked. For our first meet up we wanted to test a few stoves and other devices with the group. While we learned a lot we realized that we’ve got some more comprehensive tests to run through before we can highlight each of them adequately. But before we move along with the individual tests, we wanted to thank some of the people that helped make this first stove test so much fun and informative.

Volcano Grills

In terms of stoves, Volcano Grills is nothing new to longtime readers here. We’re all big fans of this product and it keeps getting better. Mark with Volcano Grills showed us a few changes that they’ve made to the stoves to improve them and gave us a few new ideas about things to try. We’ll be reporting some of the results and showing off a few things you will want to have for your stove.

EcoZoom Rocket Stoves

The principle of a rocket stove has become quite popular recently with various build it yourself plans and kits available online. While you can make various types yourself you may want a more well-made product to depend on for long term usage. EcoZoom Stoves let us use one of theirs and we’ll be letting you know how that worked.

FireBox Folding Stove

A local newcomer, we first met the creator of the FireBox Folding Stove at the self-reliance expo in Salt Lake City. It was great to see a local with a well-made product. We knew we’d have to put this thing through some tough tests to see if it lived up to the demo.

QuickStove

Another local the QuickStove is a Stove-in-a-Can concept that seemed right up our alley. It is a self-contained kit that allows for emergency cooking and storage in your 72-hour kit

Saratoga Jacks

One town over from our test site, the Saratoga Jacks folks didn’t have far to travel. They came with their thermal cookers that we’d been researching and let us have a little hands-on time.

They also provided us with a unit to run through its paces and conduct some longer term tests. For more info see Mike’s review of Saratoga Jack’s Thermal Cookers

Eden Valley Foods

Newcomers to the food storage market, Eden Valley Foods brought over a few samples and some great information regarding various food manufacturing and storage methods as well as information on how freeze fried food are manufactured, shipped and stored.

FoodStorageMadeEasy

Along with the UtahPreppers authors that made it to our event we also had Jodi from FoodStorageMadeEasy.net, some of our best local friends. Their site is a great resource for people overwhelmed with the idea of food storage and looking on how to get an easy entry into our world.

Coming Soon:

As we get review posts about each of these products ready we’ll update this page with links. You can also follow our RSS feed to get updates when they come out.

We’ll hopefully be having more group events soon, so don’t forget to let us know (contact us, or here in the comments) if you’re interested in coming out, or if you have something you’d like to see tested!

Provo Pioneer Crafting Fair

Jayce — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 15:38:43 +0000

Looking for a chance to get the family out into our delayed summer? Provo has a great event this weekend at their pioneer village (map). It’s a great chance to get demonstrations on some old skills such as spinning, blacksmithing and more. Bring the family even if only just to get a feel for the local history, but even better, hang around and talk shop with people experienced in their crafts. This is probably one of the better local opportunities to get together with people that can teach these crafts.

When:

Saturday, June 11, 2011

10:00 AM – 2:00 PM

And a nice video explaining things via the local newspaper, the Daily Herald

Click here to view the embedded video.

Notes from Peter Schiff Speaking in Utah

phil801 — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 23:19:14 +0000

Last night, Peter Schiff spoke to an audience of about 250 people here in Utah. The event was put on by the local Campaign For Liberty. As always, he had some extremely interesting things to say and I was very glad I was able to go listen to him, it was a very informative night.

I took notes the entire time – he spoke for over 2 hours – and tried to get down the things I thought were important, educational and/or revelatory as quickly and as accurately as I could. For this post, I’m going to basically paste in my notes and add some contextual commentary to some of them.

For context, in general, he was speaking about the current state of the economy, how we got to where we are and what he sees happening in the very near future. My notes here will not be in the chronological order in which he presented them but rather in the order that I see them as most pertinent to Preppers. Please do not consider these exact quotes, I got as close as I could but some of them may have minor misquoting – however, the idea should still be there correctly and be sound.

Question from Audience: Can you tell us 4 things we should be doing to prepare for a major economic collapse?

