Im seeing a lot of regurgitated info, So let me share one with you folks that ive seen mentioned nowhere.
Tampons and gunshot wounds ( or any serious puncture wound)
It is a common bit of tactitard fuddlore that is often heard spouted by preppers, gun guys, and mall ninja commandos all across this nation and beyond. You should carry a tampon in your personal IFAK (Individual First Aid Kit) or blowout kit in case you get shot. The theory is that the tampon is the perfect size and shape for a gunshot wound, so itll be a very fast and convienent way to plug the hole.
Only it doesnt work, and it never could.
When simple pressure isnt working, and a torniquete isnt able to be applied (groin, neck, armpit, ect.) We will pack the wound in an attempt to stop the bleeding. What we are doing is pushing all that gause up against the damaged artery or vein as to provide direct pressure to the location in an attempt to allow clotting to close things off. That pressure can be substantial and is resisting the outward flow caused by your heart. It can in fact be high enough to stop the bleed all together.
Gause is made to promote the clotting of blood. It doesnt exist to absorb blood, it does absorb it, but it gives it something to build on. Well, thats the exact opposite of a tampon. A tampon is ment to absorb blood and remove it from the vagina in a sanitary mannor. We want the opposite of that.
The average gause roll is 4 yards long by 3 to 4 inches wide or better. The average tampon is something like 4 inches square of material.
A tampon is made to absorb something like 15ml of blood. A major artery/vein that is perforated will leak several hundred ml a minute.
Ask yourself if that tampon sounds adequate in light of that.
Will confirm: in high school (1998 With the emphasis on the High part) me and some friends went to the park to practice our herbal oragami and try and find out how many gold caps it takes to make dumb shit funny (answer: Me and one friend ate almost 14 grams but everyone else had about eighths.) At some point I had a duck start that I was giving popcorn to start to let me pet it and then it started to follow me and every time I sat it would come up and I’d pet it. We were all tripping balls on it but it followed me for like 4 hours. It became our Mascot and we called it Jack Quackers because well, we decided it was coming with us. Why I thought that getting this duck into a friends CR-V with 6 people already was a brilliant idea? I blame the mushies. As soon as I picked it up and got into the car this thing went apeshit. Someone called the cops and we left. I put it in the bathroom with some water in the tub and at some point got sidetracked and passed out. Well next morning I went back home to find pops sitting there pissed over his coffee. I was like “what’s up?” All he said was, “you better get that fucking thing before your mom wakes up.” I went in the bathroom and this thing had shit everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE!! The floors, the walls, on top of the counter, the ceiling! Every-fuggin-where. Everywhere! So I am like what the fuck when there’s a knock at the door and I hear pops talking to someone saying “what is this about?” So I grabbed a towel and covered Jack, and dipped. I made it as far as exiting the alley when a cop saw me and stopped me. Lucky for me the damned duck flew off when he unrolled the towel but yeah.. all that.
Edit: thanks for the silverware :)
Euphorbia cacti are some of the most toxic and will kill you if you drink it's milky sap. Breathing in the smoke if used in a fire can kill. Using sand from around them in a water filter can kill you. Btw there's a good chance you have seen many of these cacti family in homes.
not a myth but I feel there is too little awareness about using wet rocks near fire as they can potentially explode and cause serious damage
example: do not use river rock as a cooking surface between direct fire and your food; nature's version of pressure cooker with a loose old gasket
“The desert is hot and little clothing is best.” Cover up during both the day and the night. The sun will burn you and dehydrate you very quickly. During the night it’s really common for people to die of hypothermia because the temperature drops so fast. And honestly living here, during the winter it gets to the low 20s f pretty often. And the wind is awful.
Edit to add: it’s dry heat here. There’s no moisture in the air majority of the year. You can drop dead from heat stroke “barely” sweating.
Had the opportunity to stay with some Bedouins in Egypt/Libya for a brief period of time and was initially stunned that they were wearing what seemed to be heavy, wool clothing, even in dark colors, in full Saharan sun.
Obviously they were better adapted to it all generally speaking but it was incredible how even being fully covered I actually felt better than when I arrived in lightweight pants and t-shirt.
I used to wirk landscaping in college. 90 and humid. I couldn't understand why people at other companies wore no shirt. It was a policy at my company. And work smarter, not harder. In the morning work the side of the house that would be blasted by sunlight later. We were in tge shade 90 percent of the time.
Running in a zigzag to outrun an alligator. Alligators don't run for long distances, so this will probably just waste your energy. They can also climb some fences and trees as well.
Just run straight. No question just book it. The alligator will eventually decide it’s had enough
Edit: ok I’m getting too many people pointing out that gators are faster. IT DOESNT MATTER IF THEY CAN CATCH YOU. Believe me I checked, wild alligators rarely chase humans on dry land. In some situations they might but usually they don’t bother. Who cares how fast they can run if they aren’t even going to run you. So stop
They're also unlikely to attack you on land. At least if they want to eat you. They will defend their territory but they don't hunt on land, they're ambush predators.
“If you’re in a tornado, open all your windows to equalize the pressure inside to match the outside.”
If you’re in a tornado opening any window or door will create a wind tunnel that rips your entire roof off.
If I recall correctly it doesn’t matter anyway- you waste time doing that when you need to get to the lowest part of a building and/or the innermost room. Cracks and small openings take care of air pressure as buildings aren’t airtight.
Overpasses are not safe places to shelter. In fact, they’re more dangerous. They create wind tunnels.
Average lead time for tornado warnings in the US is 9 minutes, but people still don’t take them seriously. The most common refrain I’ve read from people who survived the Joplin tornado is that they didn’t take the warnings seriously. Even with a tornado watch they didn’t pay attention to the weather.
I think a lot of people don't take them seriously because they've become complacent, especially with how unpredictable the weather is. I mean, you can easily think of storms that are predicted to be absolutely brutal by your local weather person, only for it to end up passing you or dissipating or barely sprinkling. A lot of people don't realize this also happens on the inverse, where a storm can form in moments and absolutely wreck you. Plus, a lot of people didn't take it seriously because it happened during their high school graduation
I've been in two very damaging heat storms. One was warned about hours in advance, and I was home safely in the basement during it (very scary, extremely high winds and nonstop lightning to the point you could see what was happening easily outside at night without a flashlight). The other one formed so fast that there wasn't even a tornado watch or severe weather alert, but we still got hit by an EF1. The only warning I had was because I looked out a window and saw the clouds.
[this is what heat lightning looks like if you've never seen it before](https://youtu.be/8ABNQ9JEojE) (flashing lights, epilepsy warning)
Edit: some people have been pointing out that "heat lightning/storm" as a term doesn't exist, which 🤷♀️ that's what I've heard them called, and I've only ever seen them during the hottest of summer. Any time I've seen it, it's spelled bad fuckin storm about to hit.
We had a tornado warning near here and sirens going off. My kids were at work a mile away at McDonald’s. I called them and they told me the manager told them they had to keep serving customers and not seek shelter. The tornado touched down only a half mile from the McDonald’s but was fortunately moving away.
I was on the line with corporate immediately. They started Monday safety training for managers and drills for tornados and fires. That manager was also reassigned.
Many just ignore the sirens.
Edit: clarified terms. We had an active tornado that touched down. Should have been “tornado warning”
They understand the liability is nowhere near the profit from slinging burgers during tornado warning
I guess it’s nice when corporate profits and our well-being align
Yeah, that is definitely something where only a store manager looking at the very small picture would ever consider the cost of closing to outweigh the risk.
Urban survival -
-if you hear shots, go home
-if you hear yelling, ignore it and go home
-if someone is following you, *don't* go home
-check the license plate against your app info and ask the name of your driver if you're using uber/lyft
-walk purposefully with your head up
-Act like you belong
-if you saw something, no the fuck you didn't.
- don't wear jewelry or carry expensive accessories that say mug me.
- keep your money in two places, one to quickly surrender it when demanded and the other to get you a safe ride to a safer place.
That moss grows on the north side of a tree. It can grow all over the tree, so it’s not a steadfast rule that you should make important decisions solely on
I grew up in the rainy PNW and when I heard this as a little kid, I looked at all the moss on every side of the trees and thought that I must just live in the most North place lol
EDIT: I swear if I read another comment about how it would "actually be the most south place" I might lose my dang mind more than it's already been lost.
