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As you consider the following and plan your food storage, bear in mind that your survival in any scenario will have a great deal to do with the decisions you make now about your food. Good food—and a good variety of that food—boosts morale tremendously in difficult situations. Less palatable food causes stress and much worse. Whether you and your family survive and thrive in the coming difficulties will ultimately depend on acknowledging the essential role of a healthy, varied diet and planning for it. This article will give you some real food storage ideas to use for your family.

There is a lot of advice out there to store food for uncertain times, but how much? How much food to store depends on how long the difficult times last, and only you can decide how long you want to prepare for. First off, consider your situation. How many people are you responsible for? What are their ages? When you are calculating how much food to store, everything is calculated based on an adult and teen males consuming 2500 calories per day. Pregnant and nursing women get the same number of calories. Teen girls and other women are allocated ¾ of this amount. Children under 12 years count as ½.

Consider your food storage needs

Decide what event(s) you are prepping for. Is it a civil war, world war, EMP, financial collapse, personal financial misfortune, pandemic, etc., or maybe all of the above? There is no shortage of people telling you what exactly is going to happen when. So far, they haven’t been right, but someday somebody will be. Collapse of some sort is in our future; history says so. If I’m prepping for a pandemic, I’m going to want a fair number of heat and eat or freeze-dried meals for when people are too sick to prepare food. With a financial collapse, I’ll supposedly have the time to prepare normal meals at home. With an EMP, I better be able to make meals without electricity.

Consider what you want to eat. Do you really want to live on MREs, canned soups, freeze-dried meals, and the like, all of which are really high in sodium and artificial preservatives? Is that how you normally eat, or will suddenly changing to such a diet be a shock to your body? Do you want to just buy a package deal—and trust that someone else knows what and how much you want to eat? If so, pay attention to the number of calories per day. Some of those packages contain as little as 1200 calories per day. Who is going to be happy with that? TEOTWAWKI is not the time to lose that extra weight. Mental stress alone will contribute to weight loss. In addition, are you planning on doing much more physical labor when TEOTWAWKI hits? (You should be.) How happy are those doing the heavy labor going to be on 2,000 or even 2,500 calories per day? Hint: They won’t be happy. You need to plan on double the number of calories for those doing heavy physical labor.

Defining your food storage budget

Decide what your budget is. Most people can probably manage to buy a few weeks’ worth of freeze-dried meals or MREs, but if you’re prepping for the long-term and/or for a family, and your funds are limited, you are going to have to be more careful. The biggest bang for your buck is going to come from long-term storage foods such as grains and legumes.

What new skills you are willing to learn? Are you willing to learn to bake? Are you willing to learn to bake bread—without an automatic bread machine? Are you willing to grind your own grains? Are you willing to learn to garden? What about learning to can fruits, vegetables, and/or meats? Raise livestock? It doesn’t have to be cows and pigs—chickens and rabbits are much more manageable for beginners. The answers to all of these questions should govern the decisions about what you store. If you are not willing to learn to bake bread, storing a whole lot of wheat may not make much sense. You can store white flour instead—its shelf life is much shorter and it is far less nutritious, but it will keep you alive. Pick one new skill to learn each month. The most important one is probably learning to make bread, followed by gardening.

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The first items to store should be a three-month supply of foods you normally eat. Whatever it is that causes us to eat our stored food is going to be a stressful time. The last thing your digestive system needs when it is already stressed is more stress from eating unfamiliar foods. Children and the elderly are much more vulnerable in this situation and you don’t want to increase their stress (and yours!) by forcing a radical new diet on them.

So come up with your list of foods you already enjoy preparing at home and you are already accustomed to eating, preferably foods that require no refrigeration. You should really have a three-month supply of these foods. Make up a menu for one week, list every item you need for each meal, and buy thirteen of each item to have a three-month supply.

What are some real food storage ideas you can use?

