Survival Extras

Chapter 1
Survival: The Last Laugh
Chapter 1 – The Beginning

By Ron Hood, Ed.D. (ABD)
Introduction | 1 – Beginning | 2 – Innovation | 3 – Woods Master | 4 – Exposure
Before we jump into this survival thing, it seems wise to make a few suggestions about rescue. As
basic as the following suggestions may seem, they could make the remainder of this book
unnecessary. The goal of a trained survivalist is simple:
Always try to avoid placing yourself in a survival situation.
If you think you can’t avoid a survival situation because "Things like that seem to happen to me," then
the next best thing would be to ensure that you are rescued with all possible speed.
To Help Assure Your Rescue
1) Tell someone reliable where you are going. Give them a note explaining what route you plan to take
and what equipment you are carrying. Before you leave. If you fail to return on time, and your vehicle
is still where it is supposed to be (leave the vehicle description, License number, etc. with your friend),
the authorities may search for you. Your friend should be given the information needed to report your
absence should you fail to return. It should include the phone numbers of the authorities in the area
you plan to travel to. With this information the ponderous wheels of bureaucracy might begin to turn a
little sooner.
Keep in mind that the authorities have had many unnecessary experiences with foolish and thoughtless
packers. It is up to you to survive until they arrive.
2) Tell your friend when to expect you back.
3) Call that person when you return.
4) If you are delayed, try to send word to that person or to the authorities.
5) While on your journey, avoid changing your plans without leaving or sending word about the plan
changes.
6) Never go alone (Unless you are prepared to suffer the consequences). Always travel with a
companion.
7) Never leave a message on the outside of your automobile if it is parked at the trail road head.
Thieves may make use of the information in your note and strip your machine to it’s bones. If you
leave a note, leave it inside the vehicle where it can be found by the authorities should they open it.
As you travel into the woods, stop and look back frequently. This will familiarize you with the
terrain behind you and it will be easier for you to recognize the proper path when you return. This rule
applies when you are driving into the woods as well. Forested dirt roads have a way of becoming very
familiar after awhile, even if you haven’t seen them before.
Learn to recognize your own tracks, foot and vehicle, as a clue to your previous travels. Learn to use a
walking stick to mark your trail. Marks left by a walking stick are very distinctive.
9) Read the rest of this book so you will know what to do if you have an emergency survival situation.
You didn’t follow The Rule
"You didn’t follow The Rule," I thought. I sat there on a rock, staring in morbid fascination as I
watched the ants feast on the maggots in his eye sockets. Suddenly the wind shifted in my direction, so
I moved to a position farther away and out of the odor.
I was in the mountains of northern Turkey with a small group of Turkish Askari practicing survival
and pathfinding skills. It was early spring and the snows had just begun to melt from the canyons in
this part of Anatolia. Earlier in the day we had found the remnants of a hunters camp, but no hunter.
We found some tattered clothes, a torn leather knapsack, a small case of 8 mm cartridges, a canvas
shelter, cooking pots and other gear. When we found the camp, we knew that there had been an
accident. When we found the hunter, we learned the rest of the story.
He had walked away from his camp months earlier. His journey had taken him farther from camp than
he expected to go. It must have been getting late when he turned back towards his camp. A storm was
moving in. He struggled against the weather, using every bit of his energy. Finally, spent, he lay down
behind this boulder. The storm took him. The Rule he didn’t follow? Perhaps he didn’t even know the
Rule of Three’s.
The Rule of Threes
The Rule of Threes is an uncomplicated way to remember the basic priorities of the human organism,
and it is a good starting point for an exploration of survival priorities. The Rule of Three’s looks like
this:
A person can live for:

Three minutes without air.
Three hours without shelter.
Three days without water.
Three weeks without food.
Three months without love.
Let’s take a quick look at these priorities and try to understand the them a bit better.
Air
If you can’t breathe, make it so you can. If you can’t make it so, die. End of story.
Shelter
I frequently ask new survival students the question, "If you were lost in a blizzard without your gear
what would you do?" The answer I hear most (and which confounds me), sounds something like this.
"Build a fire and search for wild food." I can see it now: lost in a howling blizzard, the wind whipping
the trees to rubble, frost forming on even the memories of warmth, while our hopeful survivor tunnels
through snowdrifts in search of "wild edibles." I wonder if my Turkish friend was thinking of food
when he laid down beside that boulder. Without proper shelter, he probably died within three hours.
It seems obvious our survivor must react immediately to the threat posed by the cold blowing storm.
Only hours of life remain if the basic shelter needs are not met. Miserable and hungry, cold and
scared, but alive if the shelter is properly constructed.
The wind dies, the snow moves from its horizontal path to one more nearly vertical and then stops
altogether. The trees shiver as great blobs of storm-driven snow loosen and fall to earth. A patch of
blue as the clouds part. Then the first muted mutterings of the forest are heard as signs of life begin to
return. The hunched form of the rule-following survivor shoves aside parts of the hastily erected
debris-shelter and he sets forth in quest of the next priority. Water.
Water
Like the sailor lost at sea with "water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink," our survivor first
gobbles a handful of snow to help fill the rapidly developing vacancy in the hungry center. Oops. That
won’t do, either. It takes energy to turn snow into water. Snow may be only about 20% -30% water by
volume yet it takes lots of energy to convert the cold snow into warm water. Where is the energy
going to come from? No food to eat, and none in the stomach. There will be no power from the fat
battery for some time. (It takes many hours to start receiving energy from our fat reserves. We need to
stay alive until those reserves are available to us.) Our friend is still powered by the energy stored in
the bones and blood. Water will be necessary to assist the energy extraction processes the body uses
when converting fat into energy. Lack of water, the third priority, can stop us from utilizing even our
own reserves. With dehydration we discover another interesting relationship between water and our
chances for survival.
For each five percent our body dehydrates (by weight – i.e. a 100 pound body weight reduced to 95
pounds by dehydration), we lose approximately 25% of our ability to do work. Some authorities claim
an even a greater loss of power.
Remember, this is in addition to the loss of ability to do work caused by insufficient energy. The ratio
of work energy lost versus the percentage of dehydration remains relatively constant until the victim is
literally unable to continue to function. The percentages look something like this.
Percentage of Dehydration and Ability to do Work:
% of dehydration = % of work possible
0% = 100%
5% = 75%
10% = 50%
15% = 25%
20% = 0%
(possible death)
Water is the third priority whether you find yourself at the ocean or in a snow storm. I ought to
mention at this point that woodsmen and hunters sometimes find themselves uncomfortable and a little
under the weather a day or two after the beginning of a trip. Often this is the result of dehydration.
Though they are drinking much more water than they normally do, they still do not consume enough
to compensate for the increased effort they are putting into their days. Drink lots of water, with a little
salt in the food to stave off those agonizing midnight muscle cramps. Just a happy thought here. Drink
or die.
How do we know if we are drinking enough water? One way to tell is to measure the water we expel.
Every 24 hours a properly hydrated human can be expected to release about a quart of water as urine.
That’s it. Measure your urinary output. "Whoa there Lone Ranger! Pee in a cup!???" Not quite, but
close. Here’s the trick. Most of us have a (delicate pause here) delivery rate for our urine. Some folks
chip porcelain, others drizzle, but the rate remains constant.
Drizzle or drill into a cup while you count. When the delivery stops, check the quantity. You should be
able to calculate the number of counts needed for you to get your delivery totals up to spec. There I
said it. If you ever hear someone counting in the bathroom, chances are they know me. Recently, in
fact, a fellow wanderer, Rob Chatburn (Director, Respiratory Care University Hospitals of Cleveland)
sent me this little jewel…
"Ron… the data are from a 150 lb, male caucasion of average build. Also, since the regression
equation in my case had a y-intercept of -1 oz, I would simply ignore it and estimate that 1 quart was
about 32oz/0.5 = 64 seconds worth of pee."
"I found it hard to believe that flow would remain constant, given various bladder volumes (and hence
driving pressures). So I did a short experiment. I collected 4 urine samples and performed a regression
on the count for each. Unbelievably, the urine output in ounces was a perfect linear function of the
count. This means that your statement was correct, at least for this experiment, and the flow remained
constant despite changes in volume. Amazing! For your entertainment, I have attached a JPG file of
the regression plot."
"I’ve been doing scientific research for almost 20 years, and rarely have I seen biological data with so
little variability (in this case, none!). It may be just a coincidence, but amazing none the less. Now that
I have thought about it awhile, it seems reasonable that urine flow would be constant. The pressure in
the bladder must be mainly a result of the weight of the abdominal contents, not the volume of urine
stretching the bladder wall. Thus, as the bladder empties, the pressure remains constant. Because the
resistance of the urethra remains fairly constant, flow remains constant due to the relation: flow =
pressure/resistance."
Nuff’ said!