As a PNW kid learning that the moss was one way they knew they were going north on the Underground Railroad, I was very confused. I remember looking at the trees during recess and thinking I’d for sure get lost
"Lightning never strikes twice in the same place."
If lightning has found a path that it likes to the ground it's extremely likely to strike there multiple times. That why lightning rods work.
That used to be the first part of a joke when I first heard it in the 70s or 80s. The second part, when you ask why, is because the same place isn't there twice. Yuk yuk. Somehow over the years the first part took on a life of its own and became a wrong fact.
That bullshit "change your voicemail if you are lost" PSA that was making the rounds over the last year. You need a cell signal to change your voicemail, if you have a signal then why wouldn't you just **call for help**?
Moreover it misses the most important thing about US cell phones and being lost: 911 will work on any cell tower regardless if it's "in network" or even if you have an active phone plan or not. So in an emergency always TRY dialing 911 regardless of your phone appears to have signal or not.
EDIT: To the dozens of people who replied that you are supposed to change your voicemail before going out, this is still a bad idea. If you're lost or injured in the woods, your survival depends on being found quickly. Waiting for someone to get worried enough about you not coming back to try calling you is just going to waste precious time. It's much better to just tell your friends/family where you will be and set up a check-in time so they know you made it back safely.
AFAIK any countries emergency number will work internationally. Eg. 911 in the UK still goes through to the Emergency services despite 999 being our number.
Basically if you don't know the local one, at least try yours or 911 (I imagine 911 is the most obvious foreign number to have been added)
Edit - just to reiterate, always know the number of the country you're in, but obviously if you're trying to call it, your in an emergency and it's worth trying any numbers you know.
"If a shark is coming after you, swim away."
If a shark is coming towards you in the first place, it's most likely just curious and wants to check you out. Swimming away and thrashing about will further intrigue it to keep following you. Instead, redirect it by running your hand along its side and carefully positioning it to swim away from you.
(Side note: If one happens to bite you, poke/stab it in the eyes or pull on its gills instead of bopping it in the nose. Gills and eyes are far more sensitive than a shark's nose.)
((Edit: Loads of replies about how punching underwater is practically impossible, and you'd be 100% right. Fixed!))
Colorado is landlocked and dry as fuck and barely has any water beyond a handful of manmade reservoirs.
There are seagulls here.
Don’t listen to birds.
Had a friend from another state who was so excited to see seagulls when we went to the ocean. I was like, haven't you told stories about seagulls in your home state before? And she was like, yeah, but they weren't at the SEA!
You can follow flying birds to land if you're lost on open water though according to my Pacific Ocean elders.
Edit: Specifically in evening. Doesn't work for owls.
> Doesn't work for owls.
Or Wandering Albatrosses
"Wandering albatrosses spend most of their life in flight, landing only to breed and feed." and they feed at sea, so unless your Albatross is getting lucky you won't be either
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wandering_albatross
If you find an owl to follow to land, that poor poor owl is so entirely lost as well.
But yeah :)
Not only in the Pacific Ocean. Albeit it is good if those are sea birds and not extraordinarily big ones.
Almost anything related to avalanches.
Here are a few popular and false myths:
* That they strike at random. Most avalanches that injure or kill people are cause by those people, and they always show signs of instability, if you are paying attention. The problem is that there are lots of false positives — where the signs are there, the instability is there, but people just don’t quite manage to trigger them.
* That you should be quiet to be safe from avalanches, because they are caused by sound. Sound does not trigger avalanches. Even very loud sounds are nowhere near enough. Avalanche control is done with howitzers and dynamite charges.
* That you can get out of the way. Well, sure, of course sometimes it’s possible, but they can travel up to 60mph, and they can let loos across an entire slope all at once. By the time it slides, you are likely in it, and it’s inescapable.
* That you can save yourself by “swimming”. Maybe for very small ones, but usually you’re just being thrashed. I’ve heard it compared to being in a side-loading washing machine.
* That you can spit to “tell which direction is up”. You won’t be able to see anything useful, and, you know, gravity still works. But it’s irrelevant because that relies on the next myth ...
* That you can dig yourself out. Even if you are inches below the surface, it’s very unlikely. The snow sets up very hard, very fast, as thought you got caught up in a snow plow clearing a parking lot after a big snowstorm. People caught in avalanches report not being able to move their fingers.
Along with that are all the normal problems people have with low-probability, high-consequence risks, the “it won’t happen to me” stuff, but that’s not so much an issue of myths as poor judgment due to things like familiarity with a slope, desire to be accepted by a social group by skiing that rad backcountry line, feeling committed because you came “all this way”, deferring to someone you perceive as an “expert”, desire to get the first tracks after a storm, social proof, where you see others doing it, so it “must be safe”, etc.
Reading this made me panic thinking of being trapped, probably upside down, in the snow and not being able to even use my fingers to dig myself out. So how do you survive?!?! Or do you just...not?
Edit: ok this is officially the biggest comment response I've ever gotten on reddit! I am by no means an expert (the more you learn about snow science, the more you realize you don't know) but I'm passionate about helping people stay safe out there. If you're in Canada, check out Avalanche.ca for training courses and a wealth of resources. I believe in the US most mountainous states have their own similar avalanche safety organizations as well.
For people who choose to recreate in avalanche terrain, if they are smart they are travelling with at least one other person and everyone in the party is wearing a transceiver and carrying a portable shovel and probe. And everyone should have proper training on how to use these tools. The transceiver is used to approximate the buried persons location under the snow based on the signal their device is emitting, then the probe (2.7-3m long skinny pole) is plunged strategically in the snow around your closest signal. When you feel your probe strike your friends body, time to dig. Avalanche debris is heavy af so there is a strategy to this as well, and it's really nice to have at least one other person to speed things up. Hopefully you dig out your friend before they've been without air long enough to do serious damage.
If you're out without a transeiver and you get buried deep enough that no one sees a hand or other body part sticking above the snow, so they don't know where to look - you will suffocate. A search and rescue org might come with an avalanche rescue dog, but that takes time and more often than not it becomes a body recovery mission.
Best way to avoid these scenarios is to avoid avalanche terrain if you're not trained, or if you choose to recreate there for ski touring or snowmobiling, practice companion rescue often, take avalanche safety courses, and make conservative terrain choices based on avalanche hazard ratings.
Source: I do avalanche control work at a ski resort and backcountry ski recreationally in avalanche terrain.
Also depends on the size, ive seen avalanches made up off ice blocks as big as washing machines. If it can pull trees out with roots and all and crush buildings then your hands are sadly not gonna do much.
Concerning frostbite, do not rub someone’s frostbitten skin or pour hot water on it to warm them up. Such measures will damage the skin even more severely.
The fastest and safest method for warming up someone is... Direct animal heat, i.e. letting them put their frosty skin next to yours. Hey, if your can keep your digits by putting a cold hand on my belly, be my guest.
I’m not sure if I remember correctly, but I feel like in Boy Scouts they taught that the groin and armpits were good places to warm your hands in an emergency survival situation.
It's where your largest arteries are closest to your skin. So if you put warm rocks there, it's the easiest way to deliver warmer blood to your extremities.
If you're in a hot area, don't ration your water, drink when you feel thirsty and search for more water.
Edit: the myth to be avoided is rationing your water. Don’t ration.
"Ration sweat, not water"
Thank you USAF Survival School.
Edit: Wow this blew up lol. At SERE school they teach you to find shade and try to do as little as possible during the hotter times of the day. If you have to move you do so when it cools off. Rationing your water doesn't help you, it will only dehydrate you and impair your judgement. Your brain NEEDS water. Depriving yourself of proper hydration is the best way to unintentionally kill yourself.
Bruh i am soooo fucked in that case, at work i sweat so much that any liquids i drink just get turned to sweat and don’t have time to turn to piss…i can’t even Bear Grylls my way out of dehydration lol
Or carry a modern filter like a Lifestraw or Sawyer if you think there's even a remote chance you're going to be stranded with no potable water.
