EMP Action Plan for Family

mikem317

mikem317

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Question to fellow NESers: Any thoughts on a suitable action plan in the event of a regional or hemispheric EMP (e.g. How to get home, who gets the kids, how to get from work to home, etc.)? Sure the likelihood of an EMP event is pretty small, but just curious on how others have planned for it.
 
An EMP from space will take out a lot of electronic devices within a very, very large radius; like 500-1,000 miles. Much of our current infrastructure will not work. Much of our ability to make replacements for the busted stuff won't work.

I doubt any cars, trains, planes would work, so getting home would be by foot, bike or horse.

If I wanted to take over a modern industrialized country, this is how I would weaken them. I would think that mass starvation and disease would be the most immediate problem.
 
HOnestly. Drive my car home. EMP is way overhyped. Do some research on it and you will see. We may lose long line things like power and communications but things like your car, Ipad and watch are still going to work.

We do have a plan for getting our kids from school. My wife is going to collect both our children. My daughters school is about 1 mile from the house and my sons about 3 so she can either ride her bike or walk if she has to. They get back to the house and stay put.

My job is to get home. I do always carry enough crap in the car that I can walk home if I have to in an emergency. I figure I am most likely going to be stopped by snarled traffic.
 
When it comes to prepping you have to prioritize things. The scenario you describe, while serious IMHO has little chance of happening and one cannot prep for everything. A much more realistic concern would be something like a microburst during a thunderstorm or a tornado. While both are rare, a microburst destroyed several homes in New Hampshire last week and last year (?) a tornado hit the Springfield area in Massachusetts.

What would you do if you and your spouse were both unemployed for an extended time ? Do you have sufficient savings to continue paying the rent or mortgage ? People living in low lying areas need to be concerned about flash floods at this time of year. Do you know all the flood hazard areas where you live and how to get from point A to point B without going through them ?

If your house was cut off how long can you last before running out of food ? In the winter you second heat source. Do you need a generator ? How much fuel can you store and do you know how long the genny can run on the fuel you have ?

If you read the "survival" forums often enough one can get overwhelmed by all the different situations out there, remember you cannot prep for everything.

Your "get home" plan needs to be as basic and simple as possible for all involved. Take a look at where everybody is at different times of the day and what might be a trigger to have everyone fall back at home or a rally point away from home. Modify your plan as little as possible and rehearse things every couple of months so everyone knows what is expected of then.
 
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in the event of serious SHTF my family will be gathering at home to sit it out. i have some food stocks and way to make drinkable water from the brook on the back of my property.
unless of course, if disaster that involves a radioactive fall-out when you just can't stay put because you are in the way of it, then we'll just go to our local airfield (1.5 miles away) and fly out by any means possible.
i don't really have a good plan for nuclear disaster, just because there are so many variations on how things can play out and as said before we can't prep for every kind of scenario.
stay put and wait it out as long as possible will be my solution every time, unless moving is absolutely vital, i can survive on what i have in my disposal better, than with limited means when i'm on the move.
 
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cockpitbob said:
An EMP from space will take out a lot of electronic devices within a very, very large radius; like 500-1,000 miles. Much of our current infrastructure will not work. Much of our ability to make replacements for the busted stuff won't work.

I doubt any cars, trains, planes would work, so getting home would be by foot, bike or horse.
Click to expand...

Natural EMP from solar flare will only take out long-line and space based systems. Phone (including cellphones), GPS and Electricity will be down, not much else will be affected. Running cars may stall, but will start right back up afterwards.

Man-made (Nuclear/Neutron) EMP from solar flare may take out additional devices that contain unprotected or lightly protected antenna systems (like your cellphone, rand-held radio, unprotected HAM systems, car radio, etc) but isn't going to affect your car.

So, drive to where the kids are, pick them up and head home. Wait for the other adults who are expected at our house in SHTF senerio and start securing the house. Break out the solar charging stations and get the hand-held radios out of their secured storage containers.

If I wanted to take over a modern industrialized country, this is how I would weaken them. I would think that mass starvation and disease would be the most immediate problem.
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Loss of power infrastructure systems would cause the majority of damage. Even with working cars, the loss of the electrical infrastructure is going to cause fuel access and refining ability to rapidly deteriorate. As will the lack of sanitation, medical and refridgeration facilities. It's an effective first strike, even better if you can follow it up with additional strikes that further degrade the ability to address infrastructure damage or target available fuel or sanitation supplies.
 
however effective EMP weapons could be, fortunately they do not pose or warrant large scale destruction of infrastructure. unless number of such weapons were deployed simultaneously in the number of key-locations which would be very difficult task even for military with wide scale strike capability, and definitely not possible for radical militant groups constricted by limited supply, mobility and personnel.

therefore EMP protection measures that were in place for all of .mil since cold war now slowly being abandon (starting 2001) since EMP is no longer a big threat.
 
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There was a .gov sponsored study that tested car ECU's and it wasn't much of a problem. If I remember correctly, the worst thing that happened was a running car stalled out. Systems that have long conductors attached are most at risk. Power lines, phone lines, rail signaling systems, tv & radio towers all would most likely be toast.

If you have concerns about EMP frying survival electronics, metal cookie tins might provide an additional level of protection...basically a mini faraday cage. It by no means a bullet proof method as there are a lot of factors to consider.

Personally I think the biggest danger is nuclear power stations. I would like to think that backup generators are disconnected from the grid and well shielded from EMP....if not we're gonna have Fukishima X 104 in the USA. Yankee in VT would be on my list of places to keep an eye on, its an old station that should have been shut down years ago. They have a lot of spent fuel rods on site *not* in casks. One of their cooling towers was so old it rotted out and collapsed!
 