Answer:

Financial; get out of debt, save, buy gold and silver. Buy other currencies and stocks in other countries (their values won’t plummet when ours does). Save pennies! Pennies pre-1981 are currently worth about 3 cents in copper
Store food and stock up on other non-perishable items. If costs are going up in the next several years, buy them now. Toiletries,batteries, etc
Move out of big cities, there is going to be major unrest from the dependent generations as they lose their entitlements; things will get very dangerous in the big cities – but Salt Lake seems rural compared to New York – things should be fine here.
Spread the word politically, help people understand why it (the coming collapse) happened so that after it happens the right people are there to fix it correctly

A recession is the economy making natural corrections. When we avert a recession, we only prolong the correction and make it much worse.

On why government spending doesn’t get us anywhere and will bring about it’s own inevitable end:

Too many of our resources go into services like housing, education, bureaucracy etc and not into actually producing anything.

On why government controlled stimulus distribution doesn’t work:

The stimulus money goes where the government wants it not where the free market wants it

How can our economy grow when nobody is saving and nothing is produced in America?

It’s because the rest of the world is saving and producing and will let us purchase from them on credit.

The only way we can live above our means is that the rest of the world lives below their means – once they figure this out, they aren’t likely to be willing to keep doing it.

When the housing bubble burst in 2008 it was a result of the averted recession (due to government economic policies) of 2001. Had they not bailed everyone out (this time) and let them fail (like they let the .com’s fail) the downturn would have been much more difficult but would have ultimately fixed things.

What is in store for us now us even worse because of the government’s bad economic policies – which have put our economy in a position that is now three times worse than it was in 2008.

(To correct the economy), Interest rates have to go way up and real estate has to fall hard.

The government is now growing at an unprecedented rate. The problem is, politicians think that they are necessary, they couldn’t even agree to cut the federal budget by $80 billion – saying it was “too draconian” – when they actually need to cut it by well over a trillion. $80 billion wouldn’t even make a trickle of a difference.

We are currently pumping up a new ‘government bubble’. Previous bubbles (.com and real estate) left us with something tangible (a couple companies and housing) but the government bubble will leave us with nothing and there is no one and nothing to bail them out.

Oil, food, everything is going way up, to record highs which is a consequence of printing huge amounts if money. Bernake is a fool and believes in ‘quantitative easing’ and thinks that if oil and food go up, the solution is to print more money – which always has the opposite effect on prices.

Obama is projecting that were going to borrow 8 trillion dollars over the next 5 years. He’s a moron and is assuming the the economy will grow (over the next five years) at three times the amount it did in the last several years.

We are exporting our inflation to the rest if the world.

The whole economy HAS to collapse in the next five years. It is MORE likely that it will collapse in the next TWO years than in the following two years.

You can’t have a reserve currency in perpetual decline or with a zero percent interest rate (which is where the dollar HAS to be right now) and other countries are going to quickly realize this. When they switch off the dollar as the reserve currency, we will fail almost immediately.

The reason Bernake HAS to keep interest rates as zero is that if interest rates go up, the government can’t make payments on its debt.

Sovereign debt is the problem with all the currently failing countries around the world – that is what is bringing them down. We will be no different.

Greece and other countries are being bailed out by the European Union; Nobody can bail out the United States and they won’t.

China and other countries can now start to see that boosting the US is hurting their own economies so they will bail soon and when china bails the others will bail.

All we’ve done in thus last two tears as our ‘recovery’ is borrow, print and spend money - building up the bubble even more and raising our debt dramatically

All banks that were bailed out will fail again in the next crisis, when interest rates finally go up

In 2008 free markets and capitalism were blamed for the crash and more regulation was claimed to be the solution – we HAVE to make sure in the next crash that people understand what actually happened.

This coming crisis will probably be bigger than anything since the civil war.

A lot of this is covered in his book, Crash proof – how to profit from the coming economic collapse.

The odds of making it five more years is astronomical. Most likely in the next two years, less likely in the following two.

The more money the fed prints to buy bonds, the bonds are worth less

The reason we are in trouble as a country is that we have been taught to not save and to spend like crazy. The current ideology is that to “stimulate” the economy, we have to spend and that those who save are being ‘horders’.