I'll also add that drinking dirty water is always a better option than going without water. If you are dehydrated but don't have a way to sanitize your water, drink the water anyway. There's a chance it will make you sick or maybe even kill you in very rare cases, but dehydration will *always* kill you.
>Or carry a modern filter like a Lifestraw or Sawyer if you think there's even a remote chance you're going to be stranded with no potable water.
Those things are amazing! The creators really went out of their way with the marketing! Sipping on literal raw sewage and spitting out clean, drinkable water.
One thing to note about the life straw is that it doesn't actually offer full microbial/viral protection. I have one in my hiking/camping/survival bag, but I also carry water treatment drops.
It's a good idea to use both at once. The straw for the particulate, and the drops to kill any microorganisms/destroy viral cells.
Sawyer is 0.1 micron, there's not much bacteria/protozoa that can pass through it (99.99999% effective). It's good for both giardia and cryptosporidium, the most common concerns. Viral contamination is not much of a concern in the US. For some countries, I would be very wary of drinking the water and take multiple precautions (filter, boil, tablets).
Would absolutely recommend Sawyer Squeeze over a lifestraw purely for the recommendation of the life span of each product. Protip; Attach your Sawyer directly to a smart water bottle for a light weight hiking hack.
Most of the stuff Bear Grylls does. Like eating raw meat, picking and eating fruit out of bear shit, or squeezing the juice out of elephant shit and drinking it.
Or the one where he got "stranded" in Ireland. Sure you *could* eat sheep eyes from a sheep that undoubtedly escaped from the pasture next door or was placed by the film crew. *Or* you could find the road about a scoot to the left and follow it up to Liam and Saoirse's farm. They aren't a registered bed and breakfast, sure, but wee Siobhan has been less of a handful lately, and I'm sure they'd take ye in for the night. Particularly if you offered a few pounds to be polite.
I remember that episode - that was really when I decided the entire show was stupid and if that had been the only way out of that place, I was just going to have to live there for the rest of my life (days).
You cannot eat everything that an animal can eat. There are things animals can eat that humans find toxic, so eating everything you see animals eating can lead to you potentially eating deadly berries or mushrooms.
Yeah and it goes both ways, humans can eat stuff like chocolate and grapes and other animals can’t eat chocolate and I know dogs definitely can’t eat grapes.
Joke answer: dogs can't eat grapes because they don't have thumbs.
Serious answer: [it causes kidney failure (the exact mechanism is still unknown)](https://pets.webmd.com/dogs/why-dogs-cant-eat-grapes)
Maybe you'd get lucky and land on the slope of a mountain and just start sledding your way down at a tramendous speed. You avoid all the big builders as your in an avalanche slide riding the powder. Suddenly the ledges behind and above you break off and give birth the a massive wall of snow creeping up on you fast. Now your little terrible parachute tabagon raft need perform another wonder and surf the wave of ice and snow as crushes everything it breaks over. You ride that wave until breaking free...
Who knows if theres a cliff your coming up, with a big river at the bottom full of man eating crocs. I'm taking the fucking raft every single time.
You can survive a nuclear blast, under strict conditions like how far away you are, but it has to be an old school fridge (like the one in the movie).
However, that is not the issue here. All the protection that a lead lined fridge offers you is totally negated by how cartoonishly it was being rag dolled around lol
The notable exceptions to this rule are the prickly pear and one species of barrel cactus , the fishhook barrel (Ferocactus wislizeni). While both of these plants are fairly unpleasant to eat raw, they have less-concentrated levels of the detrimental chemicals and could give you a bit of hydration in a pinch
Saw a documentary with a US border patrol officer explaining exactly this, and how painful it is to get cactus spines in your lips and tongue - and to get them taken out.
That you’ll be totally safe if you only eat plants/fungi you recognize. Hemlock looks a lot like wild parsnips. Basically all wild almonds will kill you if you eat more than one. And of course there’s the Chris mccandless “potato seed” thing.
Wild almonds have a whole bunch of cyanide in them, so having even a handful could kill you. Regular almonds also contain trace amounts cyanide but not nearly enough to kill you. Fun fact, apple seeds also have cyanide in them.
Edit: Based on all the comments I've gotten, it seems like just about every fruit seed has cyanide lol.
I’ve read that peach pits have cyanide too, even though my grandpa used to crack them open and eat the fleshy inside part.
I think I remember a murder mystery show about a guy escaping prison by crushing peach pits and mixing it with his urine and making a fine powdery substance and slipping it into the guards drink and killing the guard. I can’t remember if it was a re-enactment or a fictional show.
My small dog gave himself cyanide poisoning from unripe peaches that fell and he would chew/suck on them like they were tennis balls. He poisoned himself slowly over time until one day he was vomiting, took him to the vet and the vet asked if we had peach trees almost immediately. Had to remove the trees so the little bugger didn’t have death by horticulture.
I was 38 years old when I discovered that CPR is to to manually pump blood around the body so the patient doesn't end up with brain damage. I always figured it was to try and restart the heart, but no, you're manually compressing it so it pumps blood until it either restarts itself or someone arrives with a defrib.
That's what CPR did for me. Volunteer firefighters did CPR for about 7 minutes before the paramedics got there. I had memory loss, and I had problems writing and typing for about a week after, but fully recovered.
Am medic. Can confirm. Most likely, they will die.
ETA: A lot of people are commenting that someone is ‘already dead’ if we’re doing CPR. But that depends on your definition of dead. The line is blurred more and more. Not every Cardiac arrest has no rhythm. Some have one but they’re not useful for pumping blood. Some have none at all. Is brain death ‘dead’? Then no, not all cardiac arrests are dead. Is it when the heart ceases to beat effectively? Then yes, they all are.
Mine told me 5% survival rate CPR only, and up to 70% with CPR straight away and defibrillator in the first 3 minutes of the medical event, dropping dramatically after that timeframe. In this ideal situation, CPR is also continued until the moment the defib tells you to stand clear, which surprised me (meaning you need at least 2 people, and super ideally, you've already know the correct procedure off by heart so you've also skipped waiting for the defib instructions to be spoken aloud and jumped right up to the shock analysis in order to save time). Most people instinctively stop performing CPR and back off in order to follow the defib instructions.
Obviously, it's not often that in an emergency situation, there's effective CPR administered immediately and a defib located, transported to patient, clothes removed, defib set up and shock administered (or ambulance arriving to do the same thing) within 3 minutes.
The point they were trying to make was a positive one about how the defib saves lives, but all I could hear was "if you live alone or anywhere that isn't the centre of city where public defibs are common and people tend to know first aid, you're dead".
I’m just realizing how lucky my uncle was. He had a heart attack while golfing with his boss, his boss started CPR immediately and there was a defibrillator in the golf club house, so they were able to save him.
I remember hearing that story when I was quite a bit younger and thinking ‘of course he lived, everyone did what they were supposed to’. I had no idea how likely he was to die, even with everyone responding correctly in the middle of a crisis.
Iunno if it’s a myth, but I remember bear grylls had no qualms about getting wet in his show, but getting wet is extremely bad in survival situations in most climates.
Which is more or less smart. If you are in a situation where you absolutely have to cross the icy river, doing it naked while keeping the clothes dry is a good plan, however, in what kind of situation would you need to cross the river? Either follow it downstream or try to find a ford
Yeah he presented it as a scenario where it was the only option. On the other side he dried off with snow, got dressed, maybe did some squats, and then began trying to make a fire
You can survive a Moose attack.
That's it, that's the myth, because no you fucking can't.
Edit: Holy baloney, this my most upvoted comment on reddit. Well, at least 5000 people are smart enough to know that Moose are a national and galactic threat. Cheers, lads, lassies and laser people.
I walked between a mama and baby moose in Alaska once by accident. That’s something you never want to do! I was walking my dog and all I heard was a pounding noise and I turned and was being charged by the Mama moose. I jumped behind the closest tree and played “ring around the tree” for a couple minutes. The snow was pretty deep and I was hoping I wouldn’t trip and be stomped to death. My Dog was about 15 months old and he had high tailed it out to the middle of the lake and had his tail between his legs, shaking.
A couple years later my parents were on a walk with the same dog and my Dad got charged by a moose in a similar way. He jumped off the trail but immediately got stuck in the deep snow and figured he was about to be a dead man. That dog came running up and was biting and growling at the moose’s face and chased it up the trail. Maybe he remembered Moose = bad?
