I recently heard the following sad tale from a reader: “My retreat property in Oregon burned to the ground last year. I had a friend call and tell me he saw [footage of] my chimney on Fox News. Fortunately, I didn’t have much [stored] in the house, and my four forty-foot (CONEX [1]) storage trailers came throughout without a scratch, praise God. Regarding our planned rebuilding, we anticipate purchasing a manufactured house, which has concrete board siding and a fiberglass composition tile roof, which is fairly fireproof, but not able to stop anything with any velocity. We anticipate going underground for the disappearance mode, as this location already has an 8’x8’x20′ concrete “root cellar” that the previous owner had built.”
By coincidence, the same day another SurvivalBlog reader mentioned a link that he saw in the latest Progressive Farmer magazine for www.metalroofs.com [2]. They even make metal faux slates and metal faux shakes. My advice: If you have a shake or other combustible roof, replace it with a relatively fireproof roof!
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A reminder that Ready Made Resources [3] is brokering the sale of a very hard to find upgraded P-10 self-contained underground NBC [4] shelter.They are selling it on behalf of an acquaintance. When sold new, these shelters sell for $100,000 with all of the options included in this one, such as the 1,000 gallon water tank and Level 4 protective entry door. (Cutting torch and .308 bullet proof!) These very rarely come up for sale in used condition, so don’t miss this chance to buy one for only one-fourth of what it would cost to buy one new. It is being sold “on site”, so you would have to pay for hauling. (About $4,000 to the Midwest, or $6,000 to the West Coast.) Please mention that you saw it on SurvivalBlog for a nifty bonus.
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Reader SH mentioned this article from Field and Stream magazine about assembling do-it-yourself outdoor survival kits. [5]
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By way of The Claire Files [6], comes a link to this Reuters wire article: Containers pile up as imports from China soar [7]. I guess the only good news is that this glut has pushed the price of surplus CONEX [1] containers dow. They have lots of uses around a retreat. I’ve seen them used as storage sheds, improvised houses [8], hay barns, wood sheds, and as underground blast shelters (at least in locales with well drained soil.)