Gold and silver aren’t expensive, they show us the true purchasing power of the dollar, or lack thereof

Real economic growth that ended the great depression was not because of or during the war, but when the government actually quit spending money on the war (after it was over) and that money started going into producing goods.

When the world no longer wants the dollar (reserve currency) we will collapse.

The reason prices will skyrocket is that supply will collapse (because we import everything). The rich will be able to buy them but the poor will do without.

During war, the government pulls off things we wouldn’t normally let them do – like taxes. The first income tax and paper money came from/during the civil war. Tax Withholding came during 2nd war. Excise tax came during Spanish American war.

The founding fathers saw the federal government as being relevant ONLY during times of war, they expected it to be inconsequential at all other times. We have managed to turn that completely around.

We should stop building strip malls and start building factories but it’s not economical. Governments – state and federal – have put too much regulation and law against businesses and wages are way too high. This results in factories being completely uneconomical to build.

Paying people not to work means people will not work (entitlements and unemployment)

Companies open abroad because if less regulation.

A person with a bulldozer can make me more money than a guy with a shovel. It’s the bulldozer that makes it so I can earn more and pay more.

You get less if what you tax and more of what you subsidize – so why do we tax things we want (jobs, earnings, estates, etc) instead of taxing consumption? And why do we subsidize things that we WANT? (like food, farms, etc). The government does things completely backwards.

Bee Keeping Classes in Utah County, Early 2011

ekim — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 17:46:55 +0000

Beginning Beekeeper’s Class

Bee Keeping is fun and relatively inexpensive.

Maple Mountain Bee Company is hosting another round of bee keeping classes over the next couple months. As you may recall, Bryan Esquivel of Maple Mountain Bees authored a guest post for us in the past about how he got started in bee keeping. You can find the article here.

These are free classes, held in Bryan’s home. If you have any questions on the schedule, please contact Bryan using the contact information below.

Beginning Class:

This class is aimed towards anyone interested in becoming a bee keeper. The first year beekeeper who is looking gain basic knowledge about bees, the problems, swarming, honey harvests etc.

Beginning Class Schedule

February 19 @ 9:00 am

February 26 @ 1:00 pm

March 5th @ 9:00 am

Advanced Class:

A more advanced class for beekeepers can attend the following classes if they wish. Some of the topics will include; swarm management/capture, disease awareness and management, looking for signs of problems, keeping your bees healthy.

Advanced Class Schedule

March 26 @ 1:00 pm

April 9 @ 9:00 am

May 7 @ 9:00 am

Each class will last approximately 3-4 hours depending on questions.

What you Should Bring:

Pen, paper, questions

Notes:

Please RSVP to Bryan to let him know how many people will be attending.

How to RSVP:

Contact Bryan Esquivel of Maple Mountain Bees with your name, phone number, email address and number of the students that will be participating. You are welcome to contact him via email, snail mail or phone.

General Contact Information:

Email:

maplemountainbees@q.com

Mailing Address:

Maple Mountain Bees
1475 North 900 West
Mapleton, Utah 84664

Phone Numbers

801-489-1286
or
801-362-1891

If there is anyone serious about getting bees please contact Maple Mountain Bees as soon as possible. They need to put a deposit down on the bees to ensure package availability for all new bee keepers.

Discount on Utah Concealed Carry Permits

phil801 — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 19:51:54 +0000

If you’ve been waiting/wanting to get your Utah Concealed Carry License, here’s a great opportunity for you!

During my hiatus from blogging regularly (which has come to an end by the way, expect to see a lot more from me) I spent a lot of time in training. I learned lots of new skills and got certified in several things. One of those was becoming certified to teach the Utah Concealed Carry License course.

Next week I’ll be teaching 3 classes that are meant to help me get familiar and comfortable with presenting the material. Since I won’t be 100% up to par as an instructor (but I’ll still be good!) and since I need actual students to teach I’m offering these three classes at a 40% discount. You’ll still get to get a real license and all that – I just might stumble over my words a time or two. Here’s the details:

Normally $50/class – these 3 classes will be $30.00 each.

Wed, Jan 26th from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm
Fri, Jan 28th from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm
Sat, Jan 29th from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm

To Register for any of these classes, go to my website, Command Tactical and sign up!