Once you have done this (because how many of us really think the chaos will be over in three months and life will immediately return to normal?), consider adding longer-term storage foods. For each adult male per month, store the following:

  • Grains: 33 lbs per month. If you are grinding your own grains for bread, store 20 lbs hard white wheat (white wheat is generally preferred for its lighter, sweeter taste, and is also easier on the digestive system), 5 lbs white flour, 2 lbs rice, 3 lbs pasta, 2 lbs oatmeal, 1 lb popcorn.
  • Dry beans: 5 lbs per month. Pinto beans, white beans, black beans, legumes, lentils. Beans are among the most sensitive of long-term storage foods and must be stored in a cool, dry place. Otherwise, they will become tough and require much longer cooking times to soften.
  • Sugars: 5 lbs per month. This is only for baking and cooking meals, no desserts. It is about 3 tablespoons per day. It does not include amounts needed for canning, making jam or syrup. White sugar and honey store indefinitely. They don’t even need to be kept particularly cool, though they should be kept in a dark place if possible. You can also store brown sugar, molasses, corn syrup, pancake syrups, jams, and jellies. Often I hear people say they don’t need that much sugar. And it is true that we should all probably eat less sugar. However, bear in mind that sugar has become an important ingredient in many of our comfort foods. In addition, if you choose to store less sugar, you need to increase the amounts of other items you store to compensate for the calories.
  • Salt: ¾ lb per month. You need both plain and iodized. Most people in my food storage classes thought far less salt would be enough because they would never go through that much salt in one month. And that is true for most of us who still buy most of our food at the store. But when you are making everything from scratch, especially bread and beans, you use a lot more salt. Children need iodine for proper brain development. The rest of us need iodine for continued brain function. We generally get adequate iodine in our diets. However, when many of the commercially prepared and vitamin and mineral-fortified foods that we depend upon are no longer available, we will need to ensure we have sufficient iodine in our diets. For those who are planning to make their own bread (and we should all be planning to do that—bread is the staff of life), it bears mentioning that iodine actually retards the fermentation of yeast and thus hinders the rising of bread dough. So you really want about half of your salt to be plain and half of it to be iodized.
  • Oils: 28 oz of oil per month really is the minimum. Not only is oil an essential ingredient in many recipes, but it can also render normally unpalatable foods rather tasty. Store a variety of oils—olive oil and peanut oil for frying and baking, coconut oil for some frying but more for a long-term storage butter substitute. Avoid vegetable oil (it’s all soy, and almost all soy is GMO). Some food storage experts place peanut butter in the oil category due to its calorie content, but really, do you want to use peanut butter in your baking and frying recipes? Not generally. Peanut butter is indeed high in calories and high in protein and as such makes an excellent addition to the pantry. It just shouldn’t be classed with the other oils. Call it comfort food and store a goodly amount of it, at least 1 lb per person per month. Store all oils in a cool, dry place. And for longest-term storage, store all oils in glass—they will last much longer than in plastic.
  • Dry milk: Store 1.75 lbs of dry milk per month. This amount includes not one drop for drinking—this is only for baking and cooking. If you want to be able to drink some milk, you will need to store more. If you want to improve the flavor of your powdered milk, stir in 1 teaspoon of sugar and ½ teaspoon of vanilla extract per quart of milk. And of course, make sure your milk is well-chilled. Dry milk is the most sensitive of all long-term storage foods. It must be kept dark—light will degrade the vitamins and cause deterioration in flavor. It must be kept cool, and of course, it must be dry.

Once you have stored the basics, start adding in other items.

  • Baking essentials–baking soda, baking powder, yeast, powdered eggs, cocoa.
  • Canned items—fruits, vegetables, and meats.
  • Spices—pepper, cinnamon, chili powder, cumin, mustard, ginger, herbs (oregano, basil, thyme, sage).
  • Condiments—Ketchup, mustard, relish, soy sauce, salsa.
  • Comfort foods—chocolate chips, candy, gum, Jell-O gelatin, and pudding mixes.

As you build your food storage, you also need to be learning to use it so that you will be accustomed to eating these foods—and enjoying them. It takes practice to learn how to make good bread. And your body needs time to get used to eating whole grains. Make the switch from white flour to 100% wheat in your diet, and you might find yourself with a serious case of the trots.

While doing all of the above, consider your garden. Spring is just around the corner and the time has never been better for learning how to grown your own. Fresh salad greens, home-grown tomatoes, carrots, potatoes, and who can’t grow zucchini and green beans? Eating from your garden will add variety to your diet while making your long-term storage go a whole lot further.

