Bugging Out: First Choice Or Last Resort?

Most preppers say when SHTF, they're going to bug out. I recently came upon a few articles and websites debunking the bug out, saying that bugging out is dangerous. I don't know what to do in case of emergency. Is bugging out a plan A or plan B?

 

I don't really see bugging out as much better than bugging in for most people. If you are in a major city of 30,000 or more if you stay there you are probably going to die. When the power stops and the water stops most cities just don't have enough available food and water to feed that many people. That means that if you have food they are going to descend on you and take it.

Even if they don't the fact is the cities are going to burn down. The buildings and homes are not built for wood fired cooking and once the fires start there will be no fire department and it will just burn until it burns out. Another problem will be the simple fact that no water also means no sewer system and when thousands of people start throwing waste out in the ditches disease is going to eat the people up. There will be NO WATER and any possible water is going to be quickly polluted past any hope of purifying it.

Now on the other hand, running out into the woods to play Daniel Boone isn't realistic either. First off most people don't have a clue about what would be required and learning after the collapse is just not going to work well. You will need those skills well established before you need them or you will be no better off in the woods than you would have been in the city. There are no grocery stores in the woods and if you will watch a few survival shows you will see that even people with some skills struggle.

The other thing that you will have to understand is that as you trot off into the forest you will be among the multitude of other urbanites with little ability that are descending on the woods. This means that you may be surrounded by a bunch of hungry people with no camping skills and sadly as you get hungrier your morals fade out fast. If you make a kill you better est it fast and don't think about a BBQ. That sort of smell in a woods full of starving people won't work out well for you.

Also understand that with all these novice campers forest fires are inevitable!! Between the fires and the thousands of people there just isn't going to be any game available. The sad part is and most of the deer killed will go to waste because the people that killed them didn't know what to do with the meat and it rotted.

To me if you are serious you need to start now making a place for yourself to go to that will not be on the lists of a hundred thousand other people. This will mean at the least going there regularly and making sure that the locals know you. VERY quickly strangers are not going to be welcomed in the small towns. Farmers are going to be violently protective of their land and live stock. The gangs are going to make it tough on everyone until they are mostly wiped out but they will especially be tough on small family groups that are not prepared and entrenched in place. Thugs always go for the easy pickings. A family of farmers armed to the teeth and prepared to defend their property will be a lot harder nut to crack than a family that is sort of living out of their car or in a tent isolated somewhat.

If you live in a city and can't leave now then you need to start now organizing with others in your same position so that if things go bad you can react as a group. There will be safety in numbers somewhat. OR if you are single you can go lone wolf and run fast far and then dig in deep somewhere that isn't very attractive to most people. If you can make some connections in someplace better than where you are so that you MIGHT be accepted if you showed up after things got ugly.

I have friends in the city that are gong to try to come to me. They will come armed and with as much food and supplies as possible. See if you can find someone, friends or family that might think that a few extra hands might be good. Just make sure that you have things to bring to the table. Skills, supplies and for sure a willingness to WORK HARD.

 

You are asking a question that cannot be answered until the time comes to make that decision.

Is it safer in your home in the city or on the road attempting to flee? Will your chances of survival be better in town or the wilderness? Nobody can answer this for you, and you can't answer it for yourself until the time comes. Perhaps not even then.

All you can do is give yourself as many options as possible. Buy the gear, learn the skills, create the networks and friendships that will help you now.

Or do nothing.

You have no fate but that which you make for yourself.

 

Good one LilSoldierGirl Networking opens up your options. I know that in my life, during hard times it was often friends of friends that helped me out.

If nothing else you need to make yourself as valuable as possible by learning skills that will be of value in a more primitive world. You do this now by going to school so that you can find a good job. In the future most of the degrees won't have a lot of use but knowing how to sew or how to cure leather and make shoes would make you a very popular person to have around because tennis shoes aren't going to last for very long when people start walking everywhere. THINK now so you can REACT instantly later. LEARN now because you won't have time for that later when you need those skills.

