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 “JWR”. Our goal is to educate our readers, to help them to recognize emerging threats and to be better prepared for both disasters and negative societal trends. You can’t mitigate a risk if you haven’t first identified a risk. Today, we look at Zapping Fake Power Grids.
Gun Sales Surge — Mostly for Pistols
Gun sales surge fueled by first-timers, mostly for ‘concealed’ pistols.
Zapping Fake Power Grids to Help Us Survive an EMP Attack
Reader G.P. spotted this: Scientists Are Zapping Fake Electrical Grids to Help Us Survive an EMP Attack.
Here is a an excerpt:
“Substations are the central hubs of the power grid, but if you don’t work for a power company, it may not be obvious. Next time you’re driving around, watch where the power lines go — eventually they’ll connect to large metal towers on a fenced-in patch of dirt or rock.
On the outskirts of the substation will be a little shed, called a control house. Think of it as a giant version of the circuit breaker in your home. It houses the switches, batteries, meters and control boards that keep transmission lines and transformers in check.
The control houses can be made of a variety of materials – concrete, brick, metal, or a combination of the three. But little research has been done on what might happen to these power centers during an EMP. To find out, Randy Horton and his colleagues at the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) took on the challenge in a report released in April.
Horton and his colleagues at EPRI spent the last three years simulating what happens when E1 waves ripple through the equipment used in power stations. This included actually zapping transformers and transmissions lines with high-frequency pulses and building substation housing out of different materials and putting them to the test to see how the electronics inside held up.”
Unplanned Movie DVD Debuts #1 on Amazon
I was pleased to see that the pro-life movie Unplanned had a debut at #1 in Drama DVDs at Amazon.com on its release day. Congrats to the film-makers!
Prepping is Now Part of Mainstream US Politics and Culture
Reader C.B. sent this: Forget ‘Obamageddon’, ‘Prepping’ is now part of mainstream US politics and culture. For more detailed reading, here is a link to the original scholarly article. Note that the study depended on biased sources like the SPLC.