Crisis What Crisis? The One You Start To Wish You'd Stockpiled Like Your Crazy Friend? Continuation thread (3)

[RedToothBrush]

Previous threads
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5576816-aibu-to-think-my-friend-is-overdoing-emergency-stockpiling?page=1
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5585259-crisis-what-crisis-is-my-friend-over-doing-the-stockpiling-and-am-i-too-continuation-thread-2?page=1

Continuation of the AIBU to think my friend is overdoing emergency stockpiling thread for discussion about the government advice to stockpile for an imminent emergency and what the heck that emergency might actually be.

Spoiler: it's more of a perfect storm of lots of factors coming together to potentially form one great clusterfuck from economic woes, global energy shortages (mainly diesel), potential food shortages, war and madmen to crazy weather patterns rather than a clear identifiable singular thread.
This is a practical thread and a bit of a handhold thread to make sense of events and how they may affect you. This is not an end of the world thread.

Remember an emergency can range from a temporary unexpected event to a much longer crisis but the underlying principles generally stay the same.

This is the official government information and advice, if you want further details on what the actual recommendations are:
https://prepare.campaign.gov.uk/get-prepared-for-emergencies/

ROUGH STATUS REPORT (as of 9am 22nd Oct - please note this isn't fully comprehensive, and is moving FAST)
Civil Unrest reported in:
France, Italy, Greece, Belgium, Albania, Indonesia - multi reasons, but largely due to economic pressures and the cost of living
Spain has had problems but these have temporarily stopped, probably due to significant weather related issues due to the Dana effect
More protests planned for this coming weekend
High Alert in the Middle East:
Netanyahu now committed to regime change in Iran, as he believes they are developing a nuke.
The US has pulled all Embassy Staff from Saudi Arabia and is hoping no one notices that they've ordered personal and families across the Gulf home and then seem to have lied that they have.
The Emir of Qatar has stated at their equivalent of the annual King's Speech at the Opening of Parliament that war was coming and to prepare for the worst scenarios. US pulling planes out of Qatar.
The Egyptian PM has warned the country of severe crisis ahead - given the nature of the country this is related to their alliance with Saudi Arabia and their reliance on the Suez Canal which the Yemeni rebels now control access to and their exposure to famine
Iran is saying if there is another attack, the gloves are off and they'll try and wipe out the middle east oil industry as they go down, as well as hitting critical civilian infrastructure.
Much movement / noise is similar to run up to the first US attacks this year. Debate over whether the attack will come before the Israeli Election or the US Midterms - possibly within 72hours - latest mood music suggests potentially this weekend. Seems to be shifting to a when not if.
Israel election: 27th Oct
Prices and Shortages:
Diesel needs no real reminder - we need it for haulage, mass transportation and farming, we are screwed without it. Fuel Emergency declarations in West Virgina, Kentucky, Michigan, Maryland, Arizona, Nebraska and Texas - typically allowing limited dyed diesel use for ag or commercial vehicles. Illinois and Missouri have also allowed by not under emergency orders. Less reported is the fertiliser shortage and knock on effect, poor yields this year and the effect of El Nino on next years, sulphur export bans and the blockade on Ukrainian and Russian wheat exports which are particularly crucial in feeding North Africa and the Middle East. This is liable to have significant impact on the UK with 6% rises in food already expected next year (and there's every reason to believe this will be higher especially with civil unrest all over the place). Reports of aviation fuel running low in some parts of Europe with emergency supplies (which can't last forever) being used.
El Nino:
See above about farming and also think of disasters - like the ones Spain is facing with flooding. Storm Austin is incoming and there is a weather warning for the South of England with power outages and flooding possible today/tomorrow.
The Internet:
PHP is 70% of the internet. Its got compromised so it can pretty much all be hacked. This is VERY BAD (in capital letters). Many websites offline whilst this is sorted including multiple government ones around the world.
Just AI generally - everything from putting everyone out of work to just hacking and killing us all. No Biggie.
Trump and the Mid Terms:
Trump is firmly losing his marbles. He's defected to Russia, can't stop rambling about men's arses, is waving at non-existent people, his team are known to be considering ways to impose martial law, he's getting heckled at Trump rallies by his own supporters, 83% of all voters think the biggest problem in the US now isn't the cost of living crisis but government corruption. He's being called a traitor by some of his fellow Reds. Mid Terms look a disaster and Trump probably won't accept them. He's reversing bills that Congress passed weeks ago by executive order.
Mid-Terms: 3rd Nov
Ukraine and Russia:
Ukraine facing massive problems still cos Elon has got the ump. Starlink isn't working at face enough speeds. They've bombed a shedload of Data Centres in Russia. This has killed off the Russian Internet and many Trump/Musk supporters in the process (one way or another) which screws up Twitter (and its value) for them. Ukraine is getting blamed for diesel shortages cos they refuse to stop hitting Russian refineries even though it has no choice now its been cut off by the US. Zelenskyy now says Trump isn't an ally. Trump wants Zelensky gone and thinks Putin is being reasonable and Ukraine doesn't want peace. Germany states it would have activated Art5 if the confirmed Russian sabotage attack on Liepzig had been successful.
Russia is apparently planning to step up its sabotage campaign in Europe after having successfully sunk a few boats in EU waters (Romania / Bulgaria - these sinkings have been in both international waters off the coast AND within their official territorial waters).
Economy:
Lots of debt. Much concern over the implications of this particularly with regards to AI and state debt in the US, UK, France and Japan (but not restricted to). Much money put into gold by China. Background of this bad given the approach of potentially multiple crisis.
France Moody's credit review: Due tomorrow 23rd Oct - expected to be not good especially in the current political climate in France
UK Budget: 28th October

