Low-cost prepping for power outages using solar and other items.

Natural hazards, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, landslides, wildfires and droughts are increasing in frequency and intensity, in large part because of climate change (M. Coronese et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 116, 21450–21455; 2019). In 2022, at least one event occurred every day, according to data from EM-DAT, an international disaster database. And a 2021 report from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization stated that the “annual occurrence of disasters is now more than three times that of the 1970s and 1980s” (see go.nature.com/43pmeke).

But natural-hazard events don’t necessarily have to escalate into widespread disasters. Even though they are more common today than they were in the past, the number of deaths from them has drastically declined. In 1920–29, for example, more than 8.5 million people died globally as a result of natural disasters, compared with just over 503,000 in 2010–19, according to data from EM-DAT. This can be attributed partly to improvements in disaster risk reduction and preparedness measures. Nature talked to five disaster researchers about how they are working to reduce the risks and impacts of natural-hazard events.

"Organizations that are used to their local weather patterns tend to only plan for those patterns," Yu said. "When those patterns change, administrators now have to address new disaster possibilities that they might not have invested resources into. These include wildfires, blizzards or massive power grid failure."

A good place to start with data backups in general is to follow the 3-2-1-1 rule. A modified version of the traditional 3-2-1 rule, the 3-2-1-1 rule recommends three copies of data, including the original plus two backup copies; two different types of storage media; one copy kept off site to protect against localized disasters; and one copy kept offline in immutable storage to protect against ransomware.

Everyone should have a “grid-down” protocol, said Jason Charles, a former New York City firefighter who posts survival tips as the Angry Prepper on social media. Supplies should be customized to meet certain residential and health conditions.

https://lemmy.world/post/2313051

With all these fires going around and the potential of house fires a quick question about gas masks.

Is the RD40 40mm thread EN-148-1 the same as the STANAG 4155 Nato thread?

Would a draeger rd 40 filter fit a MP5 Gas mask ? Or a military nbc filter fit a draeger x-plore-6300?

Edit: Just want to know if the civilian and mil spec threading is identical.

Colorado family members die trying to live 'off the grid'

The group - including the sisters who were in their 40s - had no outdoor survival experience and had watched online videos to learn about how to survive in Colorado's rugged backcountry ...

What do you think? How useful is ham radio in emergency comms?

In North American boreal forests, several million hectares can go up in smoke in a single year. On the other hand, these forest fires can seem almost negligible for several consecutive years. During the past 60 years, the area annually affected by forest fires has increased, presumably because of climate change. Or at least that’s part of the explanation.

However, to better understand the long-term trends it is important to take a step back. This is the work our team of forest and fire ecology specialists recently carried out.

The results of our research contradict the common wisdom about North American boreal forests — that they burned more in the past than they do today. But before we go into more detail about this, we feel it’s important to provide some background and context.

Seasonal forecasters are warning it means you need to prepare for a more uncertain forecast for the rest of the season with the potential for more storms and stronger ones.

The “bunker/shelter” would be used for “some event where 50%-99.99% of people die,” said a memo exchanged between Bankman-Fried’s brother, Gabriel, and an officer at FTX’s philanthropy arm, according to the court document. “Probably there are other things it’s useful to do with a sovereign country, too,” it said. Bankman-Fried’s lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.

“This really shows how much billionaire doomsday prepping is really about fantasy,” Calum Matheson, a professor at the University of Pittsburgh who has studied preppers, said of the FTX plans. For the rich, “doomsday is a fantasy to play with, but they can always keep it at a distance.” It is simply “entertainment,” he said.

I wonder if this could be sustainable for permaculture and for growing urban/suburban vegetable gardens.

A WWII-era concrete bunker once used to protect Britain against incoming Luftwaffe attacks has been transformed into a remarkable vacation home in southern England. Corstorphine & Wright, along with engineers Symmetrys, worked to retain the character of the bunker, while adding a comfortable interior, including a "bomb blast" glazed opening to provide superb views of the coastline.

According to investigators, he had been talking about surviving in the wilderness and "going off the grid" before he disappeared.

They say James might have two survival guidebooks with him that his father, Bill Yoblonski, had bought him, as well as a firearm.

Pre-pandemic preppers tend to be associated with an irrational fear of “doomsday”, while those who stocked up on vital goods during the pandemic have been (often unfairly) portrayed as hoarders. We propose a new kind of prepping, without the anticipation of doomsday and the stigma of hoarding. Here are four ways to become a responsible prepper.

The United Nations Security Council held its first meeting on artificial intelligence on Tuesday where China said the technology should not become a "runaway horse.”

