SHTF in a big city.

[05redtaco]

What would you do if **** hits the fan in a big city? Try to get out of the city or stay in a try to ride it out?

Here is what you have;

Your only food is what you have in a fridge and cupboards.

You have SKS with 100rounds, full size hand gun .40 S&W with 600 rounds and pocket pistol in .380ACP with 30 rounds.

You have a 2x4 truck and passenger car.

You have a wife, couple of children and a dog.

You live in the middle of a big city, New York, Las Vegas, Chicago, Phoenix for example.

You only have $500 in the bank, no cash at home.

Give me the best scenario based on those conditions.

[Rocketvapor]

Make friends, both in and out of the city. It wouldn't take much of a disaster to lose water, heat, cooling, access to food.  Building integrity could be lost due to fire or explosion putting you on the street.  It may come gradually with no job then no money or all of a sudden with stores looted and no food or gasoline available.  Streets would be a big crime scene within 24 hrs.  You need at least one month of food and water just to make it through something like a storm that destroys infrastructure. Law enforcement, if they didn't jump ship and leave will be spread thin and not be able to tell the difference between the bad guys and the good guys.
A valid plan B requires a viable alternative to everything you need to survive. 

[bobbers]

I'm not sure there IS a "best scenario" with what's been outlined.  What was described is an unprepared situation, no good comes of those.

[Chip Hazard]

Know several ways out of the city and then look at how everyone else is trying to get out and then go the opposite direction- stay low, out of sight, and  and hope for the best.

Not much else you can do in a scenario like that

[washburnizer]

Seems as if the guy in the scenario has already failed by having failed to prepare.

[tinman762]

Read a blog called SHTF School. Guy who writes it survived a year in a major city during the Yugoslavian Civil War. There's a lot of good information in there, especially the urban stuff which would apply more to you than to a more rural dweller.


I'd stock up on ammo.

[wolfgang2000]

I doubt you would live in any of the cities you mentioned with those guns.  And if you are caught walking around with a SKS in NYNY the cops will proably turn you into a pinata. 

Cities are not necessarily a death trap.  Not all of New Orleans was a free for all.  At least not till the government started taking law bidding citizens guns away.  There were many sections where neighbors banded together and did quite well. 

I've lived through some of the worst hurricanes to hit the gulf coast, in cities from 250,000 to 1 million.  A lot depends on the type of neighbors you have. 

Also planning goes a long way, as well as situational awareness.  i.e. keeping up on current events.  (A storm is coming, the market is in free fall, etc.)  The odds favor a natural event to cause a infrastructure disruption.  Right now they are worried about earth quakes and possable tsunami on the left coast. 

If a family wants to they can easily prep for an event in a city.  9 times out of 10 you will never fire a shot during a disaster.  Granted there are exceptions.  I agree that if a national event such as an EMP all bets are off.  Again the odds favor a natural event. 

[jason bourne]

In a big city, under the provisions you listed. your better off staying put locked in your house for a day or two, once the masses have exited or failed trying you could either attempt to go hunt for food and supplies, or leave.

I live in Miami, we have constant traffic. We are severely over populated. when it rains people forget how to drive. There is practically zero compassion for one and another (this is sad but true, there is only a handful of genuine good people left). If a SHTF scenario were to come up. Fortifying the house and setting up camp would be the only option. Hurricane Andrew was a prime example of this.

You need to to take at least "100" of the "500" and keep it in your house, broken into smaller bills.
You need to have at least 3-4 weeks of supplies (usually A LOT more, but understanding in the city, storage space is a problem), and more ammo certainly wouldn't hurt. I would have a b.o.b ready for every member of the family in the event you do have to leave without notice.

[jwperry]

SHTF is kind of a broad stroke.

Zombie apocalypse? Kiss your loved ones as you're all dead.

LA Lakers won the championship and the fans are rioting again? Wait a few days and they'll all go away until next season.

Natural disaster has cut off food/water/fuel to your AO? Hold tight, wish you would have spent less money on your 600 rounds of 40S&W and more on water filters and nonperishable canned foods.

If you're in a major metropolitan area, you need to get out before all hell breaks loose, otherwise your best bet is to shut in and wait for the crazy to expand to areas where you aren't.

[ranger1968]

 As others have said ....

  If it's a shorter term event , like a storm, localized civil unrest, etc, hunker down; reinforce your physical security a bit by having things like metal shutters or think plywood pre-cut and easy to install to limit access , stock in things like food , water, etc,  and stay inside and ride it out;

   For a longer term event-  a major societal collapse, with the power being out indefinitely, and widespread unrest, bug out; a large urban or suburban population area is the last place you want to be, because you will have too many people competing for too few resources.....It's simply going to be an untenable situation, and while it may be survivable, the risk of remaining is unacceptable if you can plan ahead enough to have the option to be someplace else. .....