All classes will be taught in Highland, Utah. You will be sent the exact address and directions within 24 hours of you payment being received. The cost of the class covers ONLY the instruction. You will still need to pay the fee for your license (I’ve got no control over that) and you will need to get a passport photo taken. The class will cover the instruction and fingerprinting.

If you haven’t been waiting/wanting to get a Utah Concealed Carry License and you don’t already have one – and you’re a gun enthusiast, let’s talk about the benefits of being licensed.

Having a Utah CCW permit allows you to open carry and to conceal carry on your person or in your vehicle with a loaded firearm (you can open carry and conceal carry in your vehicle without a license but it has to be statutorily unloaded). The benefit to being able to carry a concealed firearm is that if you ever feel uncomfortable going somewhere or in a particular situation, you can legally carry (and use if needed) a firearm into that situation/location. This can be a huge stress reliever and comfort if the situation is right. Furthermore, concealed carrying every day (which is what I do) allows you to fully exercise your 2nd Amendment rights and allows you to be a proper sheepdog – always able and ready to defend yourself and others. If you’re of a mind to be able to do this, getting licensed is the way to go!

Finally, the Utah Concealed Carry Permit is one of the most recognized permits in the country. With it, you can legally carry in over 38 states without having to get a license in that particular state. This can be a HUGE benefit if you are traveling cross-country and like to carry a firearm with you when traveling. If you are pro-gun and pro-carry, then a Utah CCW is the way to go! If you live outside of Utah and have an interest in acquiring a Utah Concealed Carry Permit, contact me. As long as you’re legally allowed to own a firearm, you can get your Utah Concealed License – we can set something up to get you certified.

Stephen Pratt Presentation

Jayce — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 21:27:19 +0000

On a semi-related note to preparedness, a friend of mine is hosting Stephen Pratt in Highland, UT this weekend, and asked if I could pass along the invitation. If you are interested in a great chance to learn more about personal liberty and self-reliance, this is a great opportunity.

KNOW YOUR LIBERTY
STEPHEN PRATT
Will be in Highland, Utah!
January 7-8, 2011

Explore the story of AMERICAN LIBERTY by examining the evidence.
7:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Friday & 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Saturday

Highland City Hall
5400 West Civic Center Drive

Jan. 7 – The Empire Has No Clothes: The Bare Naked Truth v. the Official Literature

Jan. 8 –
Original Intent: The True Nature and Character of Our Federal Government
The Unknown American Republic of Republics
State Sovereignty: The Original Concept

No Charge: Seating is limited / Arrive early and RSVP

For more information contact: Dan or Jenni Campbell

dan@infogenix.com
jenni@infogenix.com
Or phone 801 768-7336

Stephen Pratt’s lectures are widely regarded as informative and entertaining. Help us spread the word by sharing this link on Facebook/Twitter, and bring a friend!

The night of the Herriman (Machine Gun) Fire

Doran Barton — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 20:07:51 +0000

A lot of people have written up their thoughts and their experiences about going through the Herriman “Machine Gun” fire 19 September 2010. I’ve had some friends ask me to do the same. One friend asked me to specifically to highlight the preparedness aspect of our experience.

We’ve lived in the Herriman area for about seven years. During that time, we’ve seen a handful of fires on the hills south of us, usually ignited by lightning. These have usually been small fires and quickly contained by firefighters. So when we heard there was a fire burning in the hills Sunday afternoon, it wasn’t terribly shocking news.

When we came out of church after 4:00 p.m., the sky was considerably smoky to the point that the light from the sun had taken on an orange-ish hue. That was remarkable, but it still didn’t really concern any of us. We carried on with our plans just as most everyone did.

We had been invited to my parents’ in West Valley City for dinner. I decided to drive out there on the Bacchus Highway instead of using the usual route on Bangerter Highway. I wanted to see if the Bacchus route, with fewer stop lights, would be as fast, despite having to drive further to get to the artery.

I drove down 6000 West to 11800 South and then went west toward the Bacchus Highway. As we headed west, I looked south and was really taken back by the visual of the smoke plume coming off the mountain. It was suddenly obvious to me then there was a potentially serious fire burning on the mountain.

