While the majority of discussions about survival skills are centered on surviving out in the wild, this may not be the most common location that the majority of people will have to survive in.
Knowing how to survive in the wild is very important if you live somewhere rural or if you spend a lot of time in the outdoors, because you could get stuck out there. However, for the sake of surviving a nationwide catastrophe that forces everyone into a survival situation, the vast majority of the populations worldwide will need to know how to survive in an urban environment.
While there are a few similarities between them, urban and wilderness survival generally have very different challenges and dangers as well as different aspects that make one a bit easier than the other.
Since urban environments have the most people in them by default, urban survival skills will be the most necessary for the greatest amount of people in the world. There are a wide variety of skills that you may need that are very specific to surviving in an urban area during a major survival event.
Acquiring Food and Water in Your City
Surprisingly, it may actually be easier in some ways to get food and water out in the wild than it would be in the city during a major catastrophe. In the wild, you can find streams and rivers and other sources of moving water, as well as forage and hunt various flora and fauna.
This isn’t to imply that foraging and getting water in the wild is easy, because it isn’t, but in a major downtown city area, you would be hard pressed to find a water source anywhere.
Most urban areas rely solely on public water works to get water into their homes and apartments, but those systems may not function in a major survival event. Right around the start of a major catastrophe, you ll see people raiding stores and clearing them out of all essential supplies such as food and water.
This can be seen time and time again anytime there s a hurricane or blizzard coming to an area, which typically leaves shelves barren and empty in grocery stores everywhere nearby.
Unless you already had a small stockpile available, it would be difficult to get your hands on fresh, clean water in a city. In the suburbs, however, you may still be able to find things like creeks and ponds, especially around parks.
There s also naturally very little foraging that you can do in a city. While you should also have your own stockpile of food, you can also set up a small indoor garden in your home or on an apartment patio with the right equipment, allowing you to have at least some consistent food supply to sustain you and your family.
You can grow microgreens in a windowsill or use a vertical tower garden on a patio with grow bags and maximize your space for having your own food supply in times when it s impossible to find food in the city.
Avoid Riots or Demonstrations for Your Safety
One issue that s unique to cities that you might run into is rioting in the immediate aftermath of a catastrophe. When you have a large population of people all in the same place that are all very stressed out, an organized or sudden riot is a fairly likely scenario.
People may be rioting to show outrage toward their governments for not doing enough or they may just be rioting to blow off steam, but either way, it can get pretty dangerous, and you should avoid these scenarios at all costs.
It may be tempting to join if you re similarly stressed, or if you don t want to miss out on the people gathering loads of food and water from looting, but the problem is, there s a high probability of you getting injured severely in a situation like that.
Just being in a major crowd like that presents the danger of being trampled on. This has happened before to individuals at riots, evacuations, and even concerts. If you fall and get trampled by a mob, it can be fatal.
There s also the risk of the mob doing violent things inherently. People may be starting fights, and some may have weapons, whether they are designed for that purpose or makeshift.
This can easily lead to you getting severely injured or dying if you get caught up in the wrong situation by mistake. Not to mention property owners have (in the past) taken force to protect their products, so it s a dangerous situation all around.
In the very early stages of a nationwide survival event, the police or military still may be trying to maintain order, which poses another risk to being in a large riot crowd. The police can use a wide range of tactics to suppress mobs and riots, and since they have no way of knowing who s dangerous in the large crowd, they typically control crowds evenly throughout.
This means that even if you re not doing anything dangerous or violent, but some other people in the crowd are, you all have an equal chance of being struck by things like high pressure water or tear gas, or even rubber bullets in some instances.
Considering how dangerous riots can be, it would be wise for you to avoid them altogether for the sake of long term survival. Any debilitating injuries you get going into a major survival event can impair you from performing even the most basic tasks, which could be a serious threat to your own survival.
You should have plenty of alternative routes in mind while you traverse your local area to avoid riots altogether. Since most cities are very intertwined, you should always be able to find a way around it, which would be the safest option.
First Aid Is Essential for Urban Survival
While a city is generally much safer than the wilderness when it comes to the risk of injury, that may not be the case in the aftermath of a national catastrophe. Cities can often be much dirtier, and you may encounter a lot of things like broken glass or metal shards in a city that has been the site of a riot recently.
You’ll find that while most of the items you need in a first aid kit for urban survival don t differ that much from those found in a wilderness first aid kit, there are some things that you’ll probably want to stock up on more.
Antiseptic treatment, for example, is something that you re going to want a lot more of in a city environment. There s a lot more disease to be found in cities, so any cuts you get should be treated with something like an antiseptic gel or cream to prevent infection.