Food
Food. Those four letters draw pictures in more imaginations than most four letter combinations. How
important is it? If you don’t eat your habitual meals, how do you feel? Not too energetic, eh? A little
impatient, a bit short tempered with a funny thrumming in the old gut? The important thing to
remember is that the sensation you feel in the pit of the old grub grinder is not a sign that the body is
low on power. It is only telling you that your belly tank is running on empty. It isn’t telling you that
for every extra pound of fat on your body (Thank you, Big Mac!) you have nearly 4000 Calories of
energy available. 4000 Calories can do a lot of work. Is that energy available to do work now? Well…
There’s the catch, it isn’t. In fact the reserve fat calories probably won’t be ready to give themselves
up for 18 to 24 hours from the time of your last meal. In a way, that’s a comforting thought. You
really only have to survive for 18-24 hours on an empty stomach, and then you’ll find things are
getting a little easier, energy wise.
Hunger can cause enough discomfort during survival emergencies that you might make some
decisions that will hasten your movement into the next incarnation. Baby bush-munchers sometimes
forget the Rule of Threes when the low food light goes on. A suggestion… To get used to the feeling
of an empty stomach, fast (don’t eat) for 24 hours once a month. At the very least do a 24 hour fast
every three months. Once you’ve completed a 24 hour fast, go for 48! Yeah, Team!
If you fast, drink water. Lots of water. It helps… in lots of ways. Remember your count! 1… 2… 3…
The Body Battery
As you know, when you eat food, a number of events occur. Mysterious processes begin, chemicals
are released, muscles convulse, and energy is somehow extracted from whatever it was you chose to
shove down your throat. Later, energy removed, the material re-emerges to become part of a different
energy process. The important part to us? The energy is extracted and made available so you can use it
to do work or simply to store for work to be done at a later time.
Some of the energy we store is converted to fat (a part of the invasion of the inanimate muscle many
of us see developing just under our skin). Another part is stored in another way. Remember, as you eat
you start to feel a little surge of energy? This preliminary surge is the immediate benefit of eating.
Later, when you push the plate away, release some foul gas, and drift off, you know you will be able
to move about for hours on the food just consumed. If you go without eating for hours or days, the
contents of your stomach have been broken up into so many components, you continue to move and
work. Where is that energy coming from?
You already know that it will be some time before the fat power rolls around. The belly battery is
empty, yet still we move. There must be another way to store power in the body. Aha! You got it.
There is. Energy is stored in the blood, in the bones, and in the organs. Wherever there is a bit of
tissue, we have the ability to store power in the form of a large branched polymer of glucose called
glycogen. Each individual cell has the capacity to store at least a little of this material. Most of us store
a surprising amount of power in our bodies. This is the power that keeps us going when we find
ourselves benighted in the wilderness. This is the stuff that puts pop in the poop. This is the stuff we
can replenish from the fat if we are given the time to get the process into operation. The time…
There’s that word again. All we ever need is time. Again, for a person in a survival situation without
food, it will be 18 to 24 hours before some fat power jumps to the rescue. The power stored in the
blood must keep us alive for that 18 to 24 hours, then we stand a much better chance of working our
way out of the situation.
It’s important to understand that most people caught in a survival situation will be rescued or find their
way out if they survive the first 24-48 hours of the emergency. The body reserves must be carefully
guarded until the cavalry of fat can come charging to the rescue. We must do what is necessary to
satisfy the first survival priorities of air, shelter, and water until we get a handle on the fat reserves.
After that there are many simple and wondrous things that can be done to assure continued survival for
prolonged periods.
The Other Priority, Love
We’ve talked about all of the most important priorities with the exception of the mind crippler. Love.
I suppose one might say that there are many kinds of love. Spiritual, emotional, physical and mixes
and matches of those. For the survivor, the word is tied to the word hope. It has been noted that many
excellent survivors who find themselves trying to make it on the land, alone, can do so with a great
degree of success for a couple of months. Then about three months down the line comes a sort of
crisis. They feel the loneliness, the homesickness, the tension, and sometimes give up hope. When this
happens there is a definite, if invisible, threat to survival. Those who manage to rally, to drag
themselves through the barrier, will feel a new energy and a renewed purpose.
Sometimes the personal crisis never occurs, the individual may become a hermit and live life as a part
of the natural order. Sometimes the crisis is immediate and as deadly as any of the other crisis waiting
to suck the energy from the hopeless victim. This is the time when faith and love of the self becomes
most important. Concepts like self-reliance, self-confidence, and self-sufficiency help to fill the void
of loneliness. Hang in there.
Working Out the Priorities

The struggle to set priorities can be simplified if we try to define the problem first. We must ask
ourselves some questions. What forces of nature are acting against us? What forces are waiting to be
summoned? What artifacts do we have available immediately? By asking these types of questions and
giving answers, even unsatisfactory answers like "I don’t know," we’ve taken a big step toward
survival. We are thinking, and it all starts with The Rule.
The Turkish hunter didn’t follow The Rule, so I took his rifle and his knife. An Askari took his skull.
"An ashtray," he told me.
Ron Hood
Chapter 2
Chapter 2 – Something New… Innovation

The First Step
The first step in a survival situation, the very first step, is to use the most powerful survival tool
available to us. The mind. When we stop and think, if even for a moment, we have begun to program
ourselves for success. By giving in to mindless activity, we hasten the end. Luck may intervene, but
it’s chancy. If you stop to think, panic, fear, and all of those counter productive irrational states can be
held at bay. If you dig into your mind, grit your teeth, and shout, "I’m gonna make it!" you will.
Some people have suggested various methods for achieving emotional peace and intellectual and
spiritual clarity. Meditation, prayer, exercise, primal screams, and even… well… taking a dump. It has
been my experience that fear mitigates focus and enhances the need to… dump.
No bathroom? That’s OK.The act, right out there in the midst of all that stress, will seem oddly
humorous. Humor will assist your attempts to relax the icy fingers of fear that are sure to grip your
spirit. You may find prayer and/or meditation a bit easier to utilize while you perform your
enlightening. The main point should be clear. The very first act you should undertake is to think. Use
the Rule of Threes to assist you with your priorities and to help direct your thoughts. When you begin
to focus your mind muscles on your predicament your chances for success skyrocket.
Some Thoughts for Thought
While you are thinking about the situation, you may actually be threatened by inactivity. In so many
words, if you discover that one of the Rules of Three is already affecting your thoughts, you’d better
be doing your heavy thinking a little later. I’m certain that you can imagine some conditions when it
would be foolish to sit on a log, chin in hand, just thinking… a cold wet wind blowing… you get the
idea.
When you do think, what sort of ideas should you toy with? I’m certain you’ll have many thoughts
that will serve no good survival purpose, i.e. The date you will be missing that night… who might
come to your funeral after they discover your body… the strange and malevolent animals lurking in
the dark. You will be full of useless and possibly undermining memories, thoughts, and ideas. Try to
stop yourself when you feel them coming and refocus your thoughts on the problems at hand.
Of course, all of this assumes that you are alone. Companionship is no guarantee that the same
thoughts and feelings will avoid you. Indeed, it is possible that you will need to deal with the fears of a
companion(s), as well as your own. Individual idiosyncrasies, being what they are, offer no tried-and-
true formula for response to a threat other than this: the the person with the most survival knowledge
and skills often becomes the leader. Good luck!
A Few Suggestions
There you sit, benighted. Take the time to get a good look at yourself. Examine closely the clothing
that you are wearing. The clothing can serve as a focus for your thoughts. For instance, if the
temperatures are high, you might be better off loosening some of the garments in order to use them as
insulation from the hot atmosphere or sun. If the air temperatures are low, there are steps you can take
to increase the insulating value of your clothes. There will be more about this later.
Do you have a belt? If so you might be able to use it as part of a tool. Can you start a fire? People have
been found dead of exposure in forests full of dry tinder and fuel with matches in their pockets!
Examine the contents of your pockets. Loosen your boots if they feel tight, tighten them if they feel
too loose. House keeping chores of that sort will give your productive subconscience a chance to do
it’s job.
Is signaling practical? Some years ago, so the story goes, a hiker in Southern California got lost in the
dry foothills near Los Angeles. Not wanting to waste any time he decided to build a small signal fire.
His body was later found in the center of a brush fire caused by his signal fire. Think!
The walk to survival begins with these steps:
• Think a little.
• React.
• Think a lot.
• Act.
• Sleep.
Sleep? Of course! You don’t feel well if you don’t sleep under normal conditions. You need to rest
even more during a survival emergency. Provided, of course, that your last "act" will allow you the
time. Make the time.
Innovation, A New Idea
Just a few words about an idea. Not my idea, your idea. It tickles me when I see the expression of
pleasure on the face of students of mine after they have made something, to do something, from
something, that does something else. Is that clear? What I’m trying to say is that one of the most
useful and rewarding skills a survivalist can learn is the ability to make things from other things. Take
a belt for instance; it can be sliced (with some effort and a little jig to hold the leather) into long thin
strips. These can, in turn, be double twisted (more about that later) into rope. Once the rope is
available, all manner of permutations are possible. You can make a sling to take small game, a cord
for a fire bow to make fire, a bow string, etc. And if things are really hopeless, you can hang yourself!
