Why Do You Need A Bug Out Bag?
A lot of preppers ask themselves this very question. Unfortunately many more preppers don’t. Those that never consider the why of it all end up stuffing a military style backpack with all sorts of backwoods or urban survival gear and often center the contents around security & defense. More often than not, these styles of backpacks are destined to gather dust in the back recesses of a hall closet. If the day comes when an evacuation becomes necessary, these bags will be of little use in the most likely scenarios.
Bugging out has become little more than the tacticool phrase for an unexpected evacuation, therefore the first order of business should be to stop calling it a bug out bag and refer to it as an evacuation kit. This phrase is not only more fitting, but gives the kit a true sense of purpose.
Evacuations tend to occur with little to no notice and you may find yourself with only minutes to gather personal belongings…sometimes less than that. Having an evacuation kit ready to grab and go gives you the peace of mind that everything you need and everything that is important to you is ready to go. No scrambling, no thinking, no gathering, just going.
What exactly should go into an evacuation kit is a little beyond this prepping 101 article, but we will be discussing that next week in more detail. Suffice it to say, we won’t be talking about tactical machetes or wilderness survival gear. It really is much more common sense than that.