Burn gel is another great option to stock up on. Burn gel has its place in an outdoor first aid kit in case you get burned by your campfire, but you may want a bit more of it for city survival.
It s not uncommon for people during riots to start fires, which can quickly spread. Having a small supply of burn gel would be wise in the event of any people starting fires out of anger or stress.
You should also have kits on hand to deal with physical trauma. While you may encounter situations like walking through the woods and getting a sprained ankle, there can be worse violence in a city, especially during a survival event.
One item that can be a lifesaver is a tourniquet. Injuries from things like bladed weapons or even firearms that won t stop bleeding will likely require a tourniquet to stop the bleeding before receiving further medical treatment, which is one of the most common uses for them today in military applications.
Using a tourniquet will result in quite a bit of pain and has its own risks, but if used properly, it will still prevent one from losing their life due to blood loss. You never know what kind of violence you may encounter in the streets of a city after a major disaster, so it s best to be prepared.
Similarly, things like splints, boots, and crutches would be good to have on hand in the event of blunt force trauma. People may try to hurt each other with things like bats, pipes, or even bricks, so having the right equipment on hand to deal with an injury from a blunt object is essential.
Be sure to have any prescription medications you or your family need on hand, as well. There s a very low chance that pharmacies will remain operational, and they’ll likely be looted fairly quickly, so you need to be able to use whatever prescriptions you really need consistently.
While having all of the right supplies on hand is very important, it may be more important that you know how to use it all properly. Be sure to familiarize yourself with every piece of equipment in your first aid kits, so that you can act fast when you need to.
Learn to Negotiate and Have Bartering Items on Hand
The presence of other people may be the largest difference between urban and wilderness survival. In the wild you may need to be concerned about animals, plants, and the weather, but it would be very unusual for you to run into another person that you may be at odds with.
In an urban environment, you re constantly going to be running into other people, and you may have to negotiate and trade for goods, services, and even safety. Learning basic negotiation strategies would be a great skill to have.
There are dozens if not hundreds of different methods of negotiation, so you may have to just find what works best for you. Some more aggressive methods of negotiation like those you may find in sales may not be preferable, though, as they might come off as a threat in a tense situation.
It s highly likely that you will be able to trade various commodities for necessities such as water or food. In order to do so, you should also have a small supply of items that may be highly desirable among various people in a major emergency.
Some people may be willing to trade for things like medical supplies, but the less sensible may most want precious commodities in the form of things that they re already addicted to and have been unable to get given the emergency.
The main three you’ll see most commonly are coffee, cigarettes, and alcohol. All three are addictive and all three will cause withdrawals without them, meaning anyone who consumed these previously will want them badly in an emergency scenario.
For example, someone who was able to get plenty of drinking water on the first day of the catastrophe may be willing to trade a pack of drinking water for a carton of cigarettes if that s something they re missing. While it s objectively not a sound trade for them, they will likely still do that trade if they re desperate for them.
Having a small stockpile of tradeable commodities is like having a savings account. Money will likely not be worth much at the time during a major catastrophe, especially with no stores or banks open to utilize the currency, so goods and bartering will be the de facto option for most people.
Fortunately, this is something that can be built up over time and not take up a lot of space. Coffee in particular can be well sealed and lasts a long time, though you may want to stock up on instant coffee, since there s no guarantee anyone will have electricity to use an actual coffee pot.
Navigation Without Tools May Be Crucial
One of the advantages of cities is that they re much easier to navigate than the wilderness. While trees in a forest can all look the same, you have things like street names and very easily identifiable structures in cities to help navigate around.
Being able to get around in your city with ease on foot is a necessity. If you’ve lived there awhile, chances are you’ve already picked up on your local area very well, and you should know how to get to any place you need to.
You need to be able to take advantage of the fact that cities are very intertwined, and there are always alternate routes to everything. This is important to use because if you run into some people that look dangerous on your way home, you need to be able to go around them through an alternate route.
It can also be helpful if you need to suddenly run from someone so that you don t get lost. If you have to run away in a hurry, you can t be wasting time worrying about if you re going to get lost, you just need to put distance between you and your attacker.
After you lose them, you can take a second to get your bearings, and you should be able to find your way back home if you know the area well. All of this should easily be accomplished without the use of tools, as well.
If you re unfamiliar with an area, you might have to rely on a map, but it s better if you don t have to. Maps can be unreliable sometimes, and can also get lost, stolen, or damaged. If you re fully relying on things like maps, you ll be in for a very hard time when it inevitably becomes unusable.
You certainly can t rely on things like GPS, either. If you intend on using a GPS device or your phone for maps, you can t ensure that there will be working electricity for you to keep them powered on, meaning that they ll end up dying on you pretty fast.