 

[wolfgang2000]

I'll add one other point. 

If you are bugging out, you have to have a place to bug out to.  Other wise you will just be 1 in thousands of refugees.  You might want to do some research on what happen to civilians in Europe during WWII.

[Rocketvapor]

Maybe just head on over to the government shelter that will probably be set up.
Might not be able to bring your guns or pet and they might separate you based on gender, but would be better than , um, uh, aw - - -

[Gibson_GM]

That is truly an unprepared scenario!  But millions live on LESS than that level.  Everyone (basically) in a city is in worse shape than the OP.   So - I would get a few hundred more rounds for each firearm - always with the intent to NOT use any of them, to NOT be seen....go heavy on food, and esp. potable water AND a means to purify water.  Bleach works great (after straining - coffee filter, etc)...but will NOT remove chemical contaminants.  A filter is best.  You may be sorry without one.
   
Make is so you can exist for at LEAST 1 month without leaving the apartment (that is a good test).  What would you do with your SEWAGE?  Need a plan for that, too! Very important.

Then - as stated - FORTIFY.  Have a way to secure the apartment that is extremely hard to defeat!  That must be in place before anything occurred.  Windows too!   

In the 'event', you would remain GRAY.  That means no lights after dark...silent running, like Anne Frank. 

Honestly, were I in that situation, I'd know every route out of the place to quieter country.  The NON-MAJOR routes.  And as suggested, would try to choose the 'road not taken' if I had to leave.   I would rather get out than stay!  And would travel unobtrusively - NO showing the guns!  Moving at night...that kind of thing. 

Bad situation. 

[Mancat]

I hope OP doesn't actually live in a big city because he's probably screwed with what he has IMO.

My take on it, is you have a couple choices that each suck in their own way:

1. Drop everything and leave in advance or immediately when EVENT happens. You lose whatever sort of prep stuff you have by leaving quickly, but in many cases getting out immediately is the best way to avoid getting stuck, or the stuff that happens later.

2. Stay in place. Depending on EVENT, this could be short term or longer. Short-term probably would be the best time to just stick around in a city, where you could ride out EVENT without any sort of interaction with other people, given the proper preps - but, if you have no way of knowing how long EVENT will last, the city is not a great place to stay long-term. Where are you going to get water or food when you run out? Trade for it? Maybe, but you'll likely just get robbed or killed for what you have. Steal it from others? Again, great way to get robbed or killed. Stay too long, and you become a target of scavengers.

3. Wait for the exodus from EVENT to die down, and then try to escape the city. This is a great time for you to, again, get robbed or killed, and now you also have the added element of being a target of whatever law enforcement or government presence is there to maintain order. As was learned in Katrina and Boston, the government doesn't really like the idea of you defending yourself, even in situations where it's obviously the only answer. Going out on foot with a ginormous backpack and a rifle in the city is a great way to draw attention from all the wrong people. You may have a big nasty-looking rifle, but it only takes one guy to knock you off with a lowly .22 pistol from a smashed-in dark storefront window to bring you down and take all of your stuff.

People who got out of Katrina generally were able to do so because NOLA is a car-friendly place, and people could escape in cars or boats, but even then your vehicle becomes a huge target. There are numerous stories of people getting to their cars, and still having to defend their cars from roaming gangs. Some cities are more receptive to this than others. Places like New York, Chicago? Forget about it.


http://lonestar-mvpa.org/events/2005/05_Katrina.htm

Really, the best course of action for you is to NOW begin adjusting your employment and lifestyle situation to remove yourself from urban living. A city is the absolute worst place to be during any sort of serious cataclysmic event. Cities are where people who have no survival skills, social skills, or morals tend to congregate.

[seanc]

All good suggestions whether you stay put or hit the road. 

From the OP, it sounds like the plan so far has been to acquire a couple firearms for SHTF.  You now need to plan how to at least tread water for more than a couple days.

Assuming this is you and you can't move and you've got $500 right now to play with:
1. Buy a Berkey water filter.  Whether you hunker down or get out of Dodge, you'll need water before you'll run out of food.  Just buy the filters and make your own water tanks from 5 gal. buckets. You can collect water from downspouts or ditches and that will give you clean water.
2. Buy 500 rounds of 7.62x39 and some stripper clips.
3. Over the next 2 months, buy some (more) canned goods and a good Oxo manual can opener.  Once you have at least a 2 months supply of canned food, rotate that into your normal meal plans, replacing as consumed to extend the shelf-life indefinitely.  If you don't already eat much canned food, most will keep for at least 5 years.  Hopefully, what you have in your cupboards will feed your family for at least 2 months.

That's a bare minimum prepping for nearly any SHTF scenario if you can get out of Dodge or successfully hunker down (hide!).  Hopefully, you've got somewhere within 300 miles you can get to (one tank of gas with some to spare).