 

If you are in a big city right now and can't afford to leave I really do understand. I ended up where I am because hard times made a move totally necessary so we killed two birds with one stone. We chose where we are and then as things allowed we moved even deeper into what we wanted when we bought a new home several years later. I can't take a lot of credit for bravely dumping my life and moving someplace better for the sake of survival. The fact is every place that I had ever worked closed and there was NO future left there for us. We were going to lose our home sooner or later so we ended up choosing sooner. 25%+ unemployment rates are deadly on an economy!

I do have a few ideas though for those of you that are trapped in the big cities and with jobs and homes to nice to walk away from. There is a lot to say for living in or very near a small country town. There is a lot of land around it and a lot of people living in the rural areas all around it. Unfortunately there are not a lot of jobs there and well the shopping is limited as far as fancy department stores. On the other hand a lot of these little towns have the OLD style country stores that sell a little of everything and both butcher and smoke meat.

What you might think about is picking a small town near someplace that you might like and start vacationing there. Once you decide that this might be the place you can start networking in that area. Join and go to a local church maybe. As you get to know people if you can start making some connections you need to rent a little warehouse in the near area and start moving some serious basic supplies into it. Spare clothes, food, water, tools, weapons and some ammo... That way if you have run you won't just be limited to what you can carry.

I live in such and area. We have a lot of seasonal people here that come her to escape the winters up north. Some stay in travel trailers and some have small duplexes and rent one side year around. We also have several camp grounds where people come sometimes every year. They store their campers there year around. If they show up at least they will be known and not just one of many strangers trying to move in.

If things start looking really bad maybe one of you can go with the kids and be there and that will only have one of you on the road in a major mess. You might get a good bicycle and a bike rack so if you are just caught totally trapped in traffic you can abandon the car and ride on to your hopeful bug out location.

 

It's up to you to asses your situation. Make a plan for whatever possibilities you may face. Multiple plans. If this happens, do this or that. Just like a flow chart. Test your options to make sure they are feasible according to the event. Perform dry runs so you can be efficient & avoid panic. This will also reveal problems with your plan so you can then revise as needed.

 

If one is a helicopter pilot / mechanic, then bugging out becomes more of a reality.

So I exaggerate. But, my point is this, look at your bug-out route. How many bridges will you have to cross? In an earthquake or flood situation, these puppies stand to be damaged or destroyed. My wife has kin out near the Mississippi to the south and we have on numerous occasions crossed the Mississippi to the north. Those bridges could easily be shut down, but in those flat regions of America, there are many bridges on almost all roads. One New Madrid quake and these structures go bye-byes.

What are the odds that your escape rout will be cut-off by traffic jams? Think your plans are unique? Double, or triple, the number of people using these routes and I bet that these routes will NOT handle the traffic they'll be called upon to carry. In a SHTF situation, being stuck in traffic could get you robbed or far worse. One could plan on having to abandon a vehicle and switch to a trail-bike type of motorcycle, then swap to foot when one's fuel runs out, or one is facing a wall of motorcycle thieves. Some hidden monster could remove you from your bike with a baseball bat or a tension wire. Motorcyclists are very vulnerable to loads of buckshot.

If you are bugging out, one part of your equipment will have to be a crystal ball. You are going to have to start your exit before a SHTF event, else your route is very likely to be put at risk.

 

The thing about bugging out is that it is going to put you in direct contact with and among the masses unless you bail well ahead of time. If you wait until you are SURE that you need to bug out the roads are going to be blocked by the multitudes.

All of these other people are going to be scared and panicked and it is going to be a powder keg. Not only are the people that are trapped in endless blocked traffic jams going to be a problem and freaking out, the people near these places are going to be pretty upset when these masses invade them like a swarm of locust. The few stores that will be open will be stripped bare and water is going to be an extremely precious commodity immediately. Within three days people on these roads will be killing each other over bottles of water.

Personally, i think, that if you can't bug out ahead of this mess then you will be better off to shelter in place for a couple of weeks or a month and then try to walk out. There will be thousands of empty houses and if you keep a low profile and are prepared to defend yourself you should be able to hide out. After a month there will be a lot fewer people around and a lot of the gangs will be dying out. They will find out real quick that no police means ordinary people will shoot them almost on sight. Cops primarily protect criminals and are only interested in regular citizens after they become victims.

Unfortunately most of the people that will bug out will actually just be running with no plan and little in the way in preparation. If you are mixed in among them you are going to have a tough time.

 

Like many, we would prefer to bug in. Our homestead is growing & much better equipped than any bug out location we have available to us currently. The geography surrounding our homestead poses difficult challenges. There are three exit routes, 2 over water with bridges & 1 over land. All 3 routes bring us dangerously close to major metropolitan areas. So if we were to bug out it would HAVE to be prior to any mass panic, rioting or martial law imposition.

 

With guns as controlled as they are there and the fact that it is illegal to bow hunt how will the average person kill anything to eat? Trying to live on nothing but wild vegetation is only a viable option if you are experienced and very knowledgeable of what there is out there to eat.

If you are in the inner city you HAVE to bug out because the inner cities will burn and without water or a fire department it will spread and burn everything. Depending on their set up, at least in Texas, most suburban neighborhoods have a little space between the homes and won't be quite so likely to burn down.

You will need to at least get out of the apartments and row houses. With people trying to cook and heat with fire it is a certainty that there will be fires even if the trash people don't set fire to everything. If it is winter you need to run fast because even out in the woods you won't believe how fast the forests will be stripped of the easy wood to get and then there will be the forest fires created by inexperienced and just plain stupid people.

Even people that bug in will need to be very careful about using up their wood supply too fast. There was a reason why the pioneers log cabins were TINY by our standards. I live in a place that is heavily wooded. I have seen pictures of this area from around the turn of the century...there were NO trees. People are lazy and will take the trees that are close first before they will go further for the wood. All around here are little com unities with names like Crabbs Prairie, Pine Prier and Lone Prairie. They are in dense woods now but a hundred years ago you had to go miles to find and cut firewood because there wasn't any near these little farming communities. The "Prairies" were not natural, rather they were the result of clear cutting for farms and what little was left in the creek bottoms was cut for fire wood.

 

I think people shouldn't put all there eggs in one basket. Just because SHTF doesn't mean natural disasters are going to quit. What happens if you have a large wildfire heading straight towards your bug in location with no one coming to help. Good to have multiple backup locations in mind for backup locations. Another important part of that is to catalog the resources for each location. I keep multiple backups if it's a small cabin or its a secluded spot in the woods with known resources marked on maps for different seasons.

 

Disaster events cascade. They set off the domino row. One example: economic collapse => looting => street battles => famine => electrical grid gone => no pumping of water => unclean water => cholera outbreak => ... => ... on and on and on. During America's Revolutionary War and Civil War, the big killer was dysentery.

Today, during good times, I see mansions being built back in forested areas (I'm talking east of the Mississippi). I look at the forest floor and see all manner of dead brush and trees. Drought = tinder box = forest fire = escape routes blocked = nasty fire casualty counts.

And people who bug-out to wilderness areas often do not realize the degree to which they are going to need to defend themselves against interlopers and locals who will want them dead. Locals will not want them in their area and interlopers will kill to steal food and other supplies. In the wilderness they will need to build heavy structures or entrench themselves. What a horrible situation! If one is going to bug out, man oh man, had they better have planned and planned and planned.

 

When I think of bugging-out, I think of with whom it is I'll be staying. On whom will the wifer and I impose ourselves until able to settle ourselves. Maybe the best case would be to find someone who will need help. Head for those in need, bringing with you items needed where you are headed. If you show up being in need yourself, you might as well brand "666" on your forehead.

If you have close friends or relatives with whom you are on good terms, evaluate their preparedness. If the topic of post-SHTF is not taboo, then openly discuss what plans you folk can make in unison.

An older family member has passed away. Now it is time to read the Last Will and Testament. As you read my last two sentences above and as you contemplate gathering with family under such circumstances, as you imagine the conflicts that could arise during the reading of such, now contemplate everyone in one location when any and all resources are in profoundly short supply. Contemplate everyone's emotions being stretched to the max. And what family, what group of friends, are one and all 100% mentally sane 24/7?! People are going to be on the verge of "losing it". Some will have utterly "lost it" when that which "cannot happen" has happened. Such are the psychological realities one has to calculate into their bug-out plans.

 

IMHO this is very good advice to follow. The acronym used is RED OUT
RESOURCES (or lack of)
ENVIRONMENTAL THREAT
DESTINATION

OVERWHELMING FORCE
UNPREPARED FOR THE SITUATION
THREAT GROWING

The video goes into detail. Not to long, and worth watching.

 

There is real need for Strength in numbers whether one is bugging in or bugging out , having a large close family or tight knit group of REAL friends will be a plus , farms can not be defended by any one man for long and neither could a wagon train in the old west. JMHO and S/FI!

 

Everyone should be packed and ready to bug out at short notice at all times, it should always be an option!

My layers are
Stay put
Bug out via motor vehicle
Bug out via bike
Bug out via foot with pack
Bug out via foot no pack
Bug out via foot no nothing

Getting a bit old for the last two.

If one is to bug out it needs to be done early before the herd.
The safest thing is to bug out and be where you need to be before the herd gets moving

The most dangerous thing is to bug out late as one is most vulnerable on the road if the herd is in motion.

 

Those trying to get ahead of the herd shouldn't be surprised if a big portion of the herd catches up and joins you, if your destination is public land . That could be a bad situation when your new neighbors realize your not getting as scrawny as them .

 

I used to live in a small town in the mojave desert, next to a military base. It was a great job, but just about everything possible is wrong with the location. So I bugged out four yrs ago. At least thats what I called it.

What I did was sell my overpriced house in southern California, buy a small ranch in eastern oklahoma, move all my stuff, and start learning to grow a garden and raise livestock.

Folks that wait till after the S hits the fan are forgetting something. Its going to take you years to raise enough food to avoid starvation. That years of learning and trying, while you can buy new tools, replacement animals, groceries, and diesel fuel.

 

The problem with last minute bugging out without a prepared plan is that any place that you can think of will be where many other people will be going. Real easily you can find yourself jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire. If you don't know where you are going when you leave you probably won't get there.

If you think that running to the forest and making like Daniel Boone is the thing to do you had better be talking about a place the size of a small nation or state. Texas is a big place but I guarantee that the national forests are going to be FULL of people most of them without a clue about true primitive living. Fires and fights over EXTREMELY limited resources will make those places as deadly as big cities.

Rushing off to small towns where you are not known might not be a great idea either. I live in a small town and even after 25 years, I'm still one of the "new" people. My profession allowed me to get to know a lot of them and it has been a great place to live but I saw things beginning to get ugly during a hurricane evacuation. The roads were blocked and the stores were stripped bare. there was no gas left. The local police put up roadblocks on the bridge over the river and after that would only allow cars to pass a few at a time.

People sat there with their engines running until they either overheated and froze up or they ran out of gas. It was insanity. People that lived on the highway had a lot of trouble between theft, and idiots more or less trying to DEMAND shelter, food, and water. The local church was feeding two meals a day but that didn't seem to be good enough for some of the idiots. Fortunately, the power to the people on the highway came on pretty fast and the idiots were gassed up and sent AWAY!! Also, it helped that the National Guard showed up handing out water, MREs and ice.

Think hard and long and try to get as far off the beaten track as possible.

 

We will bug in and wait. If the opportunity presents itself, then we head for family further south.

If the SHTF event is sudden and you attempt to scoot at that time, you'll be almost certain to run into trouble. Rural Appalachia, you just show up when things go bad, think you'll be welcome? No. Think maybe your life would be in peril? Yes. Heartland America where the food is grown will be the same way. No outsiders will be welcome.

If traveling by truck, then know that all major federal and state highways will be parking lots. If switching to off-road motorcycle, then wow!, do you ever have some scouting to do.

New Jersey Mafia attempted to dump hazardous waste in my region of S.Appalachia and the drivers got their engine blocks blown. Message; "Next time it will be your skull." Welcome to the real America. Know that many combat soldiers come from our neck of the woods. People back home enjoy fighting and taking god-awful risks.

When communicating with family who are hundreds of miles away post SHTF, think HAM radio. Both sides of the comm will be firing up their generators at the same time. Must have a generator.

 

Curious, because this factors into my thinking. How far off of the highway were the people who had trouble with evacuees? Hypothetically when people evacuate a city they will follow the major highways. For arguments sake consider that marching horde of people will be the width of the highway. For clarity let's say the highway runs East/West. How far off of the highway North/South will those people go? A hundred yards? 1/4 mile? 1/2 mile? How far from the main thoroughfare will they stray before they go back, and resume their trek?

 

The front of the horde will stay close to that highway but those who come after will divert to all those minor roads trying to get somewhere first for fresh pickings, they will disperse out like a flood.
They will continue outward until they are sated or dead, some will homestead as they can some will just plunder and move on.

 

All of the posts on bugging out I read seem logical , but basing my assessment on how the people reacted evacuating the gulf coast area AFTER hurricane Katrina I have a different perspective on this . Those that don't choose to sit in place hoping someone will save them , will drive their vehicle "if it will crank " and drive until it runs out of fuel and then like the ones that didn't bug out will sit there and die waiting for someone to save them . Out of the hundreds of out of fuel vehicles strewn along the road I didn't see not one person grab a bug out bag and start walking . The people on this forum would be the exceptions . I wouldn't expect the walkers to have much company .

 

Katrina was a localised event and everyone knew it, there was a reasonable expectation of .gov saving there sorry arse!

A true SHTF event will be different and most everyone will know it, peoples actions will also be different.

 

Those with fuel will drive out as far as their fuel or circumstances allow before they are forced to abandon their vehicle. Abandoned vehicles will then force those who follow to divert onto minor roads causing problems at pinch points along the route that were never intended to handle large vehicles or any great volume of traffic. This has been demonstrated when Britain had fuel strikes, when the strike was over many fuel deliveries were further delayed by vehicles abandoned around fuel stations. It happens whenever it snows, people get stuck and abandon their cars preventing more capable vehicles or snow ploughs from getting through.
As a result there will be reasonably large numbers of people on foot, wandering around the hinterlands where there aren't the facilities either to help them or control them.

 

I think once their cars stop they are going to only hoof it as far as the closest exit. With the mentality of looking for help they're going to think there is help at the next exit. I can see people pour in there and congregate at say gas stations, restaurants truck stops or any other structure. Now depending on what happens by the locals might determine if a mob grows there and soon grows stupid and demands "stuff" or if they're told to get on down the road to where inevitably some place the locals are going to "open their arms" and a mob will form and the locals will regret what they did as they're overrun and decimated.

 

I was watching a apocalyptic movie last night , but lost satellite signal as it was a bit cloudy " being under a tornado watch " . So I finished watching it this morning . Interestingly a young couple were trying to reach my chosen survival area via bicycles . This area they described as a " preppers paradise " . Supposedly one of the bugging out couple had a combat experienced uncle that was a prepper hunkered down in the hills that they were trying to reach . -- As I have stated on this forum a time or two , my survival grounds are in the heart of one of the largest congregations of preppers in the United States .

 

Have a plan . When it goes down don't be left like a deer caught in the headlights . It appears those above maps were made with my survival retreat in mind , but that can't be actually so , or were they ?

 

There's Cornwall, but stay upwind of Plymouth.

Old naval bases may have to be brought back into service post SHTF. Our enemies know this and may just hit those bases in a first or second strike to make sure that they cannot be brought back or re-purposed.

See #12. Find potential fallout maps for England. For me, breakfast awaits.

 

For those that gather some of their survival oriented information from the " poplar Report " by Steve Poplar , be it known he is bugging out . He is bugging out to the country of India . He says he may still broadcast a report from time to time . -- There is a broadcast put out by him available as of now , addressing his bugging out .

 

For any that may read this , whose plan is to bug out after S.H.T.F. within the United States . Actually I don't recall whether it is Russia or China but likely is both - Their military plan is to destroy motorways such as major interstate intersections , and all the bridges crossing the Mississippi river , both vehicle and railroad bridges . Their objective is to is to isolate military as well as civilians and prevent bugging out . --- Ridiculously many actually think they will be able to pull into a fuel station a time or two and fill up as they proceed to their envisioned survival destination . -- If I hurt someone's feeling by posting this , it is not my intention and will give a pre- apology right now . I only desire to help , but realize most will simply die .

 

China now has over 10,000 boots on the ground here in the USSA ... plus all of those who are continuing to stream in via our Southern border. Key infrastructure targets are sure to be hit by these sapper / sabotage crews.

Pipelines crossing the Mississippi are amoung our most fragile targets. During any panic relocation, a person would have to be brain-damaged to think the bridges wouldn't be jammed-shut. Decades back, I used one of these "primary" bridges. This was only one of the remaining 2-lane bridges; however, the overland 18-wheelers used it like crazy due to it being a great shortcut. There I was crossing this ancient bridge trying not to get killed by these monster trucks doing >70 mph with only a couple of feet between the side of my vehicle and the bridges side rails. Scared the sh## out'a me and it takes a lot to do that. I'm a risk-taker, but that was a sphincter pucker-factor beyond my threshold of "would you do that again".

Another point: These enemy troops on the ground here in Amerika have the means and the training to zap our power grids and our massive computer servers. Our server systems are robust, but ...

Grid down = city dwellers die. Thus nuke targets are our silos, military bases, and population centers in the areas surrounding the military bases (these areas house military personnel and civilians who work critical jobs on the bases).

Key population centers could also get eliminated with biological weapons brought in via these Chinese border-crossing saboteurs. Though China's nuclear arsenal is puny compared to ours, their biological weapons programs are robust.

The enemy is here.

=================================

Should Russia hit the U.S., there are only a few strips of US territory that will be spared significant nuclear fallout.



LONG back, decades back, I knew an engineer who was part of the team de-commissioning the Redmond, Wash. site. That place is currently VERY past-tense. Not a target unless the enemy wishes to waste a nuke. (That was one very interesting dude! He's dead now. Poor health, but not radiation-induced. He was in Iraq testing radiation levels after we bombed the sh## out'a that country.)

If our silos get hit, then this map is a hint-hint nudge-nudge to where NOT to be trying to survive. Also look at where nukes are stored on our Pacific and Atlantic coasts. Central Texas and other states have major military bases that would be prime targets, but the fallout wouldn't be anything like silo-hits. Silo-hits are diggers. MASSIVE volumes of the earth is sent high in the upper atmosphere and all of that mass will be radioactively HOT. These millions of tons of radioactive material will fall hundreds of miles away. We're talking infinitely beyond NASTY!!!



The following article contains multiple fallout maps (post silo hit). Whichever way the wind is blowing will determine the areas receiving fatal amounts of fallout.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/...nt-of-an-attack-on-u-s-nuclear-missile-silos/

Click to expand the following set of fallout maps. Note how far the deep purple and red areas extend, i.e. hundreds and hundreds of miles. Really scary, too, is the destruction of our nation's breadbasket -- millions of square miles of our croplands would be annihilated. The maps are based on the wind patterns of given days. It's a roll of the dice whether you'll glow in the dark.