The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods:

SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “HJL”. The 2017 Eclipse reports continue to be sent in and some of our readers had some amazing experiences.

Medical

Survival Medicine will be having a couple of classes on “Survival Wound Care with Hands on Suturing and Stapling” coming up very quickly:

September 3rd, 2017 at the RK Prepper Show, Camp Jordan Arena in Chattanooga Tennessee at 9:30am and again on September 10th, 2017 at the RK Prepper Show in Knoxville Tennessee. You can find more details about these classes on their website.

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Also noted on Survival Medicines website in this interesting article. If you don’t have access to or sufficient Potassium Iodide pills to treat people exposed to radiation, a Povidone-Iodine solution (brand name Betadine – a common medical disinfectant you should stock anyway) painted on the abdomen or forearm daily should provide equivalent protection. Thanks to reader J.N. for the link.

Vehicle Security (Electronic)

Reader DSV sent in this article outlining a hack that nearly all vehicles on the road since 1993 are vulnerable to. The hack involves placing a physical device on the vehicles electronic network (Controller Area network – CAN). This device corrupts certain signals and the default behavior of the car is to shutdown and ignore the offending electronics so as to not clog the system with defective traffic. This can result in failures of airbags, anti-lock brakes and other critical systems. Note that physical access is required to the electronic network in this case.

Second Amendment

Reader D.B. sent in this article showing all of the states ranked worst to best for concealed carry. I don’t necessarily agree with their criteria for ranking the states, but it’s not a bad either. Of note is that the American Redoubt does well in the listing. Idaho ranks #16, Montana ranks #13 and Wyoming ranks #4. What it doesn’t really take into account is the effect of “open carry”. The so-called “stand-your-ground” is also a strong indicator that is used in the ranking.

Eclipse Reports

The concerted safety campaign of the science community and the media did a pretty good job of getting the work out on staying safe while viewing the eclipse. There were, in fact, very few cases reported of eye damage from staring at the sun. There were a number of cases of broken bones from people trying to walk while wearing their dark eclipse glasses. Reader R.C. sent in this humorous note of several cases where people presented themselves at hospitals because they had put sunscreen in their eyes in an effort to protect them. It’s a reminder to take ownership in your own health. At least read the instructions on anything that you plan to use in your first-aid kit.

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I ran across this amazing video filmed from several ultralights at 12,000 feet using four cameras. Vlogger ttabbs planed to be right on the center line of totality. The video is only about 4 minutes long because it is played at 8x speed, but the results were spectacular. It is well worth the watch.

Sewage Spill

Once of the drawbacks to using shared services is the sheer size of the processing plants. When something goes wrong, it is generally not a small area affected. The Groveland Community Services District’s sewer system is a case in point. Approximately 15,000 gallons of raw sewage was dumped into Rattlesnake Creek because someone plugged a hole with a softball. The issue immediately come to mind: If a treatment plant is this easy to sabotage, how will they be protected from a more concerted terrorist attack? Thanks to S.B. for the link.

News Tips:

Please send your news tips to HJL. (Either via e-mail of via our Contact form.) These are often especially relevant, because they come from folks who watch news that is important to them. Due to their diligence and focus, we benefit from fresh “on target” news. We often “get the scoop” on news that is most likely ignored (or reported late) by mainstream American news outlets. Thanks!