We continued to my parents’ house and had dinner. My brother had driven from Utah County and remarked on seeing the smoke as he drove north on Interstate 15.

The smoke was obviously affecting many in the Salt Lake Valley as the winds carried the smoke north. Christine got on the computer at my parents’ house and read a news story about how residents in The Cove were being evacuated and the amount of smoke was causing problems because it was limiting visibility. We decided to head home after 7:30 p.m.

As we drove south on Bangerter Highway, our level of concern began to elevate. The mountain was no longer encompassed by just a plume of smoke, but there was also a prominent red-orange glow that become more and more prominent as darkness set in.

After we turned onto 12600 South to head into Herriman, we began to notice throngs of people pulled over to the side of the road and out of their cars with cameras, video cameras, cell phones, and binoculars, gazing southward at the fire on the mountainside.

It was a spectacular sight, nothing like you’re ever used to seeing at the south end of the Salt Lake Valley. It evoked memories of the visuals of Mordor from the Lord Of The Rings films. One of my neighbors later wrote he had been joking Sunday he was living near “Mount St. Herriman” in a reference to the Mount St. Helens volcano eruptions in the early 1980s.

So far, the fire was merely an intriguing spectacle. Traffic was heavy for a Sunday evening, but it seemed the extra traffic was due to spectators. As we drove up the hill to our home, things were more chaotic. Residents and spectators were visible in nearly equal numbers as well as law enforcement.

Mandatory evacuation

We stopped at a close neighbor’s home where there was a gathering of people. There we learned of the evacuation order that had just been issued. One of our neighbors was starting to panic. “What do we take with us?!” he asked.

As we drove home, I started pondering the possibility we might need to evacuate. In my mind, I considered what we should get out of the house. Our important documents (social security cards, birth certificates, bank account information, etc.) were in a small Sentry fire safe. All our digital photos and lots of other valuable data was stored on our Linux file server in the basement.

When we got home, we told the kids to hurry and pack a day or two of clothes to wear. I went to our storage room and got the 72-hour kits we’d put together a couple years before, one for each member of the family.

Being an insulin-dependent diabetic, I carry fast-acting insulin with me pretty much all the time, but I also inject a long-acting insulin analog in the evenings, so I packed that with my basic toiletry items.

We put our dog in the van.

Our oldest daughter was worried about her pet rats she keeps in a cage in her room. I wasn’t really that concerned about them, but she and my wife convinced me we should take them to a friend’s house who could take care of them temporarily. Our daughter called her friend who agreed to take the rats.

We decided not to do anything about our two cats as they were free-ranging and, we figured, they could get away from the house if the fire got to it.

I disconnected our file server and took it to the garage and fetched our safe as well. My wife grabbed a box from our bedroom closet that had family pictures in it. We packed our clothes and items we were “saving” into the back of our van and the trunk of my wife’s car.

The entire time we were running through the house gathering items, police officers were driving up and down the road in their patrol vehicles running their sirens and talking over their PA horns saying, “Evacuate now! The fire is here!”

There were no firefighters in sight.

It took us about ten minutes to get everything gathered and packed into the vehicles. After I had pulled the van out into the driveway, I got out and quickly took a picture with my phone of the fire advancing toward our house from the west. My kids, especially my younger daughter, was hysterical inside the van that I would delay our escape to take a photo. As you might imagine, tensions were running a bit high.

Here’s the one photo I took of the flames advancing on our neighborhood.

Because we were taking the rats to our daughter’s friend who lived in a nearby neighborhood, we didn’t take the major artery roads out of our neighborhood. As a result, we didn’t run into any of the congestion others reported having to deal with.

After we dropped off the rats, my wife and I convened outside our vehicles for a few minutes to decided where we should go. We didn’t have any family close-by. My parents already had my brother and his son living with them, so there really wasn’t any room there. We considered the possibility we might be out of our house for several days and we’d want to be somewhat close to Christine’s work and able to get the kids to school. In the end, we decided to go to Sandy where there were several hotels.

We drove to Sandy and listened to the news on the radio as we went. Of course, the headline news was the fire in Herriman, but there wasn’t any information being broadcast that we didn’t already know.