Other parts of the belt may be useful. The buckle may work to remove tops from soda or beer bottles.
The sharpened buckle post may work as an awl for drilling leather. It may even be possible to break
the buckle into parts for fishing gear. The buckle can be used as a trigger mechanism for traps and
crossbows, or… See what I mean? Take a good look at what you are wearing and start practicing
innovation.
What uses can you put your shoe laces to? List them and try. Next time you load your backpack, take
a close look at the items you plan to carry into the wilderness. How can each item be used in a
different manner so that perhaps some other item can be left behind? The weight you save can be
carried in another more interesting form, or maybe you can just cut your pack weight. A lighter pack
may allow you to lift your head to see the wilderness through eyes unclouded with fatigue.
Take a close look at the pack itself. You can empty the pack bag and use it to cover some portion of
your body should the need ever arise. Sleep in your pack? Sure, why not? Mice do it.
Look at the frame of the pack, a heavy rock can crush the tubing flat. My God! Why would you do a
thing like that? It’s sacrilege! Consider this: if conventions and conservatism stop your innovations,
you may seriously hinder your chances at a long full life.
Back to that frame tubing. I know a fellow who lost his pack into a mountain torrent. The pack was
washed downstream through rapids and finally over a rather evil waterfall. It was seriously modified
by it’s encounter with the rocks at the bottom. The contents of the pack and the pack bag were
scattered and lost, but somehow the battered frame, still attached to the sleeping bag, floated to shore.
Hours later, my friend retrieved the now modified frame and soggy sleeping bag. He decided that his
journey into the woods was over. Three days from the road head, no matches, night coming, and his
food feeding fish at the bottom of the torrent. He had a problem. What to-do?
First step, think. He did. He took the frame, which by that time looked like metallic spaghetti, and
smashed a part of it flat. He worried that part free, converted his shoe laces into a short rope, cut a few
pieces of the appropriate kinds of wood, punched a dimple into the aluminum with a rock, and presto!
A fire bow set. He used the aluminum as a bearing surface for the fire drill, the shoe laces as a cord for
the bow, made fire, and started his survival odyssey. Because of his innovations and his skills, he
managed to turn a possible disaster into a fine adventure. A story, incidentally, he loves to tell again
and again and again… I sometimes wish that he had a second story to tell, just for variety.
It is clear that there may have been other things he could’ve done and perhaps come away with a little
more story. The significant part remains, he survived. And he did it through innovation and
imagination. Now maybe if he had taken the aluminum of his pack, combined it with the nylon from
his sleeping bag, made a hang glider, and… Innovation has it’s practical limit. Remember, too, that
there are always those could of’s and should of’s. They are easy to imagine after the fact.
Incidentally, could of’s and should of’s are fine. They demonstrate the exercise of the innovative
process. Usually they represent alternative answers to a problem. As I have said before, you are trying
to develop a solution to your situation. If you survive, you succeeded. Anything else is only a matter
of degree, of class, or of comfort.
Remember, too, a rule called Occam’s Razor. Basically Occam’s Razor states, "The simplest effective
solution is the best solution." Effective and simple… keywords for innovation.
Later, when we begin to explore survival kits, you’ll see some of the many ways things can be
modified. There will be few hard-and-fast rules. The contents suggested for survival kits can be
changed to suit your personal needs. The kits will give you a handle on survival that can help carry
you through your situation. Funny thing though, after we’ve decided just what items are useful in your
survival kit, we’ll see how similar items can be made, and functions performed, by materials found in
nature.
Incidentally, if the suggestion of an alternate use for some item didn’t occur to you, relax. Many ideas
are so obvious that they are difficult to recognize at first. Anything that has already been done resides
in the vast unconscious. By opening yourself to innovation, these concepts will leak into you and you
will have an idea. Survival originality is self-enhancing. Once you try innovation, you’ll probably start
using it.
Occasionally, I hear someone mumble phrases like, "I can’t do things like that." or, "I can’t do that
kind of thinking." "Can’t" is bad news, and a bad word. "Can’t" must be dropped from your
vocabulary. "Can’t" implies external control. Self-control and choices are what a competent survivalist
is looking for. "Didn’t" or "won’t" seem to be a closer description of the kind of concept you need to
exercise when you begin to feel powerless. While these words are still negative they carry with them
the germ of control we need. "I can’t do that kind of thinking" becomes "I won’t do that kind of
thinking." Then you can ask yourself, "Why not?" Why not indeed!
Everyone can innovate, but many don’t. You have to start trying. Start by opening bottles with
something other than a bottle opener. Try eating with something other than a knife, spoon, and fork.
Try chopsticks, sucking, slurping, and picking with your fingers. Try walking on your knees to change
your horizon or to pretend that your leg is broken. Make an effort to modify the use of things you
normally use. Innovate, modify, originate.
Practicing Innovation
I’ve been pushing the idea of innovation. Maybe you’ve already been innovating. Perhaps you can
make strange and wondrous things out of dirt, rocks, and bat’s eyes. Good for you. Then again, at least
for the moment, maybe you can’t. You may not know how to get started.
The starting point, or a starting point, might be to decide what items you need to assist your survival.
One way to start that process is to think about the most elementary actions you will be required to
perform. Once you have chosen some basic actions, you can look about you for ways to do these
things. Look at the following six jobs and try to think of a way to do these things with the items you
have with you right now.
Six things that need doing:
• Cutting
• Crushing
• Lifting
• Poking
• Holding
• Throwing
Let’s try the first one, cutting, and play with it for just a moment. Let’s also assume that you don’t
have a knife with you.
Suppose you have a metal belt buckle. You should be able to grind it flat along one side to give you a
knife edge. The grinding can be done with a smooth stream stone. You may also be able to take the
stone itself and hit it with another stone to create a sharp flake suitable for cutting. Is there a piece of
trash nearby, perhaps a tin can? The lid is quite sharp. (I’m certain that you have personal experience
with that fact!) If it can cut your finger, it can skin a small animal or cut apart edible plants. Do your
boots have an accessible and removable steel shank like the one found in Vietnam jungle boots? To
find out, peel back the inner lining on the bottom of the boot (Don’t do this to expensive boots!). On a
jungle boot the shank is visible as a dark plate of steel about 1 inch by four inches and easily
removable with the fingers.
If you go into the wilderness frequently, you’ve probably noticed the carcasses of dead animals.
Mostly these gross manifestations of once living things are to be avoided. For the survivalist, however,
the bones are a treasure throve of smelly delight. They can be removed, scored, split with a stone, and
ground to sharp edges for knives and arrowheads. Things like the hooves and skin can be converted to
glue through repetitive boiling. Rotten, leathery skin can be treated to make a sort of stinky but
serviceable leather, good for tools, shoes, and cordage. Even if your situation is short term, knowing
that you know how to do these things will contribute to your self-confidence and sense of well being.
By now, you’ve got the idea. Work with the words I listed first. Make a catalogue of the possible uses
for items that might be able to do the jobs listed and don’t hesitate to get a little far fetched. In a real
survival situation you’ll likely avoid doing involved tasks, but the practice will help you to find easier
ways to do simple jobs. After you are familiar with the strategy, try figuring out a few jobs you know
need doing and follow the same patterns with them. If you can think of a job, it is usually possible to
do it… eventually.
Remember, too, that though some of your tasks can be done using the more or less conventional
primitive technology, they may be impossible for you until you have the necessary skills. That rock I
mentioned earlier, for instance. The primitive peoples were able to make excellent stone tools from
rocks found here and there. They also had as many hours doing it as you have had reading or watching
TV. They could recognize the best types and textures of stones suitable for cutting chores. They knew
how to hit the material just right. They were able to manufacture the length, thickness and shape they
needed. Of course, you should still try making stone cutting tools. You will learn what they learned. In
the meantime, you can cut a material with stone by smashing it into its component molecules until it
can be pulled apart. This act is called crushing. You can crush hard, as in sundering, or you can crush
softly to crack nuts. Think.
Sex and Survival
There’s that word again. Only this really isn’t about sex. It’s about the sexes. Somehow — very
incorrectly — the word got out that survival experiences are too rugged for most women. I know that
some women readers will bristle with incipient indignation. Don’t. I will attempt to explain.
Survival skills are not limited to the male. It seems obvious that it took two sexes to make the species
work. There remains the image of some hairy brute, club in hand, heading out into the primordial
jungle to do battle with some loathsome creature. Meanwhile, his woman sits home grinding flour in a
stone bowl held firmly by grimy thighs. Let’s stop right there. Who is keeping the family alive? It
should be clear that it takes both of them, with a careful and appropriate distribution of labor, to stay
alive.
