Yesterday was an interesting day news wise, as finally 2 years
after the world made its decision the US congress has finally accepted that "Climate change is here now and is primarily
caused by human activity and is accelerating." The statements went on to say that Australia is at the most risk of developed countries and that the change was directly responsible for about 300,000 deaths last year.
In an unusual corresponding statement the mayor of
Melbourne advised city office workers to be a little more prepared and keep a torch, water, radio etc near where they work.
Now most of us are pretty prepared as we head out on a camping trip, but how ready, should we be all the time !
We have been helped several times this year by our 4wd/camping setup not out in the bush but in the city.
One example was during Melbournes record breaking heat wave in February.
Our house airconditoning packed up on day one, now normally one might think "big deal".
But then no service people were available, the shops ran out of replacement units, the temperatures went on for days, there was
was no relief anywhere, it was a pleasure to go to work in an air condition office.
Thank goodness for the old fans !
But then the power shedding began ( we actually got a power bill refund for the 25 power outages we had).
At the time our Patrol was configured with a double beds and on the worst night we slept in the car with a 240v fan blowing air through the rear doors via a 12v battery/inverter, and cooked tea on our little 12v oven, topped up sloppy ice-cream from next doors thawing fridge.
Now for us this whole scene could be described as full scale dress rehearsal for our next bush trip.
But we have a 90 year old relative, and neighbors who don't seem to even own a torch - and I can tell you this was no picnic.
We think we are a long way from survivalists but would feel very exposed if our 4wd/camping setup couldn't support us and our cars totally for 2-3 weeks without any outside
services.
So what is a reasonable level of general preparedness ?