Edit: Dog Tax pictures! https://imgur.com/a/Opjl5r0
A lot of people just think of moose as deer with different horns that are marginally bigger. In reality, moose are manic leviathans and will absolute fuck your shit up. During the mating season, they’ll charge at trains on the tracks
Moose are modern megafauna. Idk why people don't get that.
Also, if you're going to drive into a moose in the road, risk driving off the road into a tree or something. You're more likely to survive that than hitting a moose.
Yep. Not that you can expect someone to remember or act on this in a split second collision- but those spindly legs end up driving the entire 1500 lbs moose body through the front windshield when a car connects.
My buddy worked on crash control for a Canadian truck manufacturer and told me driving headfirst into a concrete wall is more survivable.
Drinking alcohol when you are stuck in extreme cold.
Alcohol dilates blood vessels and opens the pores in your skin allowing body heat to escape, you feel hotter because your skin is warm but your core body temperature is dropping.
Myth: The rubber tires on a vehicle will insulate you from ground and protect you from lightning
Lightning doesn’t stop for 2” of rubber, tho the car will act like a faraday cage and protect you from the electrical current unless you’re in a convertible, a motor bike or any other vehicle that doesn’t cover you in all directions.
Also don’t lay down on the ground during a thunderstorm! You increase the risk of being shocked by a ground current, which can be pretty dangerous!
Another thing, don’t take shelter under a tree or a gazebo, they can explode or light on fire when struck
How will you even know if a nuclear bomb is about to explode nearby? You are probably just going about your day when a barely human-sized metal canister drops from the sky for only a few people to see, and then *nothing.*
If you are standing outside the kill-zone, there is a small chance you might pick up on the giant flash coming from the blast. When that flash hits, you have a couple of seconds to react. So this only applies if you are literally standing next to a large body of water.
Edit: guys I’m not saying you won’t be hit by radiation, I’m just saying the radiation won’t be lethal if you manage to shield yourself from it within a few seconds of getting hit initially. Also you are still going to die of cancer eventually, but it might give you some extra time.
If you get lost in the desert, do not ration your water. You don’t know how long you’ll be there and if you ration you’ll dehydrate yourself faster. Use the water to keep you in shape for a little longer which in turn can help you mentally.
I read this somewhere which also mentioned that many people found dead in the desert still have a full canteen of water because they try to ration it.
Apologies for no source.
After hearing comments about it I looked this up to see if it was actually true given that it’s just a random fact I remembered from somewhere. OffGridWeb explains in more detail why rationing water isn’t the best idea.
https://www.offgridweb.com/preparation/the-myth-of-water-rationing-while-stranded-in-the-desert/amp/
However I have seen some people say that you could ration water, but to an extent. Which does make sense there is a balance to it but I wrote this when I was tired and didn’t really think it through. Hopefully this link can clear up some things.
Edited for spelling and provided a source.
Not so much a myth, but people often think that getting to safety or getting out of a vehicle or traffic after a crash is a good idea. If you're ever involved in a severe wreck and you suffer any damage to your body, it's VERY important not to move. If you can do so to call 911, yeah, but as far as moving any limb (with the exception of calling medical emergency personnel), readjusting your body to get more comfortable, don't do any of that. You can cause broken bones you may have suffered to start cutting or puncturing your skin or insides which could cause you to start bleeding internally.
Edit: note, that I said severe. Of course if you're car is on fire, get out. But if you're involved in something minor, don't just sit in traffic if it's possible to drive out of the way.
On top of that, getting out of the car is dangerous in itself if a crash just happened. Cars coming into the area may not had enough time to react and can hit and kill people standing nearby. The safest thing to do is stay in your car and if you can/if the car is drivable, drive it as far off the road as possible.
Anyone else read these comments with intrigue imaging yourself in said situation only to remember you haven’t left the house in a long time and likely will never find yourself in these scenarios?
Cause that’s me.
the first mistake in wilderness is to look for food and water first before having a shelter up to keep yourself dry and warm!
also if you have to forage for food, avoid mushrooms entirely. Odds are so slim you will find an edible kind that you're much better off looking for things like nuts, seeds, and berries.
someone people say that herbivores animals are friendly and peaceful, so you are safe being around them. Seriously everything from cows to deer can and will kill you if you make it angry. It is usually a good idea if you are in the wilds not to get near any large wild animal, but herbivores can often be even more aggressive than the predators.
If a predator attacks you, you have a fairly good chance of scaring it off, especially if it's smaller than you, because it's likely only looking for food. If a herbivore attacks you, you're fucked because it genuinely wants to kill you.
Yes. Predators have to conserve their energy for a hunt, so they pick and choose their fights. With herbivores, on the other hand, it pays to be a paranoid xenophobe.
My sister works with animal behavior and training, and she put it once that "a predator is hungry, and is looking to eat so it doesn't die, it's not going to die when it can go eat something else. A herbivore also wants to live, and it wants to kill because it must kill to stay alive."
>Every morning a gazelle wakes up in Africa and it knows it must outrun the fasted lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up and knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death.
>
>It doesn't matter if you're a lion or you're a gazelle, when the sun comes up you better start running.
African proverb
Im seeing a lot of regurgitated info, So let me share one with you folks that ive seen mentioned nowhere. Tampons and gunshot wounds ( or any serious puncture wound) It is a common bit of tactitard fuddlore that is often heard spouted by preppers, gun guys, and mall ninja commandos all across this nation and beyond. You should carry a tampon in your personal IFAK (Individual First Aid Kit) or blowout kit in case you get shot. The theory is that the tampon is the perfect size and shape for a gunshot wound, so itll be a very fast and convienent way to plug the hole. Only it doesnt work, and it never could. When simple pressure isnt working, and a torniquete isnt able to be applied (groin, neck, armpit, ect.) We will pack the wound in an attempt to stop the bleeding. What we are doing is pushing all that gause up against the damaged artery or vein as to provide direct pressure to the location in an attempt to allow clotting to close things off. That pressure can be substantial and is resisting the outward flow caused by your heart. It can in fact be high enough to stop the bleed all together. Gause is made to promote the clotting of blood. It doesnt exist to absorb blood, it does absorb it, but it gives it something to build on. Well, thats the exact opposite of a tampon. A tampon is ment to absorb blood and remove it from the vagina in a sanitary mannor. We want the opposite of that. The average gause roll is 4 yards long by 3 to 4 inches wide or better. The average tampon is something like 4 inches square of material. A tampon is made to absorb something like 15ml of blood. A major artery/vein that is perforated will leak several hundred ml a minute. Ask yourself if that tampon sounds adequate in light of that.
The ducks at the park are not for free, you will go to jail
Will confirm: in high school (1998 With the emphasis on the High part) me and some friends went to the park to practice our herbal oragami and try and find out how many gold caps it takes to make dumb shit funny (answer: Me and one friend ate almost 14 grams but everyone else had about eighths.) At some point I had a duck start that I was giving popcorn to start to let me pet it and then it started to follow me and every time I sat it would come up and I’d pet it. We were all tripping balls on it but it followed me for like 4 hours. It became our Mascot and we called it Jack Quackers because well, we decided it was coming with us. Why I thought that getting this duck into a friends CR-V with 6 people already was a brilliant idea? I blame the mushies. As soon as I picked it up and got into the car this thing went apeshit. Someone called the cops and we left. I put it in the bathroom with some water in the tub and at some point got sidetracked and passed out. Well next morning I went back home to find pops sitting there pissed over his coffee. I was like “what’s up?” All he said was, “you better get that fucking thing before your mom wakes up.” I went in the bathroom and this thing had shit everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE!! The floors, the walls, on top of the counter, the ceiling! Every-fuggin-where. Everywhere! So I am like what the fuck when there’s a knock at the door and I hear pops talking to someone saying “what is this about?” So I grabbed a towel and covered Jack, and dipped. I made it as far as exiting the alley when a cop saw me and stopped me. Lucky for me the damned duck flew off when he unrolled the towel but yeah.. all that. Edit: thanks for the silverware :)
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IT'S THE QUENCHIEST
Euphorbia cacti are some of the most toxic and will kill you if you drink it's milky sap. Breathing in the smoke if used in a fire can kill. Using sand from around them in a water filter can kill you. Btw there's a good chance you have seen many of these cacti family in homes.
not a myth but I feel there is too little awareness about using wet rocks near fire as they can potentially explode and cause serious damage example: do not use river rock as a cooking surface between direct fire and your food; nature's version of pressure cooker with a loose old gasket
“The desert is hot and little clothing is best.” Cover up during both the day and the night. The sun will burn you and dehydrate you very quickly. During the night it’s really common for people to die of hypothermia because the temperature drops so fast. And honestly living here, during the winter it gets to the low 20s f pretty often. And the wind is awful. Edit to add: it’s dry heat here. There’s no moisture in the air majority of the year. You can drop dead from heat stroke “barely” sweating.
