Short survival movie - Aftermath

[teamnelson]

Not a how to, but thought provoking.

[Pat/Rick]

Chaps, that was interesting and like you say, thought provoking. The playground must have been near the outside limit of the blast radius.......They did the right thing by seeking refuge in the family's hunting shanty instead of trying to go into the blast zone and risking radiation poisening.
 
His quest for fuel should have been preceeded by a thorough and quiet recon. I think I would have started towards late afternoon/evening, to be followed by night observation to check for folks breaking light discipline. At the first sign of unknown persons having conversation he should have withdrawn and checked further. He totally broke operational security/invisibility.
 
They should have been fishing and foraging since the first day instead of waiting for the food to run out. Would have been best for them to boil water while cooking meals to maximize their fuel stores. There's more I'm sure, that's what "stuck out" at first review.  Thanks.

[pab1]

That was very well done! I think thats a pretty accurate take on how your average person would react as far as not thinking of getting more food, fuel, etc. until they are almost out. Also the way many would resond to hearing others talking and approaching them. Most people never consider or prepare for survival situations. If the brain has never "been there" the body will not react properly when thrown into a situation. Thanks for sharing the video!

[Lost Farmboy]

 

I am having a hard time finding the message here. The man was totally dependent on modern technology. Wasting propane to fry an egg apiece or run an empty refrigerator? Going to the city to forage when surrounded by fish? 

[bilmac]

Yup, the man was totally running on fear. Afraid to go have a look around, and then afraid to stay in a place that looked to be a pretty good place to ride out a storm. So he panics and becomes a wanderer with no secure shelter, no idea what lies around the next corner, and no real hope of finding anything better than what he had left.  I find it difficult to believe that people will react that badly in a crisis.

[pab1]

Like I said, people who have not mentally prepared for a situation are not going to perform as well as those who have. Your average "shopping mall happy moron" is going to have a very difficult time adjusting to their new situation. Keep in mind that there are people who wind up stranded every day because they can't change a tire on their own vehicle. Throw that same person into the scenario shown in this film and see how well they perform. There have been many people lost in the woods who panic, start stripping off and leaving behind gear that could keep them alive in their rush to get out of their current situation. As insane as that seems to most of us, it has happened many times.
 
I think most people these days think someone will come along to save them (Katrina) at some point. Like Bilmac said, he was running on fear. With the "gang" situation he is afraid to leave his kids alone to go search for food. He probably does not want to put them at risk by taking them along searching either. Instead of taking action he uses up all their resources hoping the calvary will come along and save the day before they are out of supplies.

[pab1]

Deleted - double post. 

[teamnelson]

I find it difficult to believe that people will react that badly in a crisis.

I've ran relief NGOs overseas, relief for Katrina, two tsunami evacuations, military survival schools, and been in military operations in support of various crises ... I've seen people react that badly and worse in crises. Common sense is not so common anymore; like pab1 mentioned, its a mental preparedness issue. Current American culture is the least resilient.

Case in point, my 16yo son is taking EMT Certification B at the local community college. He is the youngest student in the class, he's a senior in HS and enlisting in the CG this summer. His first day of class was last friday, it's all day, 8 hours. These are people training to be first responders to someone else's crisis mind you ... half of them did not show up prepared for class (no book, study materials, pen, paper) and alot of them recently left military service and are using their GI Bill. Many of them did not pay attention. His "buddy" for infant CPR was a 20 something Navy wife, who freaked out because they ran out of training dummies. "OMG, there's not enough babies. What are we going to do? Um, excuse me, could someone go get us one of these infants? This is so stupid, you'd think they would've thought this through, y'know. I mean, OMG!" When I did the class there was one training infant, and a box of antimicrobial wipes so we could all share.

Psychologically its called the cycle of grief, and it applies to crisis. Our cultural has become mentally flabby when it comes to crises, which is why we have something called secondary PTSD, where the stress in someone else's life stresses us out to the point of depression ... imagine that. Something bad happens, and we go straight into a tailspin, riding the grief roller coaster and never getting off.

So I see it happening like this. (Mushroom cloud in the distance) OMG, what is that? Where's my phone, I need to get a video of this and post it on FB! Oh wait ... excuse me, sir? Is that bad? Should I do something? ... Where's the police? Shouldn't they be doing something about this? ... What am I going to do? Someone help ME! This can't be happening to me, I have important things to do today. This totally ruins my life. I'm a victim!

Its probably generational and regional, there are probably I higher percentage of the mentally prepared amongst the older rural folk. Definitely not among the younger metro folk.

[bilmac]

Totally agree that mental preparedness is a function of location. Not to say that there are not a lot of good folks living in cities. but the proportions of able vs. stupid people reverses when I travel from our small town and go to what passes for a city in this part of the world. I'm not sure of the criteria that I use, probably dress as much as anything, but as I pass people in the mall, where there are a lot of rural folks mixed with the city types my mind kind of catagorises them into someone who could survive a bad situation and those who wouldn't make it for a week.

[Pat/Rick]

He left to see if he could find his wife is what I thought.........
 
Yep, lots of folks who just freak out when the norm goes out the window. Be that anything interupting their planned day, or in the case of the class mentioned by TN, what the gals vision of how it should be turns out to be different than planned for. There's alot of flexibility needed for survivability.
 
 
People not coping? Had a story related to me where a fellow was watching a gal try to open her door on her SUV. Kept pushing the button, harder and harder, as if pressure would do the trick. The fellow walked over and offered assistance. Graciously she accepted, and was awestruck when he inserted the key into the lock and opened the door. Some folks will fall apart before they look at their watch to see how much time has elapsed since _____.
 
I hope that I can help folks, but I worry about the numbers. Could be enough to endanger my/our chances. If a victim of whatever apocolyptic scenario, I hope the survivors say a prayer of thanks, for providing for them.