To stockpile 72 hours of supplies

[seriouslessness]

..in case of disaster or attack. A new preparedness strategy inspired by Nordic countries and Germany, who already do this.

Is this something you already do, or will do?

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/26/stockpile-supplies-72-hours-disasters-attack-eu-tells-citizens

I could probably do with getting some bottled water in, but apart from that we definitely have at least 5 days of shelf stable food in the cupboards.

I live alone and always have enough food and medicine in the house in case I get struck down with the flu or similar illness. I think that is much more likely than any of the other scenarios!

i also have some wind up lamps in case of power cuts.

As pp has said, I think most household could survive three days on their pantry.

Putin carries a poo tin 😂😂

As someone who lives in the north of England, the idea of hoarding water seems funny. Buy a water filter and wait for the heavens to open…

A freezer is useless when the power is cut. A supply of tinned foods would be best. Dry foods if you have bottled water.

One of the reasons I like our wood burners is that they give us the ability to boil water and cook food if there was no power. Also obviously keeps us warm if it happened in the cooler months.

i am thinking of getting an islanding switch for our solar panels so that they would work in a power cut. We didn’t bother when we put them in because you still can’t power very much even with islanding capability but something is better than nothing.

Right now my fridge is at its emptiest but just in the freezer/cupboard I could probably make it stretch a week. Also we don't tend to have bottled water, but we both love a fizzy drink and probably have enough of those to stop us dying of thirst for a few days.

I still call mine that too! Newly replenished stuff goes in there - it’s like having your own little shop.
I also use my built in wine rack for tins as I dont tend to have that much wine in!

I like to keep enough food in that we could manage a good few weeks if we had to for whatever reason. Lots of tins and packets. Basics like pasta, dried beans etc. But I know that’s because I grew up in a house with very little food or money so it’s a psychological thing for me. I probably should buy in more bottled water, we drink tap water as it tastes just as nice as bottled (good old Scottish water) so I never think to buy in bottles for emergencies- I think I’ve got a 1.5 litre in the cupboard somewhere.

A freezer is useless if the power goes off.

You could just get 7 gigantic chocolate bars per person.

It’s not food we need to worry about it’s toilet roll.

I’m intrigued: what sort of disaster are people envisaging?

One that only lasts three days😂

Well it’s governments advising people to prep to build resilience rather than people just making stuff up so that isn’t particularly funny.

Water cut off for whatever reason (natural disaster, fire, terrorist attack)

Food supply chain cut off for whatever reason (natural disaster, extreme weather, pandemic, fire, social unrest...).

Electricity cut off for whatever reason etc. Etc.

I say fire because my building had its water supply cut for 48 hours without warning due to a fire.

Where i live now all the supermarkets in a certain part of the island were burnt down. People had to drive over an hour to another supermarket. At a time when there was social unrest everywhere and strikes so the other supermarkets didnt have much food...

If there is no electricity, yes, the UK will be in complete darkness when daylight has gone unless there’s a full moon.

My DH used to be prepared for WW3; backpack, generator, nasa type sachets etc. Then when covid hit it wasn't WW3. Don't have any of this stuff anymore.

I would stock the longest BB dates if I did. Buy in lots of airtight containers.

What is more to the point: where would you store them?

Me too. My DM used to ask if I was preparing for a siege!

30 days here. Enough water, food and gas for me. Wouldn't live like a king, but would survive.

A lot of people shop once a week so why is this news?

Because it’s about making sure you have extra and have the things you might need if there was disruption. The world is currently a crazy place with the US cozying up to Russia and trying to “annexe” aka invade Greenland and Canada

A couple of years ago there were several burst water mains in our area (Wales) after a spell of cold weather. A huge area was affected. We were without water for 5 days, some areas were longer. The water company set up a couple of lorries giving out bottled water, but there wasn't enough and they ran out, we were seriously rationing what we had managed to get. It was terrifying to be told there was no more water! More recently we had 5 days without electricity after the storm in December. We are not in a particularly rural area and had never experienced either of these things in the past.

Buy a wine rack! Sort your priorities out 😀.