Storing food for future uncertainties isn’t exciting. Nobody gets worked up over a bucket of beans or a bag of wheat. And that is probably because the vast majority of preppers and those reading this site have never been without food and have never seen starvation. I know I haven’t. But I am a student of history. Bad things happen when people don’t have any food, when they don’t have enough food, and when they don’t have nutritious food. Don’t let bad things happen to your family. Be proactive. Store a wide variety of long-term storage foods and learn to use and like them now. Recognize that your future and that of your family depends greatly upon the decisions you make now about your food. Start today.

As you consider the following and plan your food storage, bear in mind that your survival in any scenario will have a great deal to do with the decisions you

Water is life. As a prepper, as an outdoors person, and even as a human, this fact has been drilled into our heads over and over. It’s a cornerstone of the “Rule of Threes.” Three days without water and the human body starts to suffer the consequences. Water has a big place in our preparations, and it rightly should.

Water is important not only for drinking, but for cooking, for washing, and especially for hygiene. (And harvesting rainwater is a great way to have it be readily available!) My beautiful wife loves to go camping and has lived out of a backpack for weeks at a time, but the elimination of bodily wastes in the woods is not a favorite activity for her. Or for anybody, I think!

One of the most cost-effective ways to store larger amounts of water is in food-grade barrels. The barrels are strong, compact, and are relatively inexpensive. Aside from their weight when full, the other drawback to storing water in barrels is the inconvenience of getting the water back out of them.

But what if there was a way to use your emergency water storage barrels to run your household in a nearly normal fashion during a grid down event?

Would it make you happy to use your indoor plumbing as usual, without going outdoors to some out-of-the-way spot to defecate or urinate? What if you could do dishes in the sink, almost like normal? Get a glass of drinking water from the kitchen tap? I have developed a system for my home that allows me to do just that.

My inspiration for this emergency water storage system came from a power outage, timed coincidentally with a day when the entirety of my in-laws had descended upon our home. A squirrel had met its end at an electrical substation, causing power outages in the local village, extending into the rural area where we live. Although I owned a small generator at the time, it was nowhere near large enough to run the well pump.

I had water stored in several 55-gallon barrels, and initially thought I had finally found a chance to prove my foresighted genius for my wife and her family. I took a 5-gallon camping water jug (you know, the kind with the spigot?) down to my water barrels, anticipating finally having a payoff for my hard work in preparation for a day like this. I assembled the plastic water hand pump (purchased in 1998 for Y2K), and that’s when my troubles began.

The pump had threads that were different than the threads on my barrel. It wouldn’t screw in, and thus, I had to hold the pump in one hand and pump with the other, while my third handheld the jug to….uh oh: I needed more hands! After I recruited my brother-in-law to hold the jug, I found out the suction hose on the pump was also missing a part, too. The hand pump was out of order. Shaker siphon? Dang. I last saw that on my camping trip a few months ago. In the end, I used a new-in-box drill pump and a battery operated drill. It was an OK ending to the water problem, but not ideal.

What finally evolved from that occurrence and some experimentation is an emergency water storage system that I am pretty happy with. In fact, one problem may be that it is too convenient, not discouraging water use.

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The system is simple and – aside from the battery and pump – inexpensive.

Currently, my indoor emergency water storage consists of two 55 gallon barrels. I have a small 3 gallon per minute RV water pump attached to a couple of valved pickup tubes, and leading to a spigot that I installed in the water line coming into the house from the well pump. The RV water pump is powered by a small 35AH gel cell connected to a float charger, so the battery is always topped off. It can also be recharged by the 50W solar panel and small charge controller I already have.

In the photo, you will notice that there are two spigots, with a valve between them. This was so I could completely isolate the well and pressure tank from the house plumbing: If the foot valve on the well pump went out, and I tried to pump water into the house plumbing, water from my barrels would be pumped back down my well. That’s no good! The valve, hose, and fitting between the pickup tubes in the photo is the inlet where I fill the barrels.

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The clear hose (far right) connected to the upper spigot. Note the isolation valve between the two spigots.