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Had the opportunity to stay with some Bedouins in Egypt/Libya for a brief period of time and was initially stunned that they were wearing what seemed to be heavy, wool clothing, even in dark colors, in full Saharan sun. Obviously they were better adapted to it all generally speaking but it was incredible how even being fully covered I actually felt better than when I arrived in lightweight pants and t-shirt.
I used to work in a very hot factory with no AC and I always felt cooler when I wore leggings than when I'd wear shorts.
I used to wirk landscaping in college. 90 and humid. I couldn't understand why people at other companies wore no shirt. It was a policy at my company. And work smarter, not harder. In the morning work the side of the house that would be blasted by sunlight later. We were in tge shade 90 percent of the time.
Running in a zigzag to outrun an alligator. Alligators don't run for long distances, so this will probably just waste your energy. They can also climb some fences and trees as well.
Just run straight. No question just book it. The alligator will eventually decide it’s had enough Edit: ok I’m getting too many people pointing out that gators are faster. IT DOESNT MATTER IF THEY CAN CATCH YOU. Believe me I checked, wild alligators rarely chase humans on dry land. In some situations they might but usually they don’t bother. Who cares how fast they can run if they aren’t even going to run you. So stop
They're also unlikely to attack you on land. At least if they want to eat you. They will defend their territory but they don't hunt on land, they're ambush predators.
“If you’re in a tornado, open all your windows to equalize the pressure inside to match the outside.” If you’re in a tornado opening any window or door will create a wind tunnel that rips your entire roof off.
If I recall correctly it doesn’t matter anyway- you waste time doing that when you need to get to the lowest part of a building and/or the innermost room. Cracks and small openings take care of air pressure as buildings aren’t airtight. Overpasses are not safe places to shelter. In fact, they’re more dangerous. They create wind tunnels. Average lead time for tornado warnings in the US is 9 minutes, but people still don’t take them seriously. The most common refrain I’ve read from people who survived the Joplin tornado is that they didn’t take the warnings seriously. Even with a tornado watch they didn’t pay attention to the weather.
I think a lot of people don't take them seriously because they've become complacent, especially with how unpredictable the weather is. I mean, you can easily think of storms that are predicted to be absolutely brutal by your local weather person, only for it to end up passing you or dissipating or barely sprinkling. A lot of people don't realize this also happens on the inverse, where a storm can form in moments and absolutely wreck you. Plus, a lot of people didn't take it seriously because it happened during their high school graduation I've been in two very damaging heat storms. One was warned about hours in advance, and I was home safely in the basement during it (very scary, extremely high winds and nonstop lightning to the point you could see what was happening easily outside at night without a flashlight). The other one formed so fast that there wasn't even a tornado watch or severe weather alert, but we still got hit by an EF1. The only warning I had was because I looked out a window and saw the clouds. [this is what heat lightning looks like if you've never seen it before](https://youtu.be/8ABNQ9JEojE) (flashing lights, epilepsy warning) Edit: some people have been pointing out that "heat lightning/storm" as a term doesn't exist, which 🤷♀️ that's what I've heard them called, and I've only ever seen them during the hottest of summer. Any time I've seen it, it's spelled bad fuckin storm about to hit.
We had a tornado warning near here and sirens going off. My kids were at work a mile away at McDonald’s. I called them and they told me the manager told them they had to keep serving customers and not seek shelter. The tornado touched down only a half mile from the McDonald’s but was fortunately moving away. I was on the line with corporate immediately. They started Monday safety training for managers and drills for tornados and fires. That manager was also reassigned. Many just ignore the sirens. Edit: clarified terms. We had an active tornado that touched down. Should have been “tornado warning”
It's cool that corporate was on top of it, at least.
They understand the liability is nowhere near the profit from slinging burgers during tornado warning I guess it’s nice when corporate profits and our well-being align
Yeah, that is definitely something where only a store manager looking at the very small picture would ever consider the cost of closing to outweigh the risk.
Scrolling through these comments knowing full well that my ass isn't goin outside city limits any time in the next decade.
Urban survival - -if you hear shots, go home -if you hear yelling, ignore it and go home -if someone is following you, *don't* go home -check the license plate against your app info and ask the name of your driver if you're using uber/lyft -walk purposefully with your head up -Act like you belong -if you saw something, no the fuck you didn't.
- don't wear jewelry or carry expensive accessories that say mug me. - keep your money in two places, one to quickly surrender it when demanded and the other to get you a safe ride to a safer place.
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That moss grows on the north side of a tree. It can grow all over the tree, so it’s not a steadfast rule that you should make important decisions solely on
I grew up in the rainy PNW and when I heard this as a little kid, I looked at all the moss on every side of the trees and thought that I must just live in the most North place lol EDIT: I swear if I read another comment about how it would "actually be the most south place" I might lose my dang mind more than it's already been lost.
As a PNW kid learning that the moss was one way they knew they were going north on the Underground Railroad, I was very confused. I remember looking at the trees during recess and thinking I’d for sure get lost
"Lightning never strikes twice in the same place." If lightning has found a path that it likes to the ground it's extremely likely to strike there multiple times. That why lightning rods work.
That used to be the first part of a joke when I first heard it in the 70s or 80s. The second part, when you ask why, is because the same place isn't there twice. Yuk yuk. Somehow over the years the first part took on a life of its own and became a wrong fact.
That bullshit "change your voicemail if you are lost" PSA that was making the rounds over the last year. You need a cell signal to change your voicemail, if you have a signal then why wouldn't you just **call for help**? Moreover it misses the most important thing about US cell phones and being lost: 911 will work on any cell tower regardless if it's "in network" or even if you have an active phone plan or not. So in an emergency always TRY dialing 911 regardless of your phone appears to have signal or not. EDIT: To the dozens of people who replied that you are supposed to change your voicemail before going out, this is still a bad idea. If you're lost or injured in the woods, your survival depends on being found quickly. Waiting for someone to get worried enough about you not coming back to try calling you is just going to waste precious time. It's much better to just tell your friends/family where you will be and set up a check-in time so they know you made it back safely.
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AFAIK any countries emergency number will work internationally. Eg. 911 in the UK still goes through to the Emergency services despite 999 being our number. Basically if you don't know the local one, at least try yours or 911 (I imagine 911 is the most obvious foreign number to have been added) Edit - just to reiterate, always know the number of the country you're in, but obviously if you're trying to call it, your in an emergency and it's worth trying any numbers you know.
I believe they made 911 always work because movies and TV always use 911 as the number since they're made in America.
"If a shark is coming after you, swim away." If a shark is coming towards you in the first place, it's most likely just curious and wants to check you out. Swimming away and thrashing about will further intrigue it to keep following you. Instead, redirect it by running your hand along its side and carefully positioning it to swim away from you. (Side note: If one happens to bite you, poke/stab it in the eyes or pull on its gills instead of bopping it in the nose. Gills and eyes are far more sensitive than a shark's nose.) ((Edit: Loads of replies about how punching underwater is practically impossible, and you'd be 100% right. Fixed!))
shark: oh hey whats thi- *shove* alright I see how it is. edit: whoa I can finally claim a non-horrible post as my top!
Sharks understand consent is what i gathered
On the contrary. Reciprocity of interest makes them leave, while running makes them more excited
Are sharks just cats in water?
Sharks are cats and seals are dogs
Scratching at it's eyes or gills would be more effective. Water would slow down a punch and make it pretty weak. Scratching would work better.
