Anyone planning on buying a wind up FM radio?

[Kepler22B]

As part of the Be Ready campaign https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwd094x57p32o

households are advised to have basic supplies in, in case of any disruption. Which brings us inline to quite a few other countries. Most is pretty normal and easy to get or we have in already.

Except for a wind up FM radio. I don’t have one of those. But I do love a gadget. Anyone have a wind up radio or planning on buying one?

This is nonsense - just because you desire something does not make it true - the absolute incompetence over many decades regarding our North Sea oil reserves is a lesson in; 'what not to do'. Norway used their reserves wisely and now has the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world that finances (they only take 3% per annum) their social welfare programmes, pensions, it props up isolated communities and social and cultural cohesion and invests in renewables. We squandered ours during the 80s, it was seen as income rather than potential - I think drilling and creating a fund is a very good move.

I agree. A friend of mine lives in a tiny flat, and has stocked up on bottled water. She has no storage space anywhere, so has piles of bottles everywhere that she has to step over.

Yes, we will, but we'll be less vulnerable to one source being cut off.

I had one years ago (Trevor Bayliss one I think) and it was absolutely shit.

Lots of winding for about 5 min charge. I'll stick to my shed radio with batteries.

I bought one recently. And some head torches. Just in case.

If you feel reassured then that's a good enough reason for a government to do it. It's a political decision not a practical one.

Ok, well it makes a lot of sense to me, for multiple reasons.

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZG9UTfoux9M9S-ss9cr/

I have this one , and a few have sold this morning from might page as well. It solar charges as well so you don’t have to rely on hand winding. Torch , radio and phone charger.

took it camping with us to top phones up . Seems good from the few times we have used it, and other reviews are good.

if you are buying two it nocks another £5 off

I already have 2. Got them for this reason. I think my cupboards are stocked enough just as a matter of course, to survive a few days of no shops. Don’t have much bottled water, though. But do have water purification tablets. Hard to have space for emergency supplies! And they go out of date and need replacing.

Why do you have two?

This is the best one I’ve found, it’s also a power bank for phones/devices and is also solar powered as well as wind up and is a torch! https://amzn.eu/d/03bDQNCu

Yes I understand that, that's why the decision makes political sense.

Burnham indicated his approach when he said early doors he'd be 'pragmatic'.

He could easily have done other things if he didn't have voters to worry about.

Anything that is wind up will only have a few minutes play time! It doesn’t make the product itself, rubbish! The one I’ve linked above, is also solar powered

I already have a wind up radio as well as a wind up torch, bought them during Covid for some reason, probably bored! I must get the radio out and have a go using it, it also charges up using solar power I think and can charge devises which will be useful to have my iPad to entertain me.

I keep a reasonable amount of food in so not too worried about being hungry and do have several large bottles of water stored in the garage. They are out of date but will be useful for flushing the toilet or washing. I don’t drink bottled water, I’m happy using reusable bottles and tap water but I do keep a few small ones in to grab quickly if I’m in a hurry to go out. I need to take pain meds every 4 hours so always have some water out with me. I usually buy 12 Tesco own brand ones but tend to wait until I’m down to my last bottle before reordering.

I might change to keeping a pack of 12 in instead of running down my stash before reordering but I’m not sure how long bottled water keeps for, do they have a use by date? I think I’ve read that the plastic can start to break down over time?

I do have some water purifying tablets as well, bought when I was travelling in rural China in case the water was not good enough to drink, it was on the kit list we were given. I’ve never used them but I think the water might not taste good but I’m sure it will be fine when juice is added.

No but I’ve got a van with solar and a huge battery that would keep phones and radios etc changed for a week at least without having to do anything. I might have to build a guard post around the van though!

I’ve also got plenty of rechargeable torches, candles and camping cooking equipment so we’d be ok. probably be okay for food for a decent while too, although it wouldn’t be very exciting.

We have a couple. Have had them a while, they also have a torch & can be solar charged, and have a random compass…

Isn’t it just keep a bit of extra in so that if there is an emergency the outside is full of panicky dumb fucks getting in the way of emergency and rescue services?

A FM radio with batteries is fine surely? Unless house is underwater but in that case none of the stockpile will help. You will be one of the ones the rescue services will be trying to get to.

Agree...and if the carp really really hits the fan all you'll maybe really need to do is listen to bulletins and updates every hour/half hour....assuming of course there's anyone there to broadcast them......

I have a small radio that runs on batteries. We also have batteries, since it appears to be DH's job to corner the market on the things.

Have had one for years because we get so many power cuts. Similarly I have got a camping stove that could be used indoors because my cooker is electric. Never bothered with water until we were without it for a week a couple of years ago and it was over such a wide area that the shops were all empty of it. Luckily Amazon had plenty. One thing i did get when I went over to a digital voice phone was a router battery back up. It sits there constantly trickle charging until the power goes out and then kicks in and keeps whatever you have plugged into it going, so I have got my "landline" phone and my router plugged in and there is spare space to plug in a mobile, tablet or kindle. Last powercut was 9 hours and I used my laptop as normal for 8 of them, streamed some TV. Cost about 70 quid, described as powering a router for 5 hours of use.

What a demented question. Have a think.

A battery powered radio seems more practical. If power is off internet will be down anyway.

Demented is a strong word! I honestly do not know why you have two wind up radios. I don't think that's an unreasonable question.

Yep, if there's a power crisis on a county or even regional level things like the mobile phone network, Internet, and even the local radio stations and/or their VHF transmitters will be off or will be off when/if their emergency supplies fail.

For any communications at all in some circumstances it could be back to trying to get national news on steam driven AM radio.

Me too. The government clearly knows much more than the general public and if this is the advice they’re issuing, you can be sure it’ll have been through rounds of drafting by those who do know the extent of the risks and the chance of those risks crystallising.

Those rounds will have been largely intended to get the message across without panicking people. It’s got to be related to the cyber hackers using AI to identify vulnerabilities and the consequences of damage to the internet systems if they succeeded.