We checked into a Residence Inn in Sandy and they offered us a special $65 rate because were evacuees. We got a room on the third floor with a window that afforded us a view of the South Mountain burning. There were others there at the hotel who were in the same situation as us. While the hotel allowed animals—and several evacuee families had animals with them—I called my parents and asked them to come get our dog.

We stayed up late, me later than the others, watching the news coverage on television (ABC4 and Fox13 did the best jobs). I was also online following the #herrimanfire Twitter feed, Facebook, and listened to a Utah Highway Patrol radio feed provided by RadioReference.com.

We heard a couple of our neighbors on the TV news, answering reporters’ questions via cell phone. Our neighbor Jody told ABC4 he could see our houses from where he was and he could see water being sprayed by firefighters either one the houses or behind them. In any case, he could tell, at that point, our houses were still okay.

I chatted with a couple of our neighbors via Facebook. One of them told me her “cop friend” had been in touch with her and let her know that all of our homes were still okay, save one. There was one home at the top of Friendship Drive, she said, that was burning.

(Thank goodness that story turned out to be false.)

I chatted with one friend on Facebook who lives a few blocks away from us outside the mandatory evacuation area. His family had left their home, but he stayed behind. He told me he could see a home in Sol Vista Circle that sits to the west of our house and it was still okay. This home is the only house in that circle and is surrounded by mountain terrain. I think everyone expected that house to burn just because it’s isolated and surrounded by fuel. My friend told me there were several firefighter vehicles in the circle and they had unloaded some heavy equipment to create a firebreak to the east beginning from that circle.

I found these photos on Facebook, taken by Greg Cutler, that shows the heavy equipment working behind the homes above Rose Summit Drive.

My friend said there had been looters out in the neighborhood, but they had been dealt with quickly by law enforcement patrolling the streets. He also took a few pictures and uploaded them to Facebook for us.

I called a couple of our neighbors and exchanged information with them. A couple of them were still in the Herriman area. Several other neighbors and friends and family of neighbors also exchanged information with me via Facebook or Twitter. The online communities were being well utilized that night.

I finally went to bed around 4 in the morning.

Thoughts and perspective in hindsight

Looking back, there are lots of things I’m glad we did or wish we had done differently.

Planning ahead as we approached our home was smart. Having our 72-hour kits ready to go and having all our important documents in one place (the safe) was also good.

We probably should not have left our cats behind. In the end, it worked out fine. When we arrived back home, the cats were snuggled in the garage just like they would be on any normal day (except the garage smelled like a campfire). Salt Lake County had set up a shelter for pets and other animals which would have been a good place to take our cats until we were able to return to the house.

Our 72-hour kits consist of basic hygiene items, water, food, and a “space blanket.” We didn’t really need any of these things for this event and it made us wonder if we should have a couple different kinds of 72-hour kits.

While Christine grabbed a box of family photographs to take out of our house, there were still several photo albums and another box of photos that were left behind. In a day and age where photos can and should be preserved digitally, it makes sense that all those photos should be scanned and stored on a medium we can take with us.

I regret all those times I passed up CERT training or HAM radio training. Fortunately, Herriman City just happens to be doing both in October, so I will be doing at least one of them so that I can be better prepared the next time an emergency like this occurs.

Herriman City did an excellent job of getting information out via Twitter and Facebook. Other methods, such as “reverse 911” seemed to have failed miserably.

While I was able to get in touch with several our neighbors in the hours after we were evacuated, we were out of touch with most of them. It would have helped greatly if we had cell phone numbers for all our neighbors.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this write-up, we really didn’t think much of the fact there was a fire on the mountains behind us until it was very obviously barreling down toward our house at a high rate of speed. In hindsight, knowing there was a fire on the mountain, relative humidity was very, very low, and winds were gusting upwards of 60-70 miles per hour, should have caused a lot more concern.

Insurance

Going through this experience gave us an opportunity to to think about our homeowners’ insurance. Our home was purchased as a short sale and, because of this and because the housing market is depressed at the moment, if our house were destroyed, a policy payout for “market value” would probably allow us to rebuild, but we wouldn’t be able to rebuild our house. We’d have to settle for something less than our house. For this reason, we’ve been talking about discussing changes to our policy with our agent so that if our house were destroyed, it could be replaced.