The man may see himself as the hunter. So be it. Who gathers the firewood and the edible plants?
Who makes pots and starts fires? Who makes shelters and sets small traps? Who brings water back to
camp and cleans skins? The answer is as simple as the system. They both do. About the only truly
exclusive jobs are related to procreation. Women make babies, men make it possible for them to do so.
Of course, there are certain jobs that seem to be easier for the male to do. Whatever programming is
responsible for this is most probably there as the result of structural differences. As a rule, men can lift
greater weights. They have an inclination to do the heavy manual labor type chores. Women generally
enjoy allowing them the option to do this sort of heavy, sweaty work. It is true, too, that I’ve seen
many women happily assume the heavy chores and as happily discard them once they have help with
the work. Countless times I’ve seen guys performing mildly incredible feats. Lifting trees, crushing
boulders, and biting bears on the bottom. It fascinates me because so many of these Herculean feats
are unnecessary. The lifted tree can stay and become a seat. The boulders might metamorphose into
fireplaces and the bears are best left alone. Women and men are instinctive survival companions as
soon as they know that they can do it together. A lot of guys and gals already know this.
One day, during a three day survival experience with some University students, I came upon a male
student breaking wood into arm sized pieces. Sweat stood out on his back as he labored to produce his
load. Finally, he looked up in triumph, gathered his wood, and led me uphill to his camp. He and
another fellow were sharing the camp with two women and both of the guys had decided to gather
wood. When we arrived, he tossed down his burden, sat on a rock, and tried to catch his breath. I
looked around and saw no one else. He seemed disappointed that neither of the ladies was present to
witness his feat. Just then I heard a crash up the hill from the camp. We both looked up just in time to
see half of a dead tree slowly thump its way down the hill toward camp. It stopped ten feet from us. As
I looked at half a thousand pounds of broken wood. I heard the euphonious tones of the male slave’s
camp mate. She had gone up the hill to kick down the wood. She never broke a sweat. Think!
One other thought related to this sex thing. Women, as a rule, can survive lower temperatures than
men. The difference is probably related to the physiology required for child bearing. According to
studies, the woman’s body will begin to react to reduced temperatures sooner than a man’s. This
reaction begins as a constriction of the blood vessels in the surface of the body and is perceived by the
woman as cold. The constriction reduces heat loss and in this manner saves the energy to be released
to the body core later. The energy saving reaction is a defense presumed to assist the survival of the, as
yet unborn, fetus. It is not necessary for the woman to be pregnant to achieve this heat loss protection.
It is a part of the physiological programming.
Of course, there are many variables such as conditioning, fat accretions, energy reserves, etc. that can
effect this presumed advantage. There is also a minor drawback. When blood flow to the skin is
reduced to stop heat loss, the skin cools. Next, the brain receives signals from the cooling skin telling
it that things are cold. The brain makes this information available to the conscious mind and the
woman feels cold even though a man in the same conditions might not even sense the temperature
drop. She will continue to feel cold while males around her remain warm and feel warm to her. Later,
when their warmth is gone and they are dead, she will still feel cold.
Most often, survival emergencies can be met with skill and technique long before the final, fatal
calorie is withdrawn from the body. In the mean time, the ladies tend to feel colder than the guys.
A Sum Thing
Looking back on what we’ve discussed, you can see that, from my point of view, the most important
thing you need to do in a survival situation is to think about what you are doing. You need some things
to think about so that the thoughts will be more than just the idle chatter of your memories. You have
to start considering the idea of survival not as something you study, but as something you do. If you
do that, you become a survivalist and a survivor. If you ever become a participant in a survival
emergency, you will probably notice a comforting and, at the same time, disconcerting phenomenon.
The intensity of your participation in the emergency will increase to give you the concentration and
strength to do whatever is necessary. After the first night or two, you might even enjoy it.
Chapter 3
Chapter 3 – The Woods Master

He’s sitting in his office, suit coat on a hanger, tie loose, talking on the phone.
"I’ll be back in about five days. I’ll fax you a list of where I think I’ll be going and some of the
alternate routes. If I change my plans before I leave, I’ll call you. The numbers for the Forest Service
will be on the fax… Thanks, buddy… No, I’m going alone this time. I need some time to think… Sure,
I’ll leave the keys to my car in the magnet locker. You know where I hide it. OK, OK I’ll be fine. Give
my love to the wife and kids… OK. Bye…"
He’s driving along a lonely mountain road, stops, gets out, and looks back down the road. He takes in
the view, then climbs back in and drives on.
The most important part of survival training is learning how not to need it. You can’t just wait for an
emergency and then hope that your survival "instinct" will bring you through. There’s no such thing as
an uneducated instinct. Instincts are made of correct choices based on knowledge of potential threats.
The Boy Scouts had it right when they chose Be Prepared as a motto.
Some people think that preparing for an emergency is a gloomy process motivated by fear and
insecurity. Nothing could be further from the truth. Preparation is an enlightening process filled with
discovery and freedom. Preparation is when you know the mechanics of nature, when you see the
grand architecture of the skies and the land, and it is when you learn to respect this architecture.
Learning wilderness survival skills is much like learning the meaning of stop lights in the city. The
skills tell you when to stop and when to go, when you should turn and when you should continue on
your way.
Off in the distance the man can see the glint of a car windshield almost hidden in the trees. He turns
away from the reflection and continues walking down a wooded trail. He stops, bends down, and picks
up an old, rusty soup can. He puts it into his shoulder bag. A little further down the trail he spots a
piece of glass on the trail. It’s a nice view here. He picks up the glass, walks to a small bolder by the
side of the trail, sits down and begins to make a glass knife. He pulls a piece of leather and an old
horn from his shoulder bag and begins to press off pieces of glass. After a few minutes a crude but
recognizable cutting instrument is in his hands.
In ancient times, humans would search for natural materials from which to make their implements.
Today many discarded bits of human flotsam litter the wilderness. These bits can make fine tools for
the woodsman. Using them achieves two purposes. They provide tools and artifacts, and using them
helps to clean the wilderness. Glass can be used instead of flint and obsidian for cutting and for
hunting tools. Tin cans and old canvas can easily replace clay pots and boiling skins.
Finished with the glass, he puts it in his kit and he moves on.
The sun is starting to get lower in the sky. He lifts his hand to the edge of the sun, and counts the
number of hand spans to the western horizon, where the sun will set.
Ancient folks knew that they could estimate how much time was left in their day by simply counting
how many hand spans it is to the spot where the sun will set. Conveniently, the hand, extended at arms
length, will bisect about 15 degrees of arc. Because there are 24 of these 15 degree segments in a
circle, that means that the sun will move approximately 1 hour for every hand span. Hell, in the
wilderness, that’s about as good as it gets, or as good as you need it to get. Put yourself on a timetable
here and you may as well be back in the city. Still there are times when it’s nice to have some idea of
the passage of time.
As he walks he punches his walking stick into the ground occasionally. Periodically he stops to look
back. A bush catches his eye. He walks over to it, gathers some and suddenly with a quick motion,
snatches a lizard from a rock. The lizard wriggles in his hand, he strokes it’s belly and it stops
struggling and lies still. He brings it to his mouth, opens his lips just a bit to blow on the lizard, and
then releases it back to the wilderness.
Lots of folks come up here to get lost, at least it seems that way. They get caught up in the joy of
nature and forget that eventually they need to go home. When they turn around to go back, they don’t
recognize the landscape, get panicky, and then they really become lost. One of the keys to not "getting
lost" is to learn what is behind you by looking back occasionally. It’s also a good idea to use a
walking stick. The marks it makes in the trail are easily recognizable. If you can’t follow your own
tracks, you should at least be able to follow your stick marks. Even light rains will leave behind the
small pits left by a stick. (Other benefits of walking sticks include the fact that they change you from a
relatively unstable biped to a much more stable tri-ped. They distribute the effort of walking to other
parts of your body, and they can be used for digging, investigating snaky places, pushing brush out of
the way, and a myriad of other things. Learn to use a walking stick. We’ll discuss the selection of a
good walking stick later.)
Lizards are pretty good food. They taste like chicken. Actually everything tastes like chicken when
you’re hungry. The problem is that most lizards are small and it takes a lot of them to make a
difference in your survival chances. Usually it takes more energy to catch them than they are worth. If
you decide that lizards are worth the effort, the best time to catch them is in the early morning when
the night chill makes them slow and the sun hasn’t had a chance to warm them. I just like to feel their
bellies and wonder what they think of the giant carnivore that’s holding them. (They’re probably
pretty dim in the wondering department.)