They are all interconnected and one or many could tip us into abject chaos. Or not. The risks here are sky high. Of what? Take your pick.

I have a number of water holders for camping that fold flat, so take up no storage space. This might be a good halfway alternative. You can get various sizes. If you can't get them at a good price now they are bound to come back down once everyone is more focussed on Christmas festivity spending.

Otherwise think about if you have any containers that you use (wine bottles, milk cartons etc) that you could clean out and keep for water storage, space willing. Do you have a large stock pot that you could drag out of the cupboard.-remember, this is for extras if you have time before the water goes off, not your main stash.

Use empty milk containers to store non drinking water.
You will never get them clean enough for drinking water.

I’m not sure if there’s a separate thread on it but the flooding in parts of Scotland looks bad in the clips.

Ok will do when I'm at home

It seems we have yet another storm "Chloe" to deal with this week!

I don't envy the areas that have taken the impact of these storms. Hopefully, many will have started making preparations for their 3 day supplies of food/items to keep warm/comfortable with no power etc. It won't stop things from being difficult, but hopefully it'll lessen the impact.

@Kalanthe a geiger counter definitely counts as hard core supplies!
However they're not as expensive as I imagined - I thought they'd be hundreds.
It's one of those things where you don't know if it works unless you're unfortunate enough to have to try it out. I guess they don't have British kite mark ones - or do they....?
What brand did you go for if you don't mind me asking?

I got this one
https://amzn.eu/d/0eJItypP

It came with a card that contains a tiny amount of radioactive material so I was able to test it at home. My dad is visiting now and we found that my dad's body has slightly more radiation than mine (it's never 0). He joked that it's probably Chernobyl residue - I'm from Poland and radiation reached us then, although I wasn't born yet 😄

Test a banana!

Just back too.

All the bottles of still water are gone and all but the odds and sods of long life semi skimmed milk from our local Aldi

Ordered 48 bottles of bioethanol for our ethanol fireplace. It was a special price, and we’ve only got 20 left so might as well.
The fireplace is portable and although we didn’t buy it for heat it does actually heat up the room quite nicely.

So I just googled Barcelona whole furst page of news was about football team. Google Barcelona riots today, then you get the reports of riots with hundreds of arrests: never has 'bread and circuses' felt more obvious. Not helping my Trust Muscles

But Estonia is in NATO. Invading that country means they are in essence triggering a war with the rest of Europe even if Trump refused to send assistance. Still seems unnecessarily high risk for Putin who’s not a stupid man.

Btw, it occurred to me that DDs might need hygiene products time depending. Is this ever mentioned on the ‘be prepared’ lists published by govts?

Gosh, we're English you know, and don't talk about such things!!! 😲😳

Putin was clearly stupid enough to pull off his Leipzig airport drone attack in August. WSJ reported that German officials considered invoking NATO's Article 5 if the drone attack had caused mass casualties - luckily drone detonators failed and nothing exploded. This only shows how close we are to a hybrid attack going far enough to trigger a NATO response

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/airfield-attack-marked-opening-shot-in-putins-sabotage-campaign-against-europe-115dedd4

Very good point. It is in ours, UK I don’t know.

https://rib.msb.se/filer/pdf/31523.pdf

UK Prepare site

Hygiene
●Hand sanitiser, wet wipes, hygiene and bathroom products.

Where I am you can see Russian planes being chased away by ours, when they are testing limits. Drones however, is stepping up.

So my girls use period pants. However I do have a stash of pads and tampons.

Now proving we had say rolling blackouts we have a camping washer which only uses a small amount of water so would use rain water / pool water to wash them during a on period of electric.

True but that might have been an over enthusiastic Russian (North Korean/ Sudanese/South American/Iranian) drone operator. Rather than Putin’s deliberate strategy.

Shame we’ve come so far from the days when Russian soldiers helped prevent WWIII.

They should have have been more specific, it’s easy to forget..

The Swedish guidance is so much better. More detailed. I’ve printed out the household preparation pages.

Also we all had the brochure sent in the post, so noone would miss it.

In the UK people would either recycle it without reading or say it was a gross invasion of their privacy or scare mongering.

Ok I assume some just chuck it here too. But there is no drama about it here, we have to stick together as a society to have a chance. And every year there is a national preparedness week, which is great. To remind how important it is and what each of us can do to help.