We're still working on our apartment-sized earthquake survival kit.
Aside from ensuring the happy survival of our household, we're driven by the need to put together one that's compact.
So we've been trying to figure out how to deal with storing the requisite amount of water: a minimum of a gallon of water per person for 3 days.
For us, that means about 10 gallons, or ~1.4 cubic feet of water that we need to keep readily accessible in our cramped quarters so that we can find them quickly in an emergency. That's about 1.4 cubic feet of space... assuming we use Aqua Blox, which are durable, stackable and spill-proof.
We're also intrigued by Target's $29.99 Reliance Emergency Essentials Kit, a water-oriented emergency kit that includes water treatment tablets, water containers, and a "Luggable Loo" portable toilet.
We're not sure whether it's actually advisable to replace those gallons with the equivalent amount of water purification supplies, and the toilet is probably an unnecessary luxury. Perhaps the whole thing could be condensed to just water purification pills and collapsible water containers.
Thoughts?
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Comments (5)
If a big earthquake hit, you might not even have any water to purify (water mains can break or be shut off) so it's good to have an actual stash of water. You might be able to access water from your hot water heater, but you also might not. Storage is tough, but I've hidden mine under the kitchen table.
As for a toilet, you can always line your toilet bowl with a garbage bag.
I have bottled water delivered to the house and simply always make sure to have two extra 5 gal bottles on hand. It's an easy way to make sure the water is rotated and fresh, too.
A Reliance luggable loo is a simple solution to the toilet problem. It's a toilet seat that snaps onto the top of a 5 gallon bucket. I keep most of my 72 hour kit inside the bucket (no I haven't had to use it yet). To keep it smelling ever so fresh pick up some Bio Blue.
I forgot to mention- you can buy the luggable loo lids at the Red Cross store on 2nd St in SF.
Given that my building (in NYC) has a water tower I'm not too worried about storing too much water. If something serious enough to topple that tower were to happen I doubt I'd be in a position to be using my stored water.
I do keep a pile of Aqua Blox in my "zombie kit" grab and go bag.
I buy cases of liter bottles of water from Trader Joe's as an emergency supply. The individual bottles aren't too large to carry if necessary and I just use them as they get close to expiration. The cases themselves are easy to store. I made the mistake of putting soft plastic supermarket gallon jugs in my emergency bin and had to throw away everything after the bottles leaked and made a mold colony.