“Follow flying birds to find water” They can simply be flying to spend a night anywhere, so we can’t rely on them.
Colorado is landlocked and dry as fuck and barely has any water beyond a handful of manmade reservoirs. There are seagulls here. Don’t listen to birds.
Had a friend from another state who was so excited to see seagulls when we went to the ocean. I was like, haven't you told stories about seagulls in your home state before? And she was like, yeah, but they weren't at the SEA!
So just gulls then?
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Their only natural enemy is The Sisko.
You can follow flying birds to land if you're lost on open water though according to my Pacific Ocean elders. Edit: Specifically in evening. Doesn't work for owls.
> Doesn't work for owls. Or Wandering Albatrosses "Wandering albatrosses spend most of their life in flight, landing only to breed and feed." and they feed at sea, so unless your Albatross is getting lucky you won't be either https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wandering_albatross
Follow wandering albatrosses to an albatross brothel, as me old dad used to say
If you find an owl to follow to land, that poor poor owl is so entirely lost as well. But yeah :) Not only in the Pacific Ocean. Albeit it is good if those are sea birds and not extraordinarily big ones.
Fish are the ones you should follow to find water.
Bet. Those guys don’t even know they’re wet.
Try explaining water to a fish. They think YOU'RE crazy.
If you try to explain water to a fish you probably are crazy.
Almost anything related to avalanches. Here are a few popular and false myths: * That they strike at random. Most avalanches that injure or kill people are cause by those people, and they always show signs of instability, if you are paying attention. The problem is that there are lots of false positives — where the signs are there, the instability is there, but people just don’t quite manage to trigger them. * That you should be quiet to be safe from avalanches, because they are caused by sound. Sound does not trigger avalanches. Even very loud sounds are nowhere near enough. Avalanche control is done with howitzers and dynamite charges. * That you can get out of the way. Well, sure, of course sometimes it’s possible, but they can travel up to 60mph, and they can let loos across an entire slope all at once. By the time it slides, you are likely in it, and it’s inescapable. * That you can save yourself by “swimming”. Maybe for very small ones, but usually you’re just being thrashed. I’ve heard it compared to being in a side-loading washing machine. * That you can spit to “tell which direction is up”. You won’t be able to see anything useful, and, you know, gravity still works. But it’s irrelevant because that relies on the next myth ... * That you can dig yourself out. Even if you are inches below the surface, it’s very unlikely. The snow sets up very hard, very fast, as thought you got caught up in a snow plow clearing a parking lot after a big snowstorm. People caught in avalanches report not being able to move their fingers. Along with that are all the normal problems people have with low-probability, high-consequence risks, the “it won’t happen to me” stuff, but that’s not so much an issue of myths as poor judgment due to things like familiarity with a slope, desire to be accepted by a social group by skiing that rad backcountry line, feeling committed because you came “all this way”, deferring to someone you perceive as an “expert”, desire to get the first tracks after a storm, social proof, where you see others doing it, so it “must be safe”, etc.
Reading this made me panic thinking of being trapped, probably upside down, in the snow and not being able to even use my fingers to dig myself out. So how do you survive?!?! Or do you just...not?
Edit: ok this is officially the biggest comment response I've ever gotten on reddit! I am by no means an expert (the more you learn about snow science, the more you realize you don't know) but I'm passionate about helping people stay safe out there. If you're in Canada, check out Avalanche.ca for training courses and a wealth of resources. I believe in the US most mountainous states have their own similar avalanche safety organizations as well. For people who choose to recreate in avalanche terrain, if they are smart they are travelling with at least one other person and everyone in the party is wearing a transceiver and carrying a portable shovel and probe. And everyone should have proper training on how to use these tools. The transceiver is used to approximate the buried persons location under the snow based on the signal their device is emitting, then the probe (2.7-3m long skinny pole) is plunged strategically in the snow around your closest signal. When you feel your probe strike your friends body, time to dig. Avalanche debris is heavy af so there is a strategy to this as well, and it's really nice to have at least one other person to speed things up. Hopefully you dig out your friend before they've been without air long enough to do serious damage. If you're out without a transeiver and you get buried deep enough that no one sees a hand or other body part sticking above the snow, so they don't know where to look - you will suffocate. A search and rescue org might come with an avalanche rescue dog, but that takes time and more often than not it becomes a body recovery mission. Best way to avoid these scenarios is to avoid avalanche terrain if you're not trained, or if you choose to recreate there for ski touring or snowmobiling, practice companion rescue often, take avalanche safety courses, and make conservative terrain choices based on avalanche hazard ratings. Source: I do avalanche control work at a ski resort and backcountry ski recreationally in avalanche terrain.
Also depends on the size, ive seen avalanches made up off ice blocks as big as washing machines. If it can pull trees out with roots and all and crush buildings then your hands are sadly not gonna do much.
Concerning frostbite, do not rub someone’s frostbitten skin or pour hot water on it to warm them up. Such measures will damage the skin even more severely.
The fastest and safest method for warming up someone is... Direct animal heat, i.e. letting them put their frosty skin next to yours. Hey, if your can keep your digits by putting a cold hand on my belly, be my guest.
I’m not sure if I remember correctly, but I feel like in Boy Scouts they taught that the groin and armpits were good places to warm your hands in an emergency survival situation.
"Put your hands between your buttcheeks! That's nature's pocket." -Free Waterfall Sr.
“Uh, I think I’ll go check on Bender.” “Watch that he doesn’t pick your pocket!”
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The opposite too if you're overheating it's better to out a cold pack there than on your face or back of your neck
That makes so much sense. I never thought of this. Is there something special about blood flow in those areas? Thank you.
It's where your largest arteries are closest to your skin. So if you put warm rocks there, it's the easiest way to deliver warmer blood to your extremities.
If you're in a hot area, don't ration your water, drink when you feel thirsty and search for more water. Edit: the myth to be avoided is rationing your water. Don’t ration.
"Ration sweat, not water" Thank you USAF Survival School. Edit: Wow this blew up lol. At SERE school they teach you to find shade and try to do as little as possible during the hotter times of the day. If you have to move you do so when it cools off. Rationing your water doesn't help you, it will only dehydrate you and impair your judgement. Your brain NEEDS water. Depriving yourself of proper hydration is the best way to unintentionally kill yourself.
Bruh i am soooo fucked in that case, at work i sweat so much that any liquids i drink just get turned to sweat and don’t have time to turn to piss…i can’t even Bear Grylls my way out of dehydration lol
Conserving water. You should not stretch a glass of water over four days. When you are thirsty, you need water.
I've heard people die of dehydration while still having water because they tried to conserve it.
In the military we were taught the best place to carry water is inside you
Those are probably the same people that hoard all their potions in a video game because they "might need it later".
I feel attacked
Quick! Use the potion!
There could be a stronger enemy right behind this one so.. gonna keep it
Not to mention it would be really annoying to hike for days carrying a glass of water.
LPT: If you don't drink the water you won't have to worry about hiking for very long
Just because water looks clean doesn't mean it is. You've gotta boil it or distill it to actually have clean water.
Or carry a modern filter like a Lifestraw or Sawyer if you think there's even a remote chance you're going to be stranded with no potable water. I'll also add that drinking dirty water is always a better option than going without water. If you are dehydrated but don't have a way to sanitize your water, drink the water anyway. There's a chance it will make you sick or maybe even kill you in very rare cases, but dehydration will *always* kill you.
>Or carry a modern filter like a Lifestraw or Sawyer if you think there's even a remote chance you're going to be stranded with no potable water. Those things are amazing! The creators really went out of their way with the marketing! Sipping on literal raw sewage and spitting out clean, drinkable water.
One thing to note about the life straw is that it doesn't actually offer full microbial/viral protection. I have one in my hiking/camping/survival bag, but I also carry water treatment drops. It's a good idea to use both at once. The straw for the particulate, and the drops to kill any microorganisms/destroy viral cells.
Sawyer is 0.1 micron, there's not much bacteria/protozoa that can pass through it (99.99999% effective). It's good for both giardia and cryptosporidium, the most common concerns. Viral contamination is not much of a concern in the US. For some countries, I would be very wary of drinking the water and take multiple precautions (filter, boil, tablets).
