Best Place to Store Emergency Water in Your House? Under the Bed OK?

[Member 5605]

Under the bed is fine. Store it in something other than 1 gallon jugs.

Go buy a 12-24 pack of bottled water. Now stand on it.

Now think about a bed mattress, box spring and you and your old lady's weight on top of 5-10 of the packs.

Your weight is distributed just fine. Plastic bottles take a lot to crush and normally the lid pops off by them.

Two words: "weight distribution"

 

[sheepdogs]

I just bought 6 Black (Food Grade) 50 Gallon drums, filled them with water and put them behind my shop. Then I'll replace the water every 6 months.

I replace water in my smaller containers every 6 months, but I use this in my 55 gal drum: Amazon.com : Water Preserver Concentrate : Camping Water Purifiers : Sports & Outdoors

 

[sheepdogs]

This month it's time to change out the water stored in our containers. And, this year we are slowly emptying them into the basement laundry sink, then toting them out to the garage, refilling them and stacking in the garage. I have pioneer tools that can penetrate a collapsed garage to retrieve gear and water! We've been moving gear, food, etc to the garage almost a year now.

I've been thinking along these lines lately. About half my water is stored in my (large) crawl space, but what if my house partially collapses? What kind of tools? I was just thinking of an axe and crow bar. But where do you keep those...?

 

[Camelfilter]

I've been thinking along these lines lately. About half my water is stored in my (large) crawl space, but what if my house partially collapses? What kind of tools? I was just thinking of an axe and crow bar. But where do you keep those...?

Axe, crowbar, sledge, hydraulic jacks, lumber.

Enough sheething for all windows, or at least for the easily accessed ones (first floor/street facing). You can plastic sheet the others, if needs be.

Nails & woodscrews if you use rechargeable tools.

A good bunch of tarps.

Stapler.

Store em in a shed if you have one, or maybe get one of those mini-backyard cheesy plastic ones if aesthetics matter.

 

[HuckleberryFun]

We have a basement that stays cool in Summer, warm in Winter. 5 gallon water cubes get stacked there next to the utility sink.

 

[mjbskwim]

I've been thinking along these lines lately. About half my water is stored in my (large) crawl space, but what if my house partially collapses? What kind of tools? I was just thinking of an axe and crow bar. But where do you keep those...?

I guess this is a pertinent question. A guy would have to survey his own situation and determine where the least likely place to get flattened by a tree or have a structure collapse on would be. Then that's where your survival shed should go.
Is your garage going to take the "Big One"? Or will it collapse hiding all your important stuff?
How about the house? Or a neighbor's tree?
All the preps don't do anything good if they're covered with debris. If you had room a shipping container would be a fine place to keep stuff. Even a 20'er would hold enough stuff for a few days to get the rest of the stores uncovered.

 

[jbett98]

The last post reminded me of a segment in a great documentary by Werner Herzog called "Happy People, A Year in the Taiga"
Go to the 1:19:00 timeline and see what I'm talking about.
If you haven't seen this yet, you should watch it from the beginning, as it really shows what it takes to make a living way out in the Siberian wilderness.
The father using the old ways and the son making use of new technologies.
Over a billion trees in the forest and one of them just happens to fall down smack dab in the middle of your cabin.

 

[mjbskwim]

The last post reminded me of a segment in a great documentary by Werner Herzog called "Happy People, A Year in the Taiga"
Go to the 1:19:00 timeline and see what I'm talking about.
If you haven't seen this yet, you should watch it from the beginning, as it really shows what it takes to make a living way out in the Siberian wilderness.
The father using the old ways and the son making use of new technologies.
Over a billion trees in the forest and one of them just happens to fall down smack dab in the middle of your cabin.

Yeah but the old man sees it as a blessing......he doesn't have to haul it as far for the fire

 

[HuckleberryFun]

The last post reminded me of a segment in a great documentary by Werner Herzog called "Happy People, A Year in the Taiga"
Go to the 1:19:00 timeline and see what I'm talking about.
If you haven't seen this yet, you should watch it from the beginning, as it really shows what it takes to make a living way out in the Siberian wilderness.
The father using the old ways and the son making use of new technologies.
Over a billion trees in the forest and one of them just happens to fall down smack dab in the middle of your cabin.

I've had that on my watch list for a while.
I guess I should watch it.