Staying behind

We’ve heard a few stories of people who stayed despite the evacuation order. For the most part, I think this is unwise. However, there were some residents to the west of us whose homes basically sit between our house and the three homes that burned. They saw the flames heading down the mountain toward their street, saw there were no firefighters on the scene to protect their homes, and took matters into their own hands using garden hoses to soak the areas around their homes to try to save them from the fire.

(Read more about this in this Salt Lake Tribune story.)

Upon learning about this from the online news story, we talked about it and decided, if we had to go through a fire like this again, I’d stay behind, as long as there were other neighbors doing it too, and try to set up a defensive position against the fire. Obviously, this is dangerous business, but if there are no firefighters there when the flames arrive, you either walk away and consign your homes to complete destruction… or you do something.

Like I said, I wouldn’t do it alone— that’s just not smart. But, if there was a group of us working together, I’d stay and fight the fire, at least until the professionals arrived.

Misinformation

In any emergency situation there is bound to be a lot of misinformation, if any good information at all. We were fortunate to have Herriman City sending out tweets as new information became available.

Herriman City did a good job of only sending out valid information. The media, on the other hand, was all over the place. They had varying reports on different stations saying that churches had burned, that dozens of homes had been lost, and more. I remember one station was actually carrying the governor giving a statement about the fire from the command center and when we changed the channel to another station, they had no idea the governor had even arrived in Herriman.

It seems the news media got their best information from Twitter and from cell phone calls from residents in the area (when cell phones worked.)

The problem of misinformation is another motivation to set up a reliable network of information sources ranging from online information and people’s cell phone numbers. I think, despite the problems with voice communications over the cell phone network, most text messaging was working.

This is a repost from Doran Barton (Fozz), and can be found originally at his blog: Fozzolog

National Preparedness Month

royal — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 03:25:11 +0000

September is National Preparedness Month.

Make a difference this month by sharing what you know, encouraging others to do something more to be prepared and do more yourself to become better prepared.

Spread the news. This is a great month for preppers, as you will see a lot of companies with sales on their preparedness items, as well as harvests coming in with plenty of fresh foods to lay in store for another time. Get ready for the upcoming winter.

More info on the history of National Preparedness Month »

2 Food Storage Classes in Spanish Fork, April 15th

ekim — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:14:52 +0000

There will be two classes on Food Storage taught in Spanish Fork on Thursday evening.

Debbie Kent lives in the Southern California. She has been married for 30 years. She and her husband are the proud parents of 6 beautiful children, and grandparents of 3. She has been an advocate of food storage and emergency preparedness since her early teen age years. She enjoys giving emergency preparedness lessons each month at her church. Much of the resources found on this website are the culmination of hours of preparation for these lessons. She sincerely hopes that in sharing this information, other’s may benefit from her efforts. http://peaceofpreparedness.com/

Spanish Fork, April 15th, 2 classes by Debbie Kent

Hi Everyone,
I am up in Utah visiting my family and will be teaching to classes in Spanish Fork on April 15th at 7 pm. The address is 300 East and Center in Spanish Fork. MAP

The Classes are Food Storage…Use it or Lose It
and
No Power No Problem…Cooking When the Power is Out.

Come and Join us

I don’t have any information on how to RSVP so I recommend that you show up early to be sure you get a good seat.

Beginning Bee Kepping Class in Utah County April 17th

ekim — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 17:37:29 +0000

Beginning Beekeeper’s Class

Bee Keeping is fun and relatively inexpensive.

I took this class last year and obtained my equipment through Maple Mountain bees. It has proven to be a fun and rewarding experience for my family and I. The 60lbs. of honey we got our first year wasn’t bad either!

Bryan Esquivel of Maple Mountain Bees authored a guest post for us in May of last year about how he got started in bee keeping. You can find the article here.

When:

April 17th (2pm-4pm).

Where:

1475 North 900 West Mapleton, Utah.

Cost:

FREE!!

Description of Class: