Preparing and Being Ready

There’s an eclipse coming up on Monday, which you may be aware. We’re planning to celebrate with kids, who live not far away but in the path of totality. There are predictions of cloud cover, but that’s life. We will experience the daytime total darkness regardless.

image is screenshot from this KTVB7 News story

Warning Sign

Does it have meaning? Is it a warning? Maybe. In fact, I think it likely does have meaning, although its exact predictive meaning evades me—and most of the various YouTubers offering their speculations.

I have a few favorites:  

·        Christian Homestead (see his Signs in the Heavens playlist) 

·        Christian Fire Poppy (hers are full of connections she’s made, often looking at constellations, using the online tool Stellarium; I recommend her first one, together with Christian Homestead, and there are three with "Revelation 12 sign" in the title from September-October 2023, plus more as we approach the eclipse)

·        Allie Duzett (she has an entire playlist for the 2024 eclipse; hers is astrology, but looking at the energetic types of influence from the stars and planets, rather than predicting future events; much is puzzling to me, but I love her positive and practical attitude and approach)  

Even if this eclipse is just a stunning natural event in the sky, it still might be a good time to prepare. We're already in times of chaos, so it seems prudent to prepare for any eventuality we can think of.

Every location has its risks. Here in Houston we have hurricanes and tornadoes, and floods (Hurricane Harvey combined these), and power outages, which we get with frequent brief technology failures, and with hurricanes, but we’ve also experienced them with a rare severe freeze. There are certain things we know to do now. Although, my husband says if we have another hurricane with power outage, he’s going to send me away to stay with kids, because that’s easier on him than worrying about me.

Disaster Preparedness

On Wednesday night, Glenn Beck’s program was “Prepping 101: The Step-by-Step Guide to Surviving Global Chaos” (also on YouTube), complete with multiple chalkboards. He was talking mostly physical preparedness—storing food and water, having tools and ammunition, keeping some money on hand (or gold, or something tradeable).

First up in his show, he talked about the electric grid. There are three in the US: east, west, and Texas. Yes, Texas has its own. We prefer that. In that failure we had during winter storm Uri, in 2021, that happened for reasons that would only be magnified by US-level control: windmills froze and wouldn’t turn, so no power from them; solar doesn’t provide power during a storm that blocks the sun (or when it’s night). Some things were offline for repair or inspection at a critical time. There were other reasons that all lined up, as things tend to do. But there have been some improvements and protections since that disaster.

It’s true, though, that an attack on the power grid would put a majority of people in the US at risk of death, if not immediately, then within weeks or months. (I wrote about this here and here.) It’s a bit scary to be that vulnerable.

screenshot from Glenn Beck's "Prepping 101" program

There are so many ways we’re vulnerable, it’s hard to list them. Nor do we want to tempt fate. But there are some principes of survival. First up, that Glenn showed, were what is called the Rule of 3s, because so many things relate to that number:

You can survive:

·        3 minutes without air.

·        3 hours without shelter in bad conditions.

·        3 days without water.

·        3 weeks without food.

·        And you have 3 days to get out of a perilous situation and get to safety.

screenshot of one of Glenn Beck's chalkboard lists

Home Preparedness

Next up, Glenn put up a chalkboard with 6 basic steps to prepping. (He’s something of a prepper himself, and often foresees disasters coming—sometimes he’s right.)

So here are the steps:

1.      Build a solid personal finance and health foundation (money in various levels of availability, plus medicines, first aid, etc.)

2.      Get your home ready for two weeks of self-reliance. (Food, water, fuel, and any essentials to shelter in place for a couple of weeks.)

3.      Know when to “bug out.” Have “go bags.” (Essential food, clothing, meds, water to get you through about 72 hours away from home. It may be a good idea to have one packed for each member of the family, and update frequently.)

4.      Prepare for emergencies away from home. (If you can’t get home, do you have essential meds, first-aid kit.)

5.      Learn core skills—and practice! (Here’s where he suggests camping, and maybe hunting, as good practice for cooking and cleaning away from home.)

6.      Share what you’ve learned, and build a base of like-minded friends. (Around here, we have people assigned at church to learn and share preparedness skills with us. So we know who the experts are, and we get info and learn from them pretty regularly—and maybe especially as hurricane season approaches.)

screenshot of another Glenn Beck chalkboard

The next chalkboard was for getting your home ready for a two-week shelter in place. Glenn Beck offers a pretty extensive list—but many of these things are what you have already. You just need to take inventory and add what you’re missing. The categories are:

·        Water—15 gal./person (1 gal./person/day)

·        Food—23,000 calories per person (1500 calories/person/day)

·        Fire—lighters matches, fire starters

·        Light—flashlights, candles, lanterns

·        Heating/Cooling—indoor heater, extra blankets, USB-powered fan

·        Shelter—beyond home, tarps for improvised shelter, or tents

·        Medical—create list of medical supplies

·        Hygiene—wet wipes, sanitizer, camp soap

·        Communications—ham and/or NOAA radio

·        Power—batteries, rechargers, solar charger (I would add generator to this list)

·        Tools—axe, shovel, work gloves, wrenches, zip ties, duck tape

·        Self-defense—guns and ammo

·        Cash—as much as you can afford to store

o   Bartering items (alcohol, cigarettes)

o   Precious metals

·        EMP proof home (I think this means grounding, as we do to protect against lightning strikes, but maybe this is more—like a Faraday cage, but I don’t know how you do that with your whole house.

screenshot of another Glenn Beck chalkboard

Glenn Beck has a quiz to assess your readiness for whatever, and I came out “better than most.”

We have a fair amount of food—most of which I cannot eat now, because of food sensitivities/allergies. So it would be challenging to eat just from the pantry and not the refrigerator or freezer.

We have a generator (since Hurricane Ike in 2008). It’s noisy. It takes fuel. And it’s not enough to handle the air conditioner or heater. But it’s good for lights, fans, recharging phones and batteries. In fact, we were able to help neighbors on both sides keep their freezers alive as well (with long extension cords).

We used to camp, when we lived in the northwest, and Mr. Spherical Model used to camp a lot even here in Texas, as a scoutmaster. Camping is good practice, to learn skills and think of better ways of doing things and learning to be resourceful. But I haven’t been willing to camp in the Texas heat with Texas mosquitos. I’m not much of a pioneer. Still, we do have a camp stove and some basic equipment.

There’s always more to do. And it’s better done a little at a time, as you can handle things with clear thought, without panic or urgency. The idea is to prepare so you don’t have to fear.

 

Spiritual Preparedness

Near the end of his program—too late to spend time on it, Glenn Beck suggested we also need to do some spiritual preparedness.

This, I would suggest, includes the basics: knowing how to pray, and how to hear answers and receive direction from God. It includes putting your life in order, daily repentance and improvement, refining—so that the Lord (and life in general) doesn’t force you into that refinement. And it includes learning to trust God.

A friend once gave me a lapel pin of a frog, with a note that it was a reminder to “Fully Rely On God.” I like that.

We have been practicing this for a while now—maybe through some of that forced refining. We’re not really ready—as the story of Joseph in Egypt goes—for a coming disaster such as seven lean years that have followed seven prosperous years. Because we’ve been depleting our stores the past seven years. We think we’re nearing the end, and rains that make the ground fruitful are about to come down on us—despite what an eclipse may portend. But this has really stretched our reliance on God, Who has been good to us throughout.

If you’re feeling less than fully prepared, or maybe just need a reminder of what the Holy Spirit feels like, I suggest tuning in to the worldwide conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints this weekend. Boosting your spiritual preparedness is what that’s all about. You can find it on BYUTV, on YouTube, or at ChurchofJesusChrist.org. There will be three two-hour sessions on Saturday, April 6, and two more on Sunday, April 7, just ahead of the eclipse. You can watch live, or come back later to watch; transcripts will be available a few days later. And, since it's a worldwide conference, it's available in many languages.

So It Has Come to This



xkcd.com

One of my most entertaining friends finds occasion to say this, and shared the comic. It’s true; it works in more situations than you would expect.

I was thinking about this, to lighten the mood following a book I recently read for book club. I can’t recommend the book as great literature. It was, however, a novelized way of discussing a scenario maybe we need to look at. The book was One Second After, by William R. Forstchen. It’s about what could happen following an EMP strike, or electromagnetic pulse.

by William R. Forstchen

In case that term doesn’t mean anything to you, here’s a definition from the foreword:

When an atomic bomb is detonated above the earth’s atmosphere, it can generate a “pulse wave,” which travels at the speed of light, and will short-circuit every electronic device that the “wave” touches on the earth’s surface. It is like a super lightning bolt striking next to your house and taking out your computer, except infinitely worse, for it will strike our entire nation, most likely without warning, and could destroy our entire complex electrical grid and everything attached into that grid (pp. 11-12).

The book explores what would happen if we were suddenly plunged into a pre-electrical world. Cars stop running and roll lifeless to the sides of roads (or until crashing into something stops them). Planes fall from the skies. Communication ceases. Water pumps—gone. Refrigeration—gone. Sources and transport for food and medicine—gone.

Some of the gruesome parts of the book happen at nursing homes and hospitals, where death in disgusting lack of dignity ensues. There's also gang warfare and mayhem of various savage sorts.

People have to come up with new ways to survive, to ration resources, to protect each other and the resources. They have to rethink all kinds of ethical issues, often on life and death issues.

I don’t really like conspiracy theory worries. (This book was, coincidentally, mentioned just a couple of days ago on Glenn Beck’s show, which sometimes goes that direction: here, if you're a subscriber.) So a few weeks ago I asked son Economic Sphere, who has interest and information on such things, hoping for assurance that this was unlikely. Instead he said, yes, it could happen. And it could conceivably take from a few months up to one to three years to rebuild technology to where we are now (if unhindered in the effort to rebuild). So that was disturbing.

Meanwhile, I happened to read the March issue of Hillsdale College publication Imprimis, with an article by Brian T. Kennedy, called “Early Warning: The Continuing Need for National Defense.” Kennedy mentions several recent attacks as evidence. One was The San Jose Attack. I only vaguely remembered this news story:

Last April 16, just outside of San Jose, California, a group of terrorists or soldiers, operating on American soil, attacked the Metcalf transmission substation in a military action aimed at disabling a part of America’s electrical infrastructure. The operation began at 1:00 a.m., when the attackers cut underground fiber optic cables, disabling communications and security systems. Thirty minutes later, using high-powered rifles, they began a 20-minute assault on the substation’s extra-large transformer and the cooling system that supports it. Police arrived at 1:50, but the shooters disappeared into the night. To this day there is no trace of them.

John Wellinghoff, then chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, would call this attack “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involved [America’s electrical] grid that has ever occurred.” Obviously it was a professional operation by skilled marksmen… with training in reconnaissance, stealth, and evasion. That the plan went undetected, the casings from the spent shells bore no fingerprints, and the perpetrators have not been caught, suggests a high degree of intelligence. Damage to the facility forced electricity to be rerouted to maintain the integrity of power transmission to the Silicon Valley, and repairs took several months.

The political response to the attack ranged from an immediate dismissal by the FBI of the idea it was a terrorist act—puzzling given its sophistication and its proximity in time to the Boston bombing [the day before]—to recognition by a bipartisan but small group of U.S. Senators and Representatives that defending America’s electrical grid is an urgent priority….

Kennedy also mentions the EMP possibility:

Such an explosion placed over the center of the U.S. could destroy the infrastructure that distributes electricity to consumers and industrial users in every state except Alaska and Hawaii. This phenomenon has been well understood sing the 1960s….

He also mentions that a severe solar storm, called Coronal Mass Ejections, could cause similar damage, and we’re overdue for such a storm. We had a near miss just last July.

Why should we worry? According to a 1990s EMP Commission, without electricity the US “has the industrial infrastructure to provide for only 30 million of its 300 million citizens.” Let that sink in a moment. Kennedy adds this question:

Given the potentially devastating consequences of failing to defend our sophisticated but vulnerable electrical grid, citizens might well wonder how it is that our government, which doesn’t bat an eye at spending billions of dollars on the most frivolous and wasteful projects, fails year after year to do so.

So, what can we learn from this electrical vulnerability?

·         Government isn’t reliable to “take care of” all our needs.

·         We’d better learn to be self-reliant and prepared.

In Forstchen’s book, he looks at what might have been:

Anyone with even the remotest understanding of EMP and the threat to the nation should have been going insane before it hit….The threat was a hundred times worse [than the possibility of saboteurs during WWII] and they did nothing, absolutely nothing….

If people knew the simple things to do on Day One, [a leader] already trained to react to an EMP, mobilize his forces and react quickly…if they had but a few simple provisions stocked away, the same way anyone who lives in hurricane or tornado country does, would they be in this mess?...

Food, bulk food, just a fifty-pound bag of rice or flour, shoes, batteries, an additional [insulin] test kit… dog food, a water filter so they didn’t have to boil what they now pulled out of the swamp green pool…I should have had those on hand (p. 258).

At least this makes me feel a little better. We live in hurricane/tornado territory. Especially since 2005 when Katrina hit, followed a couple of weeks later by Rita, people have paid attention. Plus, our Church has spent the last century encouraging members to gather a store of food. Start with a three-day emergency supply, a 72-hour kit. In fact, it was our Church that first taught people at the annual hurricane preparedness conference, about 72-hour kits. Now everybody seems to have caught on, and most people have some version of a go-bag for emergencies.

We were also taught to build up a month or two of stuff on hand. And then build up to a year’s supply. We were told it would be today’s version of Noah’s Ark, to have that supply on hand. Obedience, rather than fear, is the motivation. But, still, there’s some fear involved.

We resupplied our food supply back when we had the larger family living with us. There’s still some fear involved for me; I can’t eat any grains. There aren’t very many canned foods I can eat. Some that I used to be able to eat are now (just recently) starting to explode in my pantry. So I have some re-supplying to do.

We have a good freezer, but that requires electricity. During Hurricane Ike, 2008, when we lost power for eight days, we used a generator to keep our freezer, and our neighbors’, going for about ten hours a day. But we still lost a lot of food. Mr. Spherical Model says next time he will evacuate me, because I’m a lot of trouble to worry about.

That was short-term. It’s hard to picture getting through one or more years. And, while we garden, it’s not easy here in the clay-soiled back yard. Still, Mr. Spherical Model has a lot of experience as a Boy Scout leader and camper. He’s resourceful. We wouldn’t be the first to go. Although, I might need a couple of medical miracles once my three-month supply of certain things run out.

My real concern is civilization. It would take some serious readjustment to live without technology. But people have done it before—most of the millennia mankind has existed. And we have people among us with needed experience. Civilization is helped along by infrastructure, but it isn’t dependent on it. Civilization requires a people who are accountable to God first, and good to each other—by choice. In order to rebuild, we will need a people who choose to be good, and caring toward one another, and willing to work together.

Government could help protect us, better than it does. But, failing that, it’s not likely we can turn to government to inculcate us with needed humanity. We have to find that within ourselves.

It’s harder to be kind and thoughtful of others when we’re stressed, hungry, tired, hot or cold. We get irritable. We might get desperate. So, maybe we can use this relatively secure time to build our reserve of inner civilization—so it will be there when it’s most needed.