Hooking up the water tanks to the spigot is a snap. I have placed valves in line to allow me to draw from one or the other, or both barrels. With a flick of a switch, the pump is activated. Since it is an RV pump, it has its own pressure sensor, which activates the pump when a faucet is opened. When someone flushes the toilet, the pump kicks on and refills the toilet tank. When someone opens the kitchen tap to wash hands, prepare food, or get a drink, the pump kicks on and delivers the water.

This system also routes the water through our whole-house water filter. also At 3 gallons per minute, it is very nearly the same as having our normal well pump working. The flow is noticeably less, but not by a huge amount. Just for fun, I took a shower with the backup system, and it was very acceptable. My water heater does not use electrical power to heat water, so it was even a hot shower! See what I mean about the system being too convenient? It does not really encourage water conservation.

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The simple PVC pickup tubes. The transparent tube in the center is for filling the barrels.

During one of the “Grid Down Weekend” exercises that our family performs, with no attempt at water conservation, we easily went through more than 60 gallons of water per day. We have a larger, 220V generator now, able to run the well pump. During the Grid Down Weekend, I ran the generator for about two hours a day. We let the refrigerator and freezer run, charged batteries, and ran the well pump for laundry, took showers and refilled the water storage barrels. This actually worked pretty well, letting us use water as “normal” without running the generator. If we were unable to run the generator for some reason, we would definitely want to implement methods to reduce the water usage.

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This 50-watt panel recharges the battery in just a few hours

Materials and cost breakdown for my project:

RV pump: eBay, used, $40 shipped
Clear food-safe tubing: 6 feet @ $1.50/foot
Garden hose “repair end,” female: $3.50
Misc. 1/2″ PVC fittings, valves, tubing: $15
Hose Clamps, stainless steel:  3 @ $1.24/piece
Battery: Used, free. New they are about $55
Float Charger: $20, Amazon
Wire, terminals, switch, etc.: $10

The drawbacks to this emergency water storage system are fairly minimal. As I pointed out, you have to keep an eye on your water use. You also have to make sure that your hose ends are kept clean. You have to make sure your stored water is clean. You may find yourself “stealing” that battery for other needs. Other than those limitations, I think it’s a great system that makes living without grid power a bit easier.

Oh, I did finally get the hand pump repaired and figured out. You know, just in case.

 

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Water is life. As a prepper, as an outdoors person, and even as a human, this fact has been drilled into our heads over and over. It’s a cornerstone of

In a disaster our first instinct is to move as quickly as possible to safety or to the closest approximation we have to our ideal of safe. For me, if anything happens my goal is to get back to my home as quickly as possible. I have supplies at home specifically designed to help me and my family handle the aftermath of almost any emergency and logically this is our first/main rally point in any crisis. No matter where I am if something happens I will be working immediately to make it back to reunite with the rest of my family. My get home plan is my first priority if I am away unless there is something that prevents me from reaching home. This is less of an issue if I am with my family and we are together, but I like most of you spend a good part of my day away from home.

We like to speak of the ideal of heavily stocked survival retreats located on hundreds of acres of land in the boonies only accessible via a dirt road and after crossing several water hazards. That is the ideal maybe, but almost none of us, when you start looking at the numbers live anything near that type of lifestyle. Are there people who live in remote areas? Of course, but for most of us, our survival retreat is our home in the suburbs or semi-rural areas still easily accessible by plenty of roads with a Walmart within a short drive. Even more live in the cities where our neighbors are practically on top of us. Most of us who call ourselves preppers do not live year round at a retreat taking care of livestock, building barns and furniture from trees we felled and wood shaped with hand tools. Most of us work a job for someone else in an area that is anything but remote and that is almost always away from home. I personally want the retreat, but unless my life changes drastically that isn’t going to happen anytime soon. For me right now, I am where I am so I plan to make the best of it. If something happens I will be heading to my home.

There are multiple strategies for travel needed with the unexpected emergency but the variables start adding up when you consider all the permutations of what the emergency could be and where you are at the time. Today I want to talk about how you can begin to prepare for a situation where you are at work and your goal is to get back home to your family, your supplies and your castle. In a lot of cases you have to plan for situations that are out of the norm. The first plan of course would be to simply hop in our cars and drive home, but what if the roads were blocked? What if you couldn’t even reach your car? You should make a plan now for getting back home in alternate ways and plan for travel that isn’t ideal.

