So if the power went off (indefinitely) how long would you last on the basis of what you have in the house?

[atticusclaw]

So the power's gone off. Everything is suddenly dead, shops can't sell you anything since the electronic tills don't work, petrol pumps don't work, lifts don't work, traffic lights don't work, tap water won't last for long since the pumps won't work, mobile phones won't work, gas/electric heating won't work (and most oil and solar systems also need mains electricity to make them work unless they're off grid systems) - MN won't work!!

How long could you last with what you have?

There are no zombies, this isn'"t necessarily a "top yourself now - who would want to live?" scenario since the power could be restored at any time….or it could last months…

It's really interesting to hear from those who have actually lived through a disaster.

I'd be ok. Woodburner, river nearby, out in countryside so plenty of pheasants and what nots and I've a proper shooting catapult with ceramic shot. There's fruit in abundance due to fruit farms, maize fields and corn and lots of other arable stuff. I think I'd be pretty happy.

Never mind camping stoves and the like, my plan was to just turn my metal bread bin into a fire container and cook over that!

I'd need to work out thaw to preserve the food that is in the freezer

My dad has solar panels so we could drive the freezer & food to him & put it in his garage

But we have the wood burning stove - so cooking it could be tricky

Food I have enough for several months of eating carefully with the freezer but only weeks of non-frozen

Camping fridges/freezers run on calor gas don't they - possibly a good buy

I know how to distil water so could get drinking water from the Norfolk Broads (yuk) initially until I could set up a water butt collection system.

Long term if I got solar panels, batteries & a good sized gas fridge we could go for years round here

Asthma medication would be a big problem for DH & DD; but we have a small stock of spares

Solar panels will only work if you have an off grid system. Most people don't because most people want the feed in payments. They are designed so that they can't keep drawing power in the event of a power cut (I believe so that they can't pump it back into the system and electrocute someone working to try to restore the power line). I found this out when researching panels. Off grid systems are more expensive.

If you have an off grid system then can we all come over?!

I haven't lived through a disaster such as the hurricane described above, that must be so scary!

However, I have lived in an African village with no running water or electricity for 2 years, does that count?

Some of the people there had been doing this for all of their lives! Can you believe it?!

(Of course, things would be very different in a rural village to an urban sprawl.)

Years :)

House is passive solar heated, food is grown / shot / caught, transport is bikes. I wouldn't be able to work because I doubt many people would be able to have surgery with limited power (though the hospital has generators not sure how much fuel reserve they have) - would spend my time at home with family, gardening or hunting or fishing or just hanging out playing card games. Sounds quite tempting!

Might need to stock up on wine though, good reminder.

I'd be comprehensively stuffed. Some stuff in the fridge and freezer to be eaten cold, obviously, and quickly so it doesn't go off. Not much store cupboard stuff edible uncooked, no bottled water, no heat but from the boiler. Some cat food and 2 cats if worse came to worst.

About a week. And I'd have to make a fire on the balcony to cook most of my food. Maybe not even a week.

Oh wait can I leave the house ? I could catch ducks on the river easily enough.

You can leave the house (if you dare to brave the looting masses)...

We live in a forest, we have a wood fired hearing and cooking system. Plus an lpg canister oven. Hot water through heating system. We have well water powered by an electronic pump run by a wind turbine, plus a hand pumped well in the front garden. I think we'd be ok here.

We have 40kg of rice stored. Enough pulses and tofu to last at least 6 months and I can forage so food we might be ok for awhile. At least I know where to get berries, hazelnuts, sweet chestnuts, wild garlic, mushrooms, apples, seaweed and we grow potatoes, onions, carrots, courgettes, quinoa, squash and leeks at home.

We have enough nappies to last until Thursday but plenty of tea towels and maybe enough loo roll, medicine and cosmetics to last 3 months.

I think we'd make it to a year comfortably but after that we might struggle and see some hunger and hardship.

We have half a ton of coal, some wood and two wood stoves, so that's heating and cooking taken care of for a while. We also have a well.
Also lots of food in tins, sacks of rice etc. I reckon we'd last about three weeks (though I'd be out asap to stock up on food the second anything dodgy happened).
It's the collapse of civil order that would worry me the most. All well and good to hope the government would send in the army, but they'd have to do all their communications via despatch rider - on horseback not motorbike because the electrics of the motorbikes wouldn't work.

Given the UK's lack of food security, though, I think we'd see a famine.