I think I need to read-up on EMPs more. It sounds less scarry than I was let to believe. I was under the impression that if an nuke burst in space over CONUS would take out most things from the power grid to the electronics in our cars to my wrist watch.
 
GomerPile said:
Personally I think the biggest danger is nuclear power stations. I would like to think that backup generators are disconnected from the grid and well shielded from EMP....if not we're gonna have Fukishima X 104 in the USA. Yankee in VT would be on my list of places to keep an eye on, its an old station that should have been shut down years ago. They have a lot of spent fuel rods on site *not* in casks. One of their cooling towers was so old it rotted out and collapsed!
Click to expand...

Danger number one is probably sanitation. Without working generators and pumps, water won't be able to be treated quickly. That's going to translate into disease which will probably be equal to or more deadly than the triggering event (e.g. nuclear weapon or accident at nuclear power plant).

Yankee also needs to get the VT sign-off. The Feds have approved though. I thought they already started putting spent fuel into casks?
 
If EMP hits when I'm 500 miles away on a business trip, I ain't walk home with that much sh*t going around. I'll hunker down and start a new family. [laugh]
 
I'm holding out hope that if someone has a nuke, and they are hell bent on using it, they don't waste it on an EMP burst and instead launch it right at DC in the middle of a state of the union address. I think that would save us all a lot of trouble.
 
June4th said:
If EMP hits when I'm 500 miles away on a business trip, I ain't walk home with that much sh*t going around. I'll hunker down and start a new family. [laugh]
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In all seriousness, that's actually my number #1 fear. Being unable to get back to the family. No way to call. Stuck on the road either going to work, or coming home from work. Or just stuck at work. And family is a good 30 miles away.

Start walking?
 
mikem317 said:
In all seriousness, that's actually my number #1 fear. Being unable to get back to the family. No way to call. Stuck on the road either going to work, or coming home from work. Or just stuck at work. And family is a good 30 miles away.

Start walking?
Click to expand...

Or buy a bike for 10 bucks at a yard sale and leave it at work.
 
cockpitbob said:
I think I need to read-up on EMPs more. It sounds less scarry than I was let to believe. I was under the impression that if an nuke burst in space over CONUS would take out most things from the power grid to the electronics in our cars to my wrist watch.
Click to expand...

The EMPs of sci-fi movies that destroy every electrical device with extreme prejudice are just that science fiction. Most of the damage from an EMP comes from inducting a large enough current into a circuit to cause arcing between two lines that damages or destroys one or both of the lines or causes a permanent short circuit by fusing the lines together. Inducted current is directly related to the surface area of the line, thus devices with antennas and devices connected to the grid (particularly the transformers connected to high voltage transmission lines) will the the hardest hit devices. Small electronics, laptops, tablets, etc would be far less effected, though not immune.
 
Pete85 said:
The EMPs of sci-fi movies that destroy every electrical device with extreme prejudice are just that science fiction. Most of the damage from an EMP comes from inducting a large enough current into a circuit to cause arcing between two lines that damages or destroys one or both of the lines or causes a permanent short circuit by fusing the lines together. Inducted current is directly related to the surface area of the line, thus devices with antennas and devices connected to the grid (particularly the transformers connected to high voltage transmission lines) will the the hardest hit devices. Small electronics, laptops, tablets, etc would be far less effected, though not immune.
Click to expand...

Translation: I have no actual experience or expertise, but I'm hoping for the best.
 
xtry51 said:
Translation: I have no actual experience or expertise, but I'm hoping for the best.
Click to expand...

Hope is not a strategy. [grin] Maybe pack a folding bicycle in the trunk? Looks like a Schwinn can be had for $200. Insurance for the unlikely event?
 
No one has deployed a 'weaponized' EMP device. This is all guess work, I'll plan that everything is down - if my vehicles still work, it's a bonus.

The way I figure it, no one knew about an Atomic Bomb - until it was built. Nothing could possibly be bigger - until a Hydrogen Bomb was built. Who's to say Kim #3 or Imadinnerjacket hasn't found a certain modification that will induce a 2x,4x, or 10x increase in the induced electromagnetic field.

Relying on everything to go right is not the mindset of a 'prepper', planning a little for everything is. A list of instructions and backpack of gear in the trunk for a loved one - good. Spare set of computers and modules in the trunk - excessive.
 
dnepro-mike said:
however effective EMP weapons could be, fortunately they do not pose or warrant large scale destruction of infrastructure. unless number of such weapons were deployed simultaneously in the number of key-locations which would be very difficult task even for military with wide scale strike capability, and definitely not possible for radical militant groups constricted by limited supply, mobility and personnel.

therefore EMP protection measures that were in place for all of .mil since cold war now slowly being abandon (starting 2001) since EMP is no longer a big threat.
Click to expand...

A single 5M-ton nuclear or neutron detonation 300 miles over central US would blanket more than 90% of the US with sufficient EM energy to compromise most of the hard-wire telecommunications and power transmission system. I would consider that "large scale destruction" with a single weapon.

A 150 mile air-burst could impact Boston, New York and Washington DC, making that another likely target for someone who can't achieve a 300 mile altitude.

All of these require high altitude strike capabilities - it takes a pretty big missle to deliver a nuclear warhead to 150 miles. Ground based EMP is MUCH more limited and much harder to achieve.
 

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