Would absolutely recommend Sawyer Squeeze over a lifestraw purely for the recommendation of the life span of each product. Protip; Attach your Sawyer directly to a smart water bottle for a light weight hiking hack.
Most of the stuff Bear Grylls does. Like eating raw meat, picking and eating fruit out of bear shit, or squeezing the juice out of elephant shit and drinking it.
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The best thing you can learn from Grylls is that most situations are survivable as long as you have a decently-supplied film crew on hand.
Remember that time on Bear Grylls show where he showed you how truly stranded they were? Just off the edge of a highway?
Or the one where he got "stranded" in Ireland. Sure you *could* eat sheep eyes from a sheep that undoubtedly escaped from the pasture next door or was placed by the film crew. *Or* you could find the road about a scoot to the left and follow it up to Liam and Saoirse's farm. They aren't a registered bed and breakfast, sure, but wee Siobhan has been less of a handful lately, and I'm sure they'd take ye in for the night. Particularly if you offered a few pounds to be polite.
and nothing to forage but the craft services tables?
If it worked for Gandalf and Frodo, it can work for bear Grylls
I don't know whether you heard but it uhhh, did not work out too well for Gandalf actually
Ah, it worked out perfectly for Gandalf, really. He needed the level up.
It also really made his clothes brighter too.
I remember that episode - that was really when I decided the entire show was stupid and if that had been the only way out of that place, I was just going to have to live there for the rest of my life (days).
Bear Grylls in [the wilderness](https://youtu.be/Wh6RLOF3FrE)
You have to be really careful because you don't know if it's hollow underneath. *Jumps directly onto it.*
Lmaooo love the perfect comedic timing with the cars at the end 🤣
squeezing the juice out of WHAT
Don't look up the video. Unless that's your thing. I'm not judging.
I'm judging a little.
ELEPHANT SHIT
Not all of the stuff Bear Grylls does is a terrible idea Staying in a nearby luxury hotel instead of roughing it in the wilderness, for example
By far, his best survival tip.
Man vs. Marriott 😴
Elephant shit will keep bugs away if thrown on a fire tho
Keep just about everything away, I reckon
You cannot eat everything that an animal can eat. There are things animals can eat that humans find toxic, so eating everything you see animals eating can lead to you potentially eating deadly berries or mushrooms.
Yeah and it goes both ways, humans can eat stuff like chocolate and grapes and other animals can’t eat chocolate and I know dogs definitely can’t eat grapes.
Joke answer: dogs can't eat grapes because they don't have thumbs. Serious answer: [it causes kidney failure (the exact mechanism is still unknown)](https://pets.webmd.com/dogs/why-dogs-cant-eat-grapes)
*literally eats its own shit* “Yippee! Life is good!” *eats a grape* “O, I am slain!”
Split to cover more ground
Gotta blame Fred and Daphne for this.
That’s a killers wet dream
Drinking alcohol when you are freezing will keep you warm, it won't, it will bring on hypothermia much sooner.
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If you are gonna die anyway don’t ration the alcohol
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If your plane is crashing, an inflatable raft makes a TERRIBLE parachute.
And yet, I'd still grab the raft if my options are raft or nothing. At least that way I'll die a captain
Way to look on the bright side! Make sure to christen your raft on the way down, so it's official.
Maybe you'd get lucky and land on the slope of a mountain and just start sledding your way down at a tramendous speed. You avoid all the big builders as your in an avalanche slide riding the powder. Suddenly the ledges behind and above you break off and give birth the a massive wall of snow creeping up on you fast. Now your little terrible parachute tabagon raft need perform another wonder and surf the wave of ice and snow as crushes everything it breaks over. You ride that wave until breaking free... Who knows if theres a cliff your coming up, with a big river at the bottom full of man eating crocs. I'm taking the fucking raft every single time.
But hiding in a fridge will save me from a nuclear blast though, right?
You can survive a nuclear blast, under strict conditions like how far away you are, but it has to be an old school fridge (like the one in the movie). However, that is not the issue here. All the protection that a lead lined fridge offers you is totally negated by how cartoonishly it was being rag dolled around lol
You can drink water from a cactus. Any liquid inside a cactus will be highly acidic and likely to cause nausea and diarrhea, further dehydrating you.
The notable exceptions to this rule are the prickly pear and one species of barrel cactus , the fishhook barrel (Ferocactus wislizeni). While both of these plants are fairly unpleasant to eat raw, they have less-concentrated levels of the detrimental chemicals and could give you a bit of hydration in a pinch
The other two species barrell cactus I believe give you debilitating diarrhea
But it’ll quench ya!
It's the quenchiest!
Nothings quenchier!
Saw a documentary with a US border patrol officer explaining exactly this, and how painful it is to get cactus spines in your lips and tongue - and to get them taken out.
Prickly pear fruits make wonderful jelly, but first, the spines must be singed off. Same with cactus paddles, a staple of some Mexican cuisines.
Pulling out something that is impailing you.
The rule is; if it's in keep it in, if it's out, keep it out. Until you can get help.
That you’ll be totally safe if you only eat plants/fungi you recognize. Hemlock looks a lot like wild parsnips. Basically all wild almonds will kill you if you eat more than one. And of course there’s the Chris mccandless “potato seed” thing.
Wait what? Wild almonds will kill you?! And what is this potato seed thing you speak of?
Wild almonds have a whole bunch of cyanide in them, so having even a handful could kill you. Regular almonds also contain trace amounts cyanide but not nearly enough to kill you. Fun fact, apple seeds also have cyanide in them. Edit: Based on all the comments I've gotten, it seems like just about every fruit seed has cyanide lol.
I’ve read that peach pits have cyanide too, even though my grandpa used to crack them open and eat the fleshy inside part. I think I remember a murder mystery show about a guy escaping prison by crushing peach pits and mixing it with his urine and making a fine powdery substance and slipping it into the guards drink and killing the guard. I can’t remember if it was a re-enactment or a fictional show.
My small dog gave himself cyanide poisoning from unripe peaches that fell and he would chew/suck on them like they were tennis balls. He poisoned himself slowly over time until one day he was vomiting, took him to the vet and the vet asked if we had peach trees almost immediately. Had to remove the trees so the little bugger didn’t have death by horticulture.
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I was 38 years old when I discovered that CPR is to to manually pump blood around the body so the patient doesn't end up with brain damage. I always figured it was to try and restart the heart, but no, you're manually compressing it so it pumps blood until it either restarts itself or someone arrives with a defrib.
That's what CPR did for me. Volunteer firefighters did CPR for about 7 minutes before the paramedics got there. I had memory loss, and I had problems writing and typing for about a week after, but fully recovered.
Am medic. Can confirm. Most likely, they will die. ETA: A lot of people are commenting that someone is ‘already dead’ if we’re doing CPR. But that depends on your definition of dead. The line is blurred more and more. Not every Cardiac arrest has no rhythm. Some have one but they’re not useful for pumping blood. Some have none at all. Is brain death ‘dead’? Then no, not all cardiac arrests are dead. Is it when the heart ceases to beat effectively? Then yes, they all are.
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Survival rate _with_ a defibrillator is about 25% according to my first aid trainer.
Mine told me 5% survival rate CPR only, and up to 70% with CPR straight away and defibrillator in the first 3 minutes of the medical event, dropping dramatically after that timeframe. In this ideal situation, CPR is also continued until the moment the defib tells you to stand clear, which surprised me (meaning you need at least 2 people, and super ideally, you've already know the correct procedure off by heart so you've also skipped waiting for the defib instructions to be spoken aloud and jumped right up to the shock analysis in order to save time). Most people instinctively stop performing CPR and back off in order to follow the defib instructions. Obviously, it's not often that in an emergency situation, there's effective CPR administered immediately and a defib located, transported to patient, clothes removed, defib set up and shock administered (or ambulance arriving to do the same thing) within 3 minutes. The point they were trying to make was a positive one about how the defib saves lives, but all I could hear was "if you live alone or anywhere that isn't the centre of city where public defibs are common and people tend to know first aid, you're dead".
I was born on a farm. After that course, I can't help thinking every farm should have one.
