Good day Mr. Rawles,
I love to read your blog and recently noticed a few articles about the “After Armageddon” program on your blog, but I have not seen it yet. Last night I did see a show, also on the History Channel, called “Apocalypse Man”. I usually enjoy a new book or television show along this subject line; even though most prevailing theories are fairly similar, it’s nice to compare details. “What’s in your bag?” “Mine is bigger!” “Oh yeah, how many rounds do you have?” and so on. However, the show last night was a little off the beaten path. By that I mean to say are the people that produced the show clueless?
T hey have this “professional” apocalypse survival guy running around like a ninja with his head cut off. He tells us the audience that the first thing we should do is to head to the city because there will be food there. Then we should head to the hospital, after siphoning a gallon of diesel fuel, to get this huge generator started for power for a few hours. The show goes on like a bad Bruce Willis movie. It includes jumping across an open draw bridge and jumping into a dark elevator shaft for safety. My personal favorite is when he siphons the diesel fuel with a bicycle tire pump and then uses the same pump to siphon water for drinking. I love the taste of diesel in the morning. Tastes like ignorance.
Alright, I apologize for ranting and being negative. I am generally a fairly happy guy. This television show reinforces my belief that it is becoming more and more popular to be prepared for the end of the world. We need a secret handshake. This trend is in my view very entertaining, but for all the wrong reasons. It will cost “Joe Armchair Quarterback” and his family their lives if this is their only source of information. I am not going to write the producers or stage a picket line protest or anything like that. In fact, I love the fact that this show is on television because the idea of thousands of people heading downtown to the hospital WTSHTF will make my route a lot less crowded. If you haven’t seen it or don’t watch television, believe me, this one is worth a giggle or two. Best wishes in 2010. – Cozy in Western North Carolina
Sir,
There’s a fairly thorough pulling apart of the [“Apocalypse Man”] show on the Zombie survival group on LiveJournal.
Here is my take on it:
I am not impressed. The mistakes made by the host in the first show:
1. He takes needless risks (A drawbridge over a river was up. Rather than finding another means to cross, he jury-rigged a grappling hook and swung across. There were several other incidents.)
2. He wastes resources. (Rather than using a small bit of steel wool to start a fire, he used a huge lump of it. He also wasted food.)
3. After emphasizing keeping a low profile to avoid people, he then broadcast over the CB emergency channel his travel plans and left it broadcasting on the frequency using a tape recorder. This not only
compromised his security, it also steps on any other broadcasts on that channel.
I also question his choice to move into the city. I would rather try to make it in a rural area rather than an urban one. But, there were some good scrounging tips. – Tim C (Reposted with permission from a forum hosted by SurvivalBlog’s Editor at Large Michael Z. Williamson)