Start learning sooner rather than later to navigate your city just going off of what you know in your head. You don t have to memorize street names or anything like that if it doesn’t help you, but just by learning to navigate based off of notable buildings you will be in a better position for survival.
Essential Items for Your Urban Bug Out Bag
At any given time during survival, you may have to end up packing up to leave quickly. Instead of panicking in the moment and inevitably forgetting something that you should have packed in your bag, it s best to have a bug out bag ready to go at any given time.
Even if you plan on hunkering down in one spot in your city, you may have to pick up and relocate to another place nearby at any given time. This could be due to damage to your building or anything else that would cause the need for evacuation, so you need to be ready to do so at any moment.
First, you re going to want to always have a first aid kit on hand. You never know what kind of problems you re going to run in to, but no matter what, you will always find a use for basic first aid items, even if it s just bandages.
Be sure to have a full water bottle in your bug out bag, as well. You may not have time to fill it up in the moment, and depending on how far you have to walk to reach your new destination, you ll be very glad that you have that water to use.
Dehydration is one of the main concerns you re going to run into on any long hike. If you have to relocate so somewhere miles away, you re going to get dehydrated fast, especially in the heat, so you definitely want a large water bottle or even one of those water bladders that line the inside of a backpack.
Along with the water, you should also have a day or two worth of food in the form of non-perishable snacks or even MREs. Chances are you re not going to want to stop and scavenge for food, so it s good to have something that you can use as fuel to keep you going along the way.
It would be wise to carry something on you or at least in your bag that you can use for self-defense. While it may be an uncomfortable topic for some, the truth is you re going to be responsible for your own safety in a catastrophe, as the police will likely not be operating at all.
This means that you will see a sharp increase, especially at the beginning, of people being violent and robbing one another for vital supplies. Consider items like knives, pepper spray, and stun guns to be viable options for defense. If you re able to get one and handle one properly, even firearms would be well-suited for this purpose.
Another item you should keep in your bug out bag is extra clothes, including a few extra pairs of socks. As you sweat over time, or if your clothes get dirty in one way or another, it can become extremely uncomfortable to keep wearing them.
Socks, in particular, can make walking unbearable if they become soaked by water or sweat. Wearing wet socks for long hikes can result in blisters very easily, so having a fresh pair that you can change into along the way will give you a lot of comfort as well as prevent injury.
Even during a major survival event, if you re hunkered down in your apartment complex or house, you still want to have your bug out bag at the ready so that you can evacuate with ease if you need to at any given time.
Work with Others to Establish and Maintain Safety
You should be taking advantage of one of the biggest differences between urban and wilderness survival during a major catastrophe, that being other people. It may be nerve racking at first if you don t know them, but by working with other people, you can achieve a lot more, and stay much safer, just as societies always have in human history.
While it may be tempting to some to be a sort of lone wolf, the reality is that other people will start forming groups of their own, some peaceful, and some malicious. If you get caught out as a loner by a more malicious group, you re going to lose no matter what.
If you can form a group with the people you live near, you will be able to split the work needed for survival evenly among all of you, making things easier for everyone. For example, three of you can go and search for food for everyone, which is much safer than trying to go scavenging alone.
One of the biggest reasons to have a large group is safety. Just as certain animals form packs or herds, humans are safer from each other in larger groups. If you have, for example, a rotating guard shift at all times, you won t have to sleep with one eye open worrying about a stray burglar stealing your supplies.
You can all communicate together to alert one another if you see someone suspicious around the area, so that you can all be wary of them, and fend them off together if they try to do anything that would harm you or otherwise lower your chances of survival.
Another advantage of this is the ability for members of your group to make up for one another s weaknesses. You, for example, may have plenty of supplies and a bit of knowledge on repairing various items and such, but lack almost any medical knowledge. If someone in your new group is a doctor, nurse, or EMT, they ll be able to cover that area of expertise with ease.
By combining the strengths of each individual, you will become a more cohesive unit than any of you would be alone. The only thing you need to look out for in the group is leeches, or people who aren’t willing to contribute anything.
This isn’t quite the same as someone who can t contribute, like someone who s seriously injured, disabled, or even pregnant. They all may still have vital information or knowledge that can help the entire group, and they can probably still do something.
A leech, on the other hand, would be someone who dodges their responsibilities and refuses to help the group as a whole, opting instead to just take in things like food and water without giving back. These types of people may need to be ostracized from your group so that you aren’t losing out on too many resources.
It’s always beneficial for survival preppers to have a wide mix of survival skills for urban environments as well as wilderness, in case you do end up having to vacate the city and head into the wild.
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Stay vigilant,
Bill Basinger