My Get Home Bag of choice right now.

How will you get home?

Before we can really start discussing how to get home, you have to take into consideration how far away home is. For the purposes of this article, I will use the example of a typical work day. For most of us that means we leave home in the morning, go to work and return home the same day. I have written articles on getting home from much further distances, but for this article we’ll assume you aren’t on the other end of the country, you are at your regular day job.

One of the first things I recommend thinking about is a Get Home Bag for anyone who works more than a few miles from home. I personally use the Maxpedition Jumbo Versipack right now pictured on the right. A get home bag has been called by a lot of other names, but it is simply a bag with basic supplies that you might need in order to walk back to your home. This is not the same as a bug out bag, but the concepts are related. All of these bags are simply containers for some essentials you might need in an emergency situation. My Get Home Bag is stored in the trunk of my car and has very basic items because on an average day I am not more than 15 miles away from home. I have spare water, some food in the form of a Mainstay bar, work gloves, lighter, paracord, ammo, multi-tool, headlamp and dust mask along with some blood stopper bandages. Could I pack more in there? Of course but I try to lean toward the minimal side on these bags and focus more on what I really could need versus what would be nice to have. For example, I don’t have a compass because I know my town and where my home is. I don’t have hand sanitizer because that is the last thing I am going to worry about. I don’t have a radio because I should be home in a few hours tops but I do have a ham radio in my car that is mobile. Your get home bag should have what you would expect to need on your trek home.

But what if my car is blocked or I can’t get to my car? What if the parking deck that my car sits in all day is shaken to the ground by an earthquake or an explosion? That is when the absolutely prepared person would grab their back up bag from their desk. I don’t have a bag in my desk and really I don’t live far enough from work that I don’t think I could make it back even without a bag. Couldn’t I leave my Get Home Bag in my desk at work and eliminate that problem? Sure but what if my office is closed or blown up or for some other reason I can’t get back to my desk? For me, the trunk of my car is the safest bet that will be with more more often than my desk drawer and if that doesn’t work out I will adapt. One thing you don’t want to have to adapt to are the elements though. I carry rain gear on days when there is a chance of rain even if I don’t plan on going outside. Cold weather is the same thing. Its easy to leave home and think that you will just be in the car, but what if you are forced to walk? Dress for the weather outside, not the weather inside.

Another aspect of making it back home is to have footwear up to the challenge. I have written before about how so many people wear flip-flops everywhere they go now and I shudder to think about what it would be like in a real disaster to have virtually no protection on my feet. As well as my Get Home Bag I have a pair of sturdy work boots in my car. I never wear flip-flops but if for some bizarre reason I have a John McClain moment and am caught with my shoes off I will have a backup.

Carry your Every Day Carry – EDC

Another aspect of my preps is my EDC or Every Day Carry items that I have on my person at all times when I am away from home. For me, my EDC consists of a concealed handgun, handkerchief, multi-tool, flashlight, knife and water. My water bottle is in my backpack with my computer, but I always have that with me. These items augment what I have in my Get Home Bag and I try to religiously make sure they are on me. If I am walking out the door to work I have an almost perfect track record of taking all of my EDC gear, but it is the odd times where my outfit choices are different when this falls down. Going to the pool for example, I have been known to change things up due to necessity and some of my gear stays in the car as opposed to poolside.

With my EDC gear it is always in my pockets or my bag, but how many of you have gone to the bathroom without your cell phone? How many have run down to the corner store without your car keys? What if something prevented you from getting back to your desk or work location and the only way you had to get into your car was several floors up, or under rubble? I try to take my keys and cell phone with me anytime I leave my desk so that I will have this option if needed.