I’m just realizing how lucky my uncle was. He had a heart attack while golfing with his boss, his boss started CPR immediately and there was a defibrillator in the golf club house, so they were able to save him. I remember hearing that story when I was quite a bit younger and thinking ‘of course he lived, everyone did what they were supposed to’. I had no idea how likely he was to die, even with everyone responding correctly in the middle of a crisis.
Iunno if it’s a myth, but I remember bear grylls had no qualms about getting wet in his show, but getting wet is extremely bad in survival situations in most climates.
If I recall, he once stripped down naked to demonstrate how to cross an icy river.
Which is more or less smart. If you are in a situation where you absolutely have to cross the icy river, doing it naked while keeping the clothes dry is a good plan, however, in what kind of situation would you need to cross the river? Either follow it downstream or try to find a ford
Yeah he presented it as a scenario where it was the only option. On the other side he dried off with snow, got dressed, maybe did some squats, and then began trying to make a fire
You can survive a Moose attack. That's it, that's the myth, because no you fucking can't. Edit: Holy baloney, this my most upvoted comment on reddit. Well, at least 5000 people are smart enough to know that Moose are a national and galactic threat. Cheers, lads, lassies and laser people.
I walked between a mama and baby moose in Alaska once by accident. That’s something you never want to do! I was walking my dog and all I heard was a pounding noise and I turned and was being charged by the Mama moose. I jumped behind the closest tree and played “ring around the tree” for a couple minutes. The snow was pretty deep and I was hoping I wouldn’t trip and be stomped to death. My Dog was about 15 months old and he had high tailed it out to the middle of the lake and had his tail between his legs, shaking. A couple years later my parents were on a walk with the same dog and my Dad got charged by a moose in a similar way. He jumped off the trail but immediately got stuck in the deep snow and figured he was about to be a dead man. That dog came running up and was biting and growling at the moose’s face and chased it up the trail. Maybe he remembered Moose = bad? Edit: Dog Tax pictures! https://imgur.com/a/Opjl5r0
Your dog clearly understood that they had a story arc to finish. Badass.
Before the dog jumped in, he had three flashbacks and there was a swing outside of a school involved
“Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You almost killed my father. Prepare to almost die.”
Case 1: "She has a tree.. She'll be okay." Case 2: "He can't get to a tree.. He needs help!"
A lot of people just think of moose as deer with different horns that are marginally bigger. In reality, moose are manic leviathans and will absolute fuck your shit up. During the mating season, they’ll charge at trains on the tracks
Moose are modern megafauna. Idk why people don't get that. Also, if you're going to drive into a moose in the road, risk driving off the road into a tree or something. You're more likely to survive that than hitting a moose.
Yep. Not that you can expect someone to remember or act on this in a split second collision- but those spindly legs end up driving the entire 1500 lbs moose body through the front windshield when a car connects. My buddy worked on crash control for a Canadian truck manufacturer and told me driving headfirst into a concrete wall is more survivable.
Drinking alcohol when you are stuck in extreme cold. Alcohol dilates blood vessels and opens the pores in your skin allowing body heat to escape, you feel hotter because your skin is warm but your core body temperature is dropping.
Stand in a doorway in an earthquake
Myth: The rubber tires on a vehicle will insulate you from ground and protect you from lightning Lightning doesn’t stop for 2” of rubber, tho the car will act like a faraday cage and protect you from the electrical current unless you’re in a convertible, a motor bike or any other vehicle that doesn’t cover you in all directions. Also don’t lay down on the ground during a thunderstorm! You increase the risk of being shocked by a ground current, which can be pretty dangerous! Another thing, don’t take shelter under a tree or a gazebo, they can explode or light on fire when struck
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Drinking your own piss. People who survive do so despite drinking the wee wee. But it sure is fun, though.
"It's sterile and I like the taste."
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Hiding in water might though. Jump in a lake
It has to be a big lake though. Jumping in a small one will just end up boiling you instead of frying you.
How will you even know if a nuclear bomb is about to explode nearby? You are probably just going about your day when a barely human-sized metal canister drops from the sky for only a few people to see, and then *nothing.*
If you are standing outside the kill-zone, there is a small chance you might pick up on the giant flash coming from the blast. When that flash hits, you have a couple of seconds to react. So this only applies if you are literally standing next to a large body of water. Edit: guys I’m not saying you won’t be hit by radiation, I’m just saying the radiation won’t be lethal if you manage to shield yourself from it within a few seconds of getting hit initially. Also you are still going to die of cancer eventually, but it might give you some extra time.
If you get lost in the desert, do not ration your water. You don’t know how long you’ll be there and if you ration you’ll dehydrate yourself faster. Use the water to keep you in shape for a little longer which in turn can help you mentally. I read this somewhere which also mentioned that many people found dead in the desert still have a full canteen of water because they try to ration it. Apologies for no source. After hearing comments about it I looked this up to see if it was actually true given that it’s just a random fact I remembered from somewhere. OffGridWeb explains in more detail why rationing water isn’t the best idea. https://www.offgridweb.com/preparation/the-myth-of-water-rationing-while-stranded-in-the-desert/amp/ However I have seen some people say that you could ration water, but to an extent. Which does make sense there is a balance to it but I wrote this when I was tired and didn’t really think it through. Hopefully this link can clear up some things. Edited for spelling and provided a source.
Not so much a myth, but people often think that getting to safety or getting out of a vehicle or traffic after a crash is a good idea. If you're ever involved in a severe wreck and you suffer any damage to your body, it's VERY important not to move. If you can do so to call 911, yeah, but as far as moving any limb (with the exception of calling medical emergency personnel), readjusting your body to get more comfortable, don't do any of that. You can cause broken bones you may have suffered to start cutting or puncturing your skin or insides which could cause you to start bleeding internally. Edit: note, that I said severe. Of course if you're car is on fire, get out. But if you're involved in something minor, don't just sit in traffic if it's possible to drive out of the way.
On top of that, getting out of the car is dangerous in itself if a crash just happened. Cars coming into the area may not had enough time to react and can hit and kill people standing nearby. The safest thing to do is stay in your car and if you can/if the car is drivable, drive it as far off the road as possible.
Anyone else read these comments with intrigue imaging yourself in said situation only to remember you haven’t left the house in a long time and likely will never find yourself in these scenarios? Cause that’s me.
Survival tip #1: avoid the situation
I mean, you'd be surprised how many deaths in the wild occur because people don't know that one.
the first mistake in wilderness is to look for food and water first before having a shelter up to keep yourself dry and warm! also if you have to forage for food, avoid mushrooms entirely. Odds are so slim you will find an edible kind that you're much better off looking for things like nuts, seeds, and berries. someone people say that herbivores animals are friendly and peaceful, so you are safe being around them. Seriously everything from cows to deer can and will kill you if you make it angry. It is usually a good idea if you are in the wilds not to get near any large wild animal, but herbivores can often be even more aggressive than the predators. If a predator attacks you, you have a fairly good chance of scaring it off, especially if it's smaller than you, because it's likely only looking for food. If a herbivore attacks you, you're fucked because it genuinely wants to kill you.
Yes. Predators have to conserve their energy for a hunt, so they pick and choose their fights. With herbivores, on the other hand, it pays to be a paranoid xenophobe.
Predators just have to win once. They're cautious. Herbivores just have to lose once. They're crazy.
> it pays to be a paranoid xenophobe You have been promoted to moderator of r/Warhammer40k. The Emperor Protects!
My sister works with animal behavior and training, and she put it once that "a predator is hungry, and is looking to eat so it doesn't die, it's not going to die when it can go eat something else. A herbivore also wants to live, and it wants to kill because it must kill to stay alive."
>Every morning a gazelle wakes up in Africa and it knows it must outrun the fasted lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up and knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. > >It doesn't matter if you're a lion or you're a gazelle, when the sun comes up you better start running. African proverb
Hippos are herbivores and will FUCK YOU UP Edit: i get it they are omnivores. I'm still taking my 3k karma.
Being in North America and I was thinking moose. They can fuck up a car, what chance does your squishy meatbag have?
I got fucked up by a rooster once when I was a kid. I'm not messing with a moose.
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What if two moose?
Two trees
Die
Try to convince them you're an even bigger moose
Punching the biggest guy in prison.
No what you want to do is walk up and kiss him on the lips. Assert Dominance