He finds himself in a canyon at an open sandy area near a stream. There’s a nice tree nearby and
some rocks. He walks to the sandy spot, drives his walking stick into the ground, and checks to be
certain that it is secure. He bends down in the sand. His finger traces the shadow in the sand. At it’s
tip he places a smaller stick, point down, into the sand, then moves away. By the rock he finds a piece
of wire. He removes his knife from it’s case on his belt and, using the knife, makes two small holes
near the top of the can, on opposite sides. He threads the wire through the holes and using a small
stick as a tool, wraps the wire around itself to form a hook. The can will now hang from a stick. At this
point he gets up and walks over to the stick. The shadow has moved and he marks the new location of
the shadow tip with another small stick. There is a distance between the two points marked by the
sticks. He connects these points with a third, longer straight stick. He draws a line perpendicular to
this longer stick, in the sand. At the tip of the drawn line, farthest from the base of the walking stick,
he writes a big "N" This is north.He really doesn’t care. It is important to stay oriented. On other
occasions he has used the shadow cast by the tip of a tree, and that of a telephone pole, to identify
directions using this technique.
There are a number of methods one can use to tell directions from the sun. Things like moss on a tree,
the bending of the top of a tree, etc. are inconsistent and inaccurate. Sure there may be places where
these techniques seem to be accurate most of the time, but don’t count on them. There are better and
more reliable ways… the sun compass for one. Even the sun compass has it’s drawbacks, far north and
far south on this planet, the technique can force circling. There are other ways to tell directions up and
down there…
He looks back up at the sun and decides that he has just enough time to find a shelter site. He looks
longingly at the place he just used for his shadow tip direction finding technique. If he were
backpacking this would be a good site, water close at hand, wood and rocks nearby. He knows,
however, that capable backpackers, deprived of their equipment, have died because they selected the
same sorts of camping sites they did when they had all of their equipment for protection. Backpacking
is gear oriented; the gear protects you from the wilderness and from your mistakes. Survival is
knowledge oriented; knowledge protects you from mistakes.
He begins to climb the side of the canyon. When he is higher than the canyon floor by the height of the
highest tree in the canyon, he goes a little higher and starts to search for a spot to make his shelter.
Cold air goes down, warm air rises. This basic information forms the basis of a number of survival
oriented decisions. At night, cold air settles into a valley. In a canyon, it settles to the bottom and then
moves down, following the drainage. The movement of air is called wind. If you were in the bottom of
a canyon you would be in the coldest air as well as in a wind caused by the movement of that cold air.
You would feel a wind chill.
Canyons are subject to an effect called the diurnal wind. That means that the wind moves down the
canyon at night and up the canyon during the day. Count on it. How much colder is the bottom of a
canyon? It varies, but we commonly measure an 8F to 10F degree difference between the bottom of a
canyon and a point 50 to 75 feet up the side of a canyon. Diurnal winds commonly move at about 4
mph giving about 5F to 7F of wind chill. This works out to a 13F to 17F degree difference between a
camp site in the bottom of a canyon and a shelter site up the side of a canyon!
As he searches for an adequate shelter site he notices that the sun is hitting some rocks nearby. At the
rocks he realizes that this part of the canyon is facing South. Good. The rocks are as large as small
cars and there is a pine tree struggling up through them. Captured between two large rocks, beneath
the tree, is a flat space covered by a thick layer of pine needles. This is home for tonight.
He sits on one of the rocks to enjoy the view and feel the heat of the last rays of the setting sun. He
knows that it will be cold tonight, but probably above freezing. At the bottom of the canyon it will
freeze tonight.
If you want to stay warm in the northern hemisphere, pick a site on a south facing slope. The sun will
have heated the ground and the rocks. The earth will give up this heat during the night creating a
micro climate. You have probably noticed micro climates before. You may have been riding a
motorcycle or bicycle at night and noticed that the air is suddenly warmer or cooler than moments
before. The next time this happens, look at the ground over which you are traveling. If it got suddenly
warmer you are probably traveling over asphalt. The darker surface traps the daytime heat and releases
it at night. If it is cooler, it may be concrete you are over. Concrete won’t hold as much heat and
therefore cannot give it up at night.
Solar radiation also effects the character of the land it hits. Sunlight dries out the topsoil faster and
tends to influence the growth of different types of vegetation on the south facing slope. Less moisture
also leads to less complete control of erosion and therefore south facing slopes tend to have more
exposed rocks and less grass. Trees tend to produce thick blankets of insulation to protect their roots.
All of these effects are good for the survivalist.
He moves back from the rock to the thick mat of needles covering the ground below the tree. Carefully
he removes the sticks and pine cones that might make his sleep less comfortable. Moving as little as
possible of the material, he flattens the sleeping area and creates a depression about 1 1/2 inches
deep where his shoulders and hips will go. Then he lays down on his bed. It is comfortable… gotta test
the bed. It is comfortable and warm, too…
Heat passes from the body by five heat loss mechanisms:
Conduction, Convection, Radiation, Respiration and Perspiration (or wetness).
First, a Law: Heat passes from the warmer body to the colder body.
You are the warmer body. If you want to stop heat loss to the ground, conduction, use insulation
below you. Pine needles are good insulation. They are found under pine trees.
If the wind is blowing (or you are moving through the air), convection will occur. Move out of the
wind. Rocks and trees help block the wind. Moving up the side of a canyon out of the wind also helps.
Radiation is heat loss to space. Cover your head and neck. A hat and a scarf help a lot. A roof over
you head also helps a lot. The spread of a tree over you offers protection, too.
If your feet are cold, cover your head. The brain automatically cuts off blood flow to the extremities
when you lose heat. Reduce the heat loss and the surplus heat will be returned to the extremities. Your
socks are more valuable on your head and neck than they are on your feet. Just be certain to keep your
shoes on and have them laced very loosely.
Respiration: breathe in cold air, breathe out warm air. You are losing heat each time you breathe.
Don’t do unnecessary exercise, because it will increase heat loss along with your increased respiration
rate. If you need to do exercises to warm up, do isometrics in place. They are much more efficient in
creating heat and they have a minimal effect on your respiration.
Perspiration… Don’t sweat. Don’t work so hard that you will wet yourself with perspiration. Try to
stay dry. Water increases heat loss by a tremendous amount (but not as much as the 640 times claimed
in some manuals).
If you take steps to control these five heat loss mechanisms you have a good chance at survival. Under
ideal circumstances, you can do a lot to control the mechanisms. If conditions are rotten sometimes
there is very little you can do.
When you make your bed, try for comfort as well as efficiency. A few minutes making the bed just
right may pay off in hours of much needed and beneficial sleep.
He dozes and as he does he sees himself selecting his shelter… Part way up from the valley floor, on a
south facing slope, in a micro climate formed by large rocks, beneath a pine tree and on top of a layer
of insulating pine needles.
Protected from the
Chapter 4
Chapter 4 – Exposure: The Cold Facts
Well, it looks like it’s time to drag up a comfortable seat and settle down to some important but kinda
boring technical survival facts. Up until now we’ve been concerned with those interesting weaknesses
of the human body and some of the devious skills needed to assist you in a generalized survival
situation. Now we get specific. After all, who wants to find themselves stuck on some cold and remote
mountain far from assistance equipped with nothing but a vivid imagination and a slowly freezing
body? I doubt that you are interested in having that sort of terminal adventure.
Since we now know that shelter is our second priority, right after air, it is particularly important that
we know what the consequences will be if we fail to build a shelter when we need it.
Exposure
Almost every week, during the colder months, an article will appear in a paper reporting some unlucky
camper or hiker who died of something called "exposure". That word "exposure" gets an awful lot of
play these days. "Hiker dies on Snerd Mt." "Man and wife found dead in storm." "Two climbers
missing and presumed dead." read the articles. Hidden in the text .…..Exposure. Sometimes the papers
use even more lurid prose to describe the situation, "Man freezes to death". When I was a kid I used to
have visions of my body hardening slowly in the cold, usually from the feet up. I could see myself
dragging my half frozen body across jagged rocks and blocks of ice. Eventually a frozen foot would
break off at the ankle, or the knee would chip like a hunk of ice dropped on concrete… Gaaaaaaa! I
resolved never to freeze to death. I want to die in my sleep, warm, a long time from now.
The fact of the matter is that "freezing to death" or exposure may not be all that uncomfortable a way
to go. I’m not recommending that you crawl into a freezer to do away with yourself, if you’ re
suicidal. As an accidental death it beats being eaten by wild dogs or smothered by slimy things.
Besides that, there’s a nice scientific name for the process which makes you dead. The name is
Hypothermia and Hypothermia is the number one killer of outdoor folk.
Something we ought to get clear before we get into the more clinical aspects of hypothermia, A person
does not normally ‘freeze to death". I suppose it is possible if you leaped into a vat of liquid hydrogen,
but in nature it takes longer to die of the cold. You freeze after you are dead, a distinction that is
unimportant to the victim. Another point is that "exposure" can refer to death by heat or cold, and you
don’t have to die to say that you suffered from exposure, or for that matter, from hypothermia.
However If you want the headlines to say that you "froze to death" you have to go all the way.