Plan more than one route back home

Where I live, there isn’t a tremendous amount of traffic so I routinely take the same route to and from work. This is the quickest way for me to travel, but in an emergency, roads could be blocked and impassable. If needed, I can take alternate roads, but in some cases that might make my trip longer by taking me further away from home to route back to a good road. Alternately you could cut through the woods or neighborhoods but this isn’t always faster. In some situations, it might be a bad idea to cut through someone’s yard and you could find yourself in an altercation you didn’t need to get in. What if your travel takes you through a rough part of town? You would necessarily want to avoid those areas at this time so that you don’t become the victim of a predator. It helps to know the area you live in well enough and in some cases to perform what I call Neighborhood Recon to scope out alternate routes and identify obstacles ahead of time. Could you make it through the swamp that is in the woods? Maybe, but would you want to?

Have a communication plan with your family

In a disaster, cellular communications might be down and who has land lines anymore? You used to find a phone booth on every corner but now they are nonexistent where I live. My communication plan is really meant to address a lack of communication I can foresee in a disaster. My family knows what my plans are and that is to come home. I might be delayed but I will stick to the plan. In the event that some crisis hits and my family is not in immediate danger from staying put at our home, they are supposed to wait for me to arrive. Depending on the crisis this could be several hours to a day, possibly overnight. Does your family know what your plans are? More importantly, do they know what to do if you never show up?

What are your plans for making it back home in an emergency if your trusty vehicle isn’t available?

In a disaster our first instinct is to move as quickly as possible to safety or to the closest approximation we have to our ideal of safe. For me, if

Emergencies can take place in a moment’s notice — at home, work or in public places — and knowing what to do next can very well safeguard you from injury or even death. There’s no point in waiting until an actual emergency happens. With that in mind, here are a few ways you can be prepared for whatever comes your way with these emergency survival tips.

Prepare for the Worst

If you live in California, you know the state has been expecting a massive earthquake for several years now. And if you live someplace where snow days are the norm, it’s important to be prepared for toughing it out if you find yourself snowed in for several days. Whatever situation comes your way, it’s important to be mentally and physically prepared for the possible events that can occur. Do your research on what can go wrong and you’ll be better prepared for anything that comes your way.

Pack a Generous ‘Bug-Out’ Bag

This may be the most crucial component of preparing for a disaster. Emergency preparedness bags, or “bug-out” bags, contain a number of items to sustain and protect you for long periods of time when you’ll likely have no other available resources. Some potential items include flashlights, a first-aid kit, water and food, emergency contact information, clean clothes, and an emergency fund. Plan accordingly for any situation and pack all necessary items ahead of time, while regularly updating your bag so any perishable items stay fresh.

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You can be prepared in every aspect, but if your health is poor, it’ll make every other task more difficult than it has to be

Optimize Your Physical Fitness

In order to successfully evade danger in an emergency, it’s important to be in the best physical condition possible. You can be prepared in every aspect, but if your health is poor, it’ll make every other task more difficult than it has to be. If you haven’t already done so, begin an exercise regimen that will build your muscles and endurance. Try going on long hikes and lifting weights to build muscle mass. In addition, eat healthy meals to keep your body in tip-top condition.

Develop Safe Driving Skills

In the case of a disaster, it’s not unlikely you’ll have to relocate to a safer location. Wherever that is, it’s important to drive safely to your destination in the midst of chaos. Begin refining your defensive, offensive and evasive driving skills by refreshing your knowledge on the rules of the road.

Plan for Recreation, Comfort Foods

It’s likely you’ll end up with a lot of “downtime” during a crisis. You may be stuck at one location for long periods, so it’s important not to let panic get the best of you. One way to avoid succumbing to fear or just a bad attitude is to prepare recreational activities and comfort foods. Pack a deck of cards or your favorite board games in your emergency preparedness bag. Include your child’s favorite toys, as well as some snacks your family enjoys. These items will become a source of comfort in an emergency situation.

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Form a survival group as soon as possible to gain advantages with numbers of like-minded people

Prep as a Community

One important aspect of prepping is to become a part of a community that shares your preparedness. This way, in a crisis, you can all support and help one another to survive. Having a community with the same mindset will make you stronger in adversity. If no one around you shares your gusto for prepping, talk to your family and close friends about the importance of being prepared for a disaster or emergency crisis. Upon finalizing your plan, share your preparation tips and tricks, as well as some resources and knowledge with one another.

Emergencies can take place in a moment’s notice — at home, work or in public places — and knowing what to do next can very well safeguard you from injury