The United States warned against its use to censor or repress people.

Britain's Foreign Secretary James Cleverly warned that the technology fuels disinformation and could aid both state and non-state actors in a quest for weapons.

Russia questioned whether the council, which is charged with maintaining international peace and security, should be discussing AI.

North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea Wednesday in what appeared to be a statement of defiance as the United States deployed a nuclear-armed submarine to South Korea for the first time in decades.

The launches came as the U.S. and the U.S.-led United Nations Command worked to resolve the highly unusual situation involving a U.S. soldier who crossed into North Korea while on a tour of a border village Tuesday afternoon.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said that from 3:30 to 3:46 a.m. North Korea fired two missiles from an area near the capital Pyongyang that flew about 550 kilometers (341 miles) before landing in waters east of the Korean Peninsula.

The Japanese military said the missiles landed outside of Japan’s exclusive economic zone and no damage to ships or aircraft was reported.

The flight distance of the two missiles roughly matched the distance between Pyongyang and the South Korean port city of Busan, where the USS Kentucky arrived Tuesday afternoon in the first visit by a U.S. nuclear-armed submarine to South Korea since the 1980s.

Pentagon spokesperson Brigadier General Pat Ryder said on Thursday that the US was "aware that [the balloon] had intelligence collection capabilities".

But "it has been our assessment now that it did not collect while it was transiting the United States or over flying the United States".

He said the efforts the US took to mitigate any intelligence gathering "contributed" to the balloon's failure to gather sensitive information.

Gen Ryder did not confirm a Wall Street Journal report that American-made equipment was part of the balloon, but he said that Chinese drones in the past have used off-the-shelf US equipment.

TL;DR: New owner found the previous owner's stash and wants to convert the room back into a movie/theater room.

TBH, If I were the new owner, I would just keep whatever supplies are still good, probably reorder the room a bit, and use extra space for other things as intended by the new owner. Disposing of the entire prepper stash would be a waste, IMHO.

The two scenarios he gave as examples, and we promise we're not making this up, were a "super contagious" lab-modified virus "being released" onto the world population and "AI that attacks us."

OK, so COVID already happened (the interview mentioned was supposedly pre-COVID). I wonder if Altman's openAI or other AI tech end up attacking us, too.

"Oppenheimer" is a historical film, but the threat posed by nuclear weapons is very real today. Nine countries now have nuclear weapons, with the United States and Russia possessing about 90% of the world’s nearly 13,000 weapons.

You might be tempted to think you would be safe if nuclear weapons were used halfway across the globe from your location. Sure, you would be able to avoid the immediate blast effects, but you would experience the after-effects. There is significant evidence that the entire globe could be impacted by even a small-scale nuclear war.

For example, one study assessed the global effects of a “limited” nuclear war between India and Pakistan, revealing that the fires produced in the conflict would send so much soot into the atmosphere that the sun’s rays would be diminished for years. This would result in reduced global temperatures, which in turn would cause widespread crop failures and worldwide famine, potentially affecting billions of people.

Jet streams are relatively narrow bands of strong wind in the upper atmosphere, typically occurring around 30,000 feet, and blowing west to east. Their normal flows lead to week-to-week weather variations, modulated in the mid-latitudes by ridges and troughs in the jet stream. A high-pressure ridge, for example, produces clear, warmer weather conditions; a trough is typically followed by stormy conditions. Together, these form waves in the jet stream that can stall as the waves grow and become more amplified, causing "stuck" weather patterns that produce longer storms and heat waves.

New research published in Nature Communications describes observations linking increased warming at high latitudes and the ever-decreasing snow cover in North America to these stalls in atmospheric circulation.

South Korea's president vowed Monday to "completely overhaul" the country's approach to extreme weather from climate change after at least 40 people were killed by recent flooding and landslides during monsoon rains. Rescue workers waded through thick mud as they drained a flooded underpass in central Cheongju, searching for more victims after vehicles were trapped in the tunnel by flash floods, the interior ministry said, with nine people still missing nationwide.

South Korea is at the peak of its summer monsoon season, and days of torrential rain have caused widespread flooding and landslides, with rivers bursting their banks, and reservoirs and dams overflowing. More rain is forecast in the coming days.

Paywalled, but of course you can use reader mode to read the text.

The scientists think changes to working hours would be especially beneficial for people for those working outdoors or in buildings not designed to withstand extreme temperatures.

But even in workspaces equipped with the cool breeze of air conditioning units, the researchers warn of a “vicious cycle” where people burn more fossil fuels to provide energy for air con which then heats the climate still further, requiring more energy. So even office workers would do well to clock out earlier.