Hypothermia
What is "hypothermia"? First some of the things it isn’t. It isn’t a fear of needles. It isn’t "feeling
cold". It isn’t that feeling you get when you play in the snow and your fingers are getting stiff. That
kind of cold is much more superficial and can be easily controlled by the body when you stop your
exposure. In fact it isn’t even necessary for the temperatures to be at or below freezing for
hypothermia to take place. There have been many instances of hypothermic death that took place in
temperatures over 50 degrees f. What is necessary in order for Hypothermia to occur is that the body
be unable to maintain it’s operating temperature in the face of whatever heat loss process is in
operation. Hypothermia is heat loss at the body core, and it results from exposure to cold with the
addition of other heat loss mechanisms.
Typically we can say that four elements are present in each case of hypothermia, and without most of
those four elements it almost never happens.
The four elements
The four elements leading to hypothermia are: Cold, Wind,Wetness and most important, a likely
victim. It should be obvious that many of us have been exposed to cold ,wind and wetness without
ever having experienced Hypothermia. Naturally this is because we were prepared for the conditions
we were exposed to which leads us to another representation of hypothermia as "The killer of the
unprepared".
One of the important goals of this chapter will be to give you the information you need to remove
yourself from the ranks of the "unprepared". This will be easier if you understand more about the
clinical aspects of hypothermia as well as the simple and effective methods we can use to survive the
sometimes hostile forces of cold.
In order to be prepared we need to examine the four elements leading to hypothermia a bit more
closely.
Cold
The second law of thermodynamics states in effect: "Heat must pass from the warmer body to the
colder body." This simply means that when you expose yourself to the cold, you lose heat. The heat
you are losing is probably heat that was generated by your body. Your body has a maximum limit to
the amount of heat that it can produce, when the limit is reached, it can produce heat no faster. If heat
is taken away faster than it is produced, the body will begin to cool.
You are already familiar with some of the effects of cold on the human body. For instance you know
that as the body begins to lose heat faster than it is producing the heat it reacts by trying to reduce the
rate of heat loss. This reduction in heat loss is brought about by a restricting the circulation in the
surface of the skin. When this happens you begin to feel the cold. Later, with continued heat loss, the
body will show other symptoms. Blood flow to the extremities will be reduced, giving you a sort of
numbness and a reduction in coordination, strength and control, "I’m so cold my fingers are stiff." is
an example of that closing down of blood to the muscles in the fingers. Continued exposure closes
down more systems, the blood temperature throughout the body is reduced and the brain is affected. It
is remarkable how sensitive the brain is to these temperature drops. A reduction of 20 Degrees f. at the
brain will kill you while a drop of over 50 degrees (from normal) in the hands and feet will cause
discomfort but no permanent damage.
Wind
Wind increases the cooling effect of cold or wetness. This occurs when the moving air encounters the
thin layer of warm air clinging to your body. The moving air strips away the warm insulating layer and
the body tries to generate another layer of warm air. As this new layer is removed the body transfers
more heat to warm more air etc. This effect is known as this wind chill effect. Wind chill accounts for
a very high percentage of deaths due to hypothermia. It is easy to overlook this factor and to wander
unprepared for wind chill into what appears to be cold weather.
I mentioned that persons have died of hypothermia in temperatures around 50 degrees F. Part of the
reason can be wind chill, take for instance an air temperature of 50 degrees, add the mind chilling
effect of a 40 MPH wind and we have an effective temperature of 26 degrees. Many snow skiers have
felt this effect when they find that although the temperature outside is low, in the sun it feels
comfortable to the skin. Come the clouds, and a fast downhill run and the cold wind will put frost on
the soul.
Another point I want to make is that for the wind to assist the cooling it is only necessary for the air to
be moving relative to the warm body. The same wind chill effect applies when the body is moving
rapidly through the air. A motorcyclist for instance, moving at 40 MPH on a windless day will
experience the same chilling effect as a stationary person in a 40 MPH wind. Imagine if you will, what
would happen to a motorcyclist who is driving along, cold because of the wind chill, and finds stiff
fingers operating clutch and brake controls. Motorcyclists are frequent victims of hypothermia. They
do not progress through the stages of hypothermia to actual death while astride their bikes, rather they
simply lose some of their awareness, the control of their machines and die of something else. like
compression during a collision.
If a person is adequately protected from the cooling effect of wind, there is a very much reduced
chance of hypothermia. This person is Prepared for wind.
Wetness
Wetness increases heat loss through evaporation. Think about the body for a moment. You already
know what happens when you get very hot. You perspire. Your body doesn’t do that simply because it
likes to discharge water and increase your odor. Sweating is an adaptive process that enhances
cooling. You know how good it feels to stand in front of a fan, or in the wind, on hot days, Cool right?
Water increases the cooling effect of wind and vice versa, This water can come from any source, It
may be the result of rain, immersion, perspiration, or from any other source. When the body is wet it
loses heat much more rapidly.
Much more rapidly is something of an understatement. Studies suggest that water may conduct heat up
to 240 times faster than dry air. No wonder the Eskimos aren’t into swimming. It has been proven that
survival times for an unprotected human in 35 degree water is listed in minutes. Heat is ripped from
the body so rapidly that it loses its strength, coordination and the victim drowns.
A point I’d like to make here includes a survival tip I read in an antique survival manual. The manual
was sold to early settlers for the journey across the continent. One suggestion found in the manual
suggests that should you ever find yourself stormbound in an unprotected place, near an unfrozen lake,
with the air temperature at or below freezing, you should climb into the obviously warmer lake and
wait out the storm! The author reasoned that since the lake was unfrozen it should protect the body
from the storm. I’d imagine that some folks tried it and discovered that it didn’t work. No one
complained because they didn’t survive the technique. Stay dry, stay out of unfrozen lakes on cold
days.
If you’ve got a waterproof covering of some sort and you use it to stay dry during a storm, then you
are prepared for wetness. A suggestion in this vein. It is often inconvenient to carry a poncho or a
tube tent when you take a short day hike Be prepared anyway. The lightest serviceable covering I
know of is the large, heavy duty. trash bag.
To use it simply cut a 9" slit in the bottom, pull it over your body until your head sticks through the
slit, and stay dry. It will protect you from wind and wetness.
The likely victim
The likely victim is the unprepared victim, If you know some of the factors that will contribute to your
heat loss you can be better prepared. if you take some realistic steps you can remove yourself from the
category altogether. simple preparations such as the one I mentioned with the trash bag will improve
your chances for survival. Think about it, How much does that trash bag cost? How heavy and
awkward is it? It actually fits into your back pocket with only a small bulge.
Of course there are many other things you can carry as well as the trash bag to help you to survive.
Most of these things will be small and cheap. But they help you to prepare, AND they help you to
develop your survival mentality.
Time for a short digression. Remember the business of innovation? Consider that trash bag for a
moment. What uses can it be put to? We already know that it will act as an effective rain shield. It can
stop the wind and hold trash. Now consider these uses; if it is dark in color it can be used to melt snow
on sunny but cold days. It will carry food plants for dinner. It can be used to carry pine needles and
leaves back to camp for use as insulation in your bed. It can be used as a cozy hat or to carry water
back to camp. It will just about perfectly fit over a loaded backpack to protects the contents from rain.
Try thinking of some other uses for the bag. You may want to carry two of them with you whenever
you go out.
Trash bags and wind aside, there is another part to being the likely victim. Panic and hysteria,
Previously when we discussed this condition we decided that it can be partially controlled by orderly
thought and directed action. Many persons who find themselves in a survival situation don’t know the
tricks you do. They will react mindlessly and try to travel vast distances with limited energy resources.
This activity not only depletes their reserves, it often brings on other parts of the hypothermia
problem. Their thoughtless actions result in sweat, exposure to the wind, and depletes their ability to
ward off even minor environmental temperature changes. They are what can be called the
"emotionally unprepared victims". The problem is neatly described by an old saying. "In panic, a
person can run for minutes, crawl for hours, and then lie down from exhaustion for eternity…"
The likely victim then can include someone who is faced with the heat loss mechanisms of cold, wind
and wetness to a minor degree. But with an emotional instability capable of magnifying the effects of
simple heat loss much as both wind and wetness magnify the effects of the cold. All of this is part of
the reason for developing your Positive Mental Attitude (PMA). Understanding the problem is half of
the solution, doing something about it is the other half.
The Symptoms of Hypothermia
Once you know that hypothermia exists, and what conditions are likely to precede the problem, it
becomes necessary to know how to recognize the symptoms. That old saw "Forewarned is
Forearmed." fits nicely here since merely recognizing the symptoms can put you on the alert and set
into motion the actions necessary to save a life. It is also important to realize that recognizing the
symptoms of Hypothermia in yourself is sometimes difficult for reasons soon to be explained.
Experiments performed by various public and private institutions have tended to yield similar results.
In most of these experiments Human beings were put through exposure to low temperatures while
their blood pressure, temperature, reaction times, strength and motor skills were monitored. The tests
have shown dramatic losses in the thinking abilities of the subjects while simple motor activities
became nearly impossible. Total incapacitation almost always occurred before loss of consciousness.
During the course of the experiments certain facts became clear. Among those was an agreement on
specific temperature ranges and symptoms, indicating the stages of hypothermia. In other words,
researchers discovered that when the body cools to a certain point a specific symptom develops,
Continued lowering of the temperature brings on the next set of symptoms. These symptoms are
common to most subjects experiencing the same body core temperature. They also discovered that
people have different abilities to resist the onset of hypothermia. Where one individual might drop into
hypothermia at 50 degrees ambient, another in similar shape and condition, might not become
hypothermic until the temperature dropped to 40 degrees.
I realize this fact is not especially shocking as we all know that people react differently to the same
conditions. The reason I point it out is to indicate that the following information, while it has internal
and symptomatic consistency, does not necessarily develop in each person at the same external
temperature.
A "Normal" healthy human, in good condition with adequate energy reserves can maintain the body
core temperature at it’s "normal" 98. 6 F, while nude in 50F. air. The air of course is still and the body
dry. At this point the body is pumping out heat as fast as it can and the core temperature is stable.
Since the body heater is full on, for each degree the environmental temperature drops, the body core
temperature will drop a corresponding degree.
Figure 1: Symptoms of Hypothermia

Stage of Body Core
Air Temp Symptoms
Hypothermia Temp.
First 47-50 F 96-99 F Uncontrollable shivering
Violent shivering in waves. Poor coordination and
Second 42-46 91-95
stumbling
Shivering ceases. Muscles are stiff or rigid. Impaired
Third 37-41 86-90
thinking and judgment
Rigidity continues, slowed pulse rate and respiration.
Fourth 32-36 81-85
Stupor, Immobility
Unconsciousness, most reflexes cease, heart beat erratic,
Fifth Below 32 78-80
possible death
Cardiac Fibrillation. Edema & hemorrhage in the lungs.
Sixth Below 32 Below 78
White foamy discharge from the lungs. Death
While looking this over it is wise to keep in mind the fact that the temperatures given for the "Air
temp." are approximate. Conditioning, fat accretions etc. all play a part in setting the final
symptomatic display. Even the final temperature prior to death has been exceeded in both directions.
Persons have survived lower internal temperatures and have died with higher ones. The symptoms
however are very commonly associated with the stages as shown.
A few points need to be made here. You will notice that as an individual develops hypothermia the
first symptoms of "uncontrollable shivering" occur. This is not that gentle "Brrrrr I’m cold" shiver.
This is a good strong full body shiver of the tooth shattering variety. The victim feels cold inside. This
shivering stage is the attempt by the body to generate heat with muscular activity of the involuntary
variety. When the temperature continues to drop, the mechanisms in control of the shivering reduce
their activity and the body reduces the flow of blood to most large muscle groups not necessary for
survival. With a reduction in shivering comes the beginning of the end for reasoned action by the
victim Also keep in mind the appearance of the victim to an observer. First the victim is shivering
hard, then there is less shivering. This gives the impression that the victim is warming. After all, there
is less shivering. As you read the symptoms again keep this fact in mind. You may not be able to tell
immediately if the victim is warming or cooling.
When the shivering ceases during the third stage hypothermia, death is at the doorstep. A lone
hypothermic has little chance of survival unless fortune provides some external source of heat as well
as a reduction in heat loss. The wind stops, the sun drives the clouds apart, a bush bursts into flame
while a cup of hot cocoa appears on the ground. Lotsa luck.
Once the victim drops into fourth stage hypothermia it’s all over but the dying. Even if a rescue is
affected there is a chance that death will still occur. Any first aid measures that take place after the
victim becomes a hypothermic in the fourth stage, must be of an extreme sort administered in a
specific manner. Simply covering the victim may delay death by a few minutes. Still there remains the
chance of survival if certain steps are taken immediately by the rescuer. Even then much of the ability
of the victim to survive is dependent upon the condition and the will of that victim. Injuries and illness
lessen the likelihood of survival. Inappropriate or inadequate treatment may hasten death.
The 1-2-3 of Hypothermia first aid
The treatment for hypothermia is a 1 – 2 – 3 matter and needn’t be done in sequence for it to be
effective. There may also be complications. First the basic steps.
1. Stop further heat loss: Remove the victim from the cold, cover and/or dry.
2. Add heat: Warm victim with full body contact or some external or internal source of heat.
3. Add fuel: Feed the victim. Hot sweet liquids are good. Cold fat or protein is not effective.
Unfortunately, taking these steps is often difficult and sometimes nearly impossible since
Hypothermia frequently occurs in an emergency when there are few essential resources. If the victim
has progressed into the later stages of hypothermia, simple exposure to heat and protection from the
cold may have little effect. Obviously there are ways to successfully rescue a hypothermic but most of
these depend on exotic techniques utilizing equipment rarely found in backpacks. The key to
successful treatment of hypothermia will be to correct the problem in it’s earliest stages. That calls for
early recognition and treatment.
Another factor to be considered is that often the hypothermic does not recognize the symptoms and
will sometimes resist treatment until it is almost too late. To gain the cooperation of the victim
remember that the administration of hypothermia first aid does not have to be a dramatic gesture. One
reason for this is the fact that the steps can be taken as conditions allow.
They can be simply a friendly act done as a favor, like loaning a jacket or stopping for shelter because
"I’m getting too cold". Try to avoid the dramatic flair sometimes associated with life saving first aid.
There is more to this so lets take a closer look at the steps, the combinations of steps and the cautions.
1) Stop further heat loss
Clearly heat loss is the root cause of Hypothermia. If you stop further heat loss and if the overall
condition of the victim is good, there is a strong possibility that the problem will disappear. It is wise
to remember the conditions that led to the problem, cold wind and wetness. if the victim is only cold,
covering up may do, but remember that cold alone is rarely the cause of the problem. As you know,
wetness and wind will probably also be present. Get the victim to some sort of effective shelter. A
tent, cabin, lean to, plastic sheet, rock shelter etc. will help. Remove the wet clothing, dry the victim
and cover up.
Under some conditions total nudity is warmer than wet clothing. This is particularly true in dry
windless cold. Wet cotton clothing is probably the worst thing to wear as cotton holds the water next
to the skin, wicking moisture through it’s structure, and increases your heat loss by as much as 90%. If
the wet clothing is made of wool the clothing can be wrung out and put back on. Wool tends to retain
warmth even when it is wet. Some new synthetic fabrics have the same qualities. Cover the victim’s
head! If the body cannot re-warm itself the victim may die. For this reason the remaining steps should
be taken in all cases.
2) Add Heat
Adding heat can occur in any way the second law of thermodynamics will allow (Heat must pass from
the warmer body to the colder body). The only restrictions placed on re-warming involve the rate of
reheating the body. Immersion of the body in molten lava is one of the many techniques considered a
no-no. Oddly enough some of the methods commonly used for re-warming are equally dangerous.
These well meaning techniques include exposing the victim to intense local heat in the form of a
blazing fire.
When an intense form of heat, such as a fire, directs its energy upon one bare area of the body,
unfortunate consequences can arise. To understand these consequences we must first remember what
happens to the body as the heat loss begins. One of the responses to cold was a general constriction of
the blood vessels in the skin and extremities. This blood may reach temperatures as low as 40 degrees
and is slowly circulated as a form of insulation for the body core. If a strong source of heat, not just
warmth, begins to raise the skin temperature to an uncomfortable level, the brain reacts by causing the
heat to be drawn away into the skin through the circulatory system to the core. If the heat is intense
and local, say an area the size of your chest, very little actual warmth will have been transferred to the
blood. The slightly heated but fatally cold blood travels directly to the body core bringing with it a
massive slug of almost ice cold blood. The delicate internal temperature balance is destroyed, the
temperature drops below 78 degrees and the victim dies. Ooops…
Therefore, when adding heat to the hypothermic, avoid intense local heating. A gradual raising of the
temperature is preferred. Often this can be accomplished without a heating fire. If a heating fire is
available, feel free to use it but be certain that the victim is heated as evenly as possible through some
intervening layers of fabric.
Ideally the external source of heat should be at or only slightly warmer than the normal body
temperature and should be transferred to the entire body. A warm bath is acceptable if it happens to be
available and if the "after drop" in core temperature is watched closely. "After drop" is the drop in core
temperature we discussed as related to a sudden increase in skin temperature resulting from sudden
exposure to high temperatures.
Another way to accomplish whole body warming while in the field is to strip the victim to the skin and
put the person into a pre-warmed sleeping bag. If conditions allow, two other persons of normal
temperature should also strip and crawl into the bag with the victim. Heat gained through conduction
and imagination will be rapid. If a sleeping bag is not available, use blankets or mink. Even one extra
naked body in the bag will speed recovery. One caveat to keep in mind, the rescuer should not
endanger him or her self by the rewarming process. Body contact rewarming is best used when there
are other fully functioning individuals in the party.