I can't decide whether to add cat litter and bin bags to the matches, candles, and water purification tablets on my previous shopping list, or whether to give up and move in with atticus* and her 25 bottles of wine. I have discovered 3 Christmas pudding at the back of the cupboard, I can bring them..

Interesting question that I have genuinely pondered on in the past. I'd say at a push on rations three weeks for food. If I could use the heat from candles to fry somehow some of the fridge and freezer food which would be defrosting initially then longer. Drink wise if there were no tap water then perhaps a week. Dh has actually said to me we should buy emergency water and rations and keep them in a box somewhere in case of emergencies with a wind up torch and radio. We sound a bit nutty don't we....but better to be prepared.

We have a woodburner and plenty of wood/trees so we would be warm. Gas hob for cooking (gas would last a year then it would be onto the woodburner)
We too have a stream but even if you boiled it would it be safe to drink? I don't know.
Dh could shoot things to eat I suppose - rabbits, birds, (sheep?!) and I could cook them but I don't see that going down too well with the kids to begin with. We have veg in the garden so would be living on potatoes and carrots!
Plenty food growing in fields nearby if things got desperate.

Our downfall would be other food - I haven't got much in the way of stocks in the cupboard. Might go and buy some big bags of rice and pasta to go with all the dead things dh brings home....
We do have a loch about two miles away so if it's warm the dc will have to be bathed there!
Not looking forward to the cat litter toilet tho....

Good point mehs, we have a fireplace and lots and lots of wood in the garden, so we'd be ok food wise for quite some time the amount of store cupboard bits that are hiding in the kitchen. If we can boil up rainwater to make it safe to drink (does that even work) then we'll be away.

Months, at least. Mostly due to serious life changes arising from paranoia after the first zombie thread, followed by a year living in a remote location where the power went put for a couple of days each month. Costco has led to serious stockpiling, plus we live on a farm with tons of fruit and veg growing, and a flock of chickens. The wood provides wood for the heating burners, and the main water tap is on a borehole. When the stockpile runs out, we have snares and fishing rods. Hundreds of candles, and a dozen hurricane lamps. And I know how to make bread, and cheese, and yougurt, and cider and wine and vinegar( all very important!)

Dp is a right survivalist, so cooking wont be an issue, I'm sure he could hunt down some food, although we usually grow our own veg.
Water would be an issue If i filled all the jugs, cartons and buckets with water a good few weeks. I have no idea where the nearest source is.. Although dp could handle it..
Id say a few weeks in the house, although wed probs move to the woods

We have a barbecue and loads of charcoal. We also have a fine stock of tins, pasta, rice, beans, oil, cured meat, flour (inc bread flour and yeast), enough to feed us for weeks, probably six weeks or so if we were frugal - plus quite a lot of fruit and veg in the garden, depending on the time of year. But the real problem for us would be water. The other tricky problem would be that DH and I both have conditions which require daily medication. Not life-threatening but v unpleasant if not treated so if the pharmacies were closed we would be in big trouble.

I'm thinking I should get chickens and stock up on bottled water. And get a pickaxe so I can break into the local chemist when it all goes tits up.

We have a wood burning stove and enough wood for next winter so fuel & cooking won't be a problem. I have stacks of salt, sugar and white vinegar so all the meat in the freezer and any veggies/fruit can be salted, turned into jerky, jam or pickles/chutney. Plenty of rice, pasta and tinned fish, beans and veg.

We have a water butt, would want to drain down whatever we can from the mains water as fast as possible (buckets, bowls, pans, whatever) to give potable water for as long as possible without having to resort to 'wild' water.

I have about three month's worth of prescription meds, if SHTF for real then the local chemist would be my first stop, just to make sure I've got plenty of the meds we need.

We have several bags of tealights and a bunch of large candles, about a dozen torches, and at least eight of those huge multi-packs of batteries.

I reckon we could last two months on what is in the house (or one month if we let my parents come over and stay)

I may have given this a little too much thought.

I think with rationing we'd last two or three weeks. I think our menagerie of pets would all have to be eaten. The neighbours ducks might have to go too if we think to get them before anyone else. DH would have to get fishing but we're near a river so that would be fine and the water would be useful too. The house would be freezing and we have no fireplaces or anywhere to put one. Cooking would all have to be outside and the fuel would be the local forest. In fact I think DH would strangely love it and it would be great for his waistline. I spent about four days with no electricity when DS1 was about 6 weeks old and that nearly did for me.