To further raise the temperature and increase the speed of the rewarming process it is also wise to
induce the victim to drink warm liquids. This will tend to raise the temperature at the core. These
drinks should be sweet (no diet sweeteners please) if at all possible. The victim will need energy in
order to feed the rewarming process. More on these drinks later.
If there is no possibility for the dual nude system in the bag, or if the victim is alone and trying to gain
warmth in the bag. Try hot water in a canteen, warming stones etc. to build heat. Keep in mind the fact
that just as clothing insulates us from cold, it also slows down our absorption of heat from external
sources. The victim will warm faster while nude in a warm environment than clothed in that same
environment.
Once the victim has regained complete awareness, continue the hot liquids. It takes time to recover
from hypothermia, full recovery may take hours or even days. Hypothermia can easily reoccur while
the victim is weak. If the hypothermic is unconscious, death is close at hand. Only the most drastic
steps are likely to be successful. Even so you should attempt to revive the victim using the resources at
hand. Many times the effort has paid off.
3) Add Fuel
Adding fuel is really very simple. You are providing the body with a generous store of power with
which to reheat. The power should come in some easily assimilated form. Warm sweet liquids are a
favorite because the effect is almost immediate and most hypothermics will accept them. Sweet foods
like candies are next. Many sugars are releasing their energy to the body within 15 minutes of
consumption.
While feeding you should consider the types of foods the victim can easily use since some items
containing protein and fat require considerable time and effort for digestion. Stay away from them
unless significant amounts of heat and carbohydrates are immediately available. Hot soup with
noodles is acceptable, Hot cocoa, hot dextrose or hot coffee or tea with plenty of sugar is acceptable.
Beef jerky or a cube of butter is almost useless in the short term. Any form of alcohol is always
unacceptable.
The Unconscious victim
Since the unconscious victim is usually unable to swallow, it is unwise to try to force liquids, you may
violate the first of the rule of threes "Three minutes without air" by drowning the person in noodle
soup. Still, to revive that cold but alive body, heat must be brought into the core. How to do that? One
way, a method used by some search and rescue teams is to offer heat absorption through the lungs.
Presumably the living victim will continue to breathe. If the air that person is breathing is prewarmed
and highly oxygenated a good deal of blood can be quickly heated and recovery can begin. The teams
carry heated air respirators.
These devices utilize a flameless low temperature chemical process to heat air carried in a small bottle.
The device is seldom carried by normal backpackers but there is a field expedient. It may not be as
efficient but it can work. Try mouth-to-mouth resuscitation with the unconscious victim. Your warm
air, body contact as well as a warm protected environment might be enough to successfully reverse the
problem. Another possibility utilizes one or two of those chemical "HeatPacks". Wrap them in a thin
layer of dry fabric and place them on the Carotid arteries on the sides of the neck just below the chin.
These can heat the blood and air providing heat calories directly to the core.
Other methods of adding heat to the body core exist and work with varying degrees of efficiency.
Some of these techniques may seem a bit distasteful but the act of bringing someone back from the
doors of death is a tasty challenge. The methods include such things as warm enemas and warm
liquids pumped directly into the stomach. Gaaaa! Both of these techniques have been field expedients
over the centuries and may be worth attempting as a last ditch effort. Both were said to have been used
by Hannibal when he crossed the Alps. With the unconscious victim either method will help raise the
temperature.
A few words about each method seems to be in order. If you choose to try to administer heat to your
victim by utilizing an enema, you have made a tough decision. Many obvious preparations are
necessary with regards to sanitation etc. and I hope for your sake the process is successful and that the
victim is good natured.
Pumping a warm liquid into the stomach is reasonably simple. Obtain a short piece of small diameter
tubing, a size that will allow air passage while it is in place. Slide the tube down the throat into the
stomach. Blow or suck on the tube to be certain the tube is in the stomach and not in one of the lungs.
Blowing will cause a bubbling sound in the stomach, sucking on the tube will lead to predictable
results. It is also possible to press on the stomach while watching the tube, Fluid indicates the proper
position in the stomach or an impossibly filled lung. Air issuing from the tube indicates a lung.
After installing the tube and checking it’s location you may force hot sweet liquids directly into the
stomach. While installing the liquid it is wise to check the breathing frequently to certify that the lungs
are neither being filled or prevented from operating. injection of the liquid can be done by mouth. Do
not pump more than one quart into the stomach and be very careful as the victim may vomit and
subsequently inhale the fluid. When the victim regains consciousness continue to offer warm drink. At
this point you may notice that the symptoms of hypothermia are beginning to reoccur in reverse order.
Sometimes the person will simply "come out of it." with no reversal of symptoms.
Treating an unconscious victim is a difficult problem to deal with. I suggest that you never allow the
problem to develop to that point by treating it early.
Disclaimer: I do not recommend the use of the stomach tube or enema system. They are included here
only to offer some historical and theoretical techniques. These methods should only be attempted by
trained medical personnel.
A last shot
We’ve all heard how a "shot" of booze can "warm the spirit". I suppose this is true in a very literal
way. Alcohol to a hypothermic warms the spirit for it’s journey to the next incarnation. You know
how much warmer you feel when you drink alcoholic beverages while you’re cold. As you probably
already know, that heat is only a momentary sensation brought to you at the expense of the heat
energy being stored in the core of the body.
This effect is caused by a process called "dilation" which is the opening of blood vessels in the skin
and extremities and is brought about by alcohol. The heat thus released results in the sensation of
warmth without any actual additional heat being generated. Don’t drink for warmth. Many
hypothermia deaths are alcohol or drug related.
Abstinence is wise with regards to any of the so called "recreational drugs". The combination of cold,
lowered resistance to drug effects, and other unknown complications may reduce your ability to cope
with the cold.
Prevention of hypothermia
Prevention of hypothermia is a relatively simple matter. Be prepared for the worst possible conditions
you are likely to encounter. A simple theory but sometimes ignored as too inconvenient. For this
reason the preparations that you make should be simple, effective, and convenient.
A major part of the preparations you have already made. You have become familiar with the problems
related to cold exposure. You know how to recognize hypothermia should it affect yourself or one of
your party. You know what to do to treat it. In fact, by knowing what to do in the treatment you have
really picked up the basics of prevention. Here are some more ideas that may be of assistance to you
as you avoid the chilling grip of Hypothermia.
You will be better able to protect yourself from the cold if you have a good basic grasp of the heat loss
and gain mechanisms for the body. Most of these we’ve already discussed but lets put them in a
slightly different form so we can deal with them effectively.
Heat sources
Heat comes to the body from two basic sources. Internal sources of heat such as the heat produced by
your metabolism and by muscular activity, and external sources such as fire, sunlight and
thermonuclear bombs.
Internal sources of heat depend upon the energy you have stored in your body battery. If you have a
fully charged biological "battery" you can generate heat for many hours. As the power in this reserve
is depleted or as the temperature and associated events, robs you of essential energy, your body begins
to react in a specified manner to generate more heat. The most common method of generating heat is
an involuntary contraction of the muscles. The contraction is called "shivering" and is associated with
hypothermia when it becomes intense enough. Shivering produces heat through an increased
metabolic rate and through friction within the muscles themselves. It also requires a great deal of
energy to perform. It is not normally wise to sit quietly in the cold waiting for your body to convulse
and generate heat. A simpler method would be to take advantage of voluntary muscular contractions.
Voluntary muscular contractions are often called exercise. If you begin to get cold, don’t wait for your
body to become so chilled that it shivers. Instead do exercises to produce heat. In a survival situation
this may mean that you have to "keep moving" throughout the night in order to survive. This
movement must be carefully done so that you do not become totally exhausted and slump into a
mindless pile half way through the night.
Voluntary muscular activity can include movement of the legs, of the chest muscles and the arms.
Slow and deliberate walking in a sheltered place may make the difference between life and death.
Another way, almost as efficient in its heat production, and much easier to control, is the simple
muscular contractions called "isometrics". In this exercise the survivalist simply forces one set of
muscles to resist the movement of another opposing set i,e. One hand grips the other, one arm forces
itself down while the other arm forces it’s way up. Another technique is to place palm against palm
and push the hands together as if you are trying to crush a walnut held between the hands. A few
moments of this type of action will develop heat energy without a significant rise in the actual
metabolic rate. Isometrics are unlikely to force perspiration or raise the respiration rate. Isometrics can
also be performed in tight spaces if room is at a premium.
Another advantage of isometrics over jumping jacks, running in place, push ups and disco dancing, is
the reduction of "Air Pumping". Air pumping takes place during active exercise. Air pumping is when
the air that is warm and close to the skin, is pumped out into the cold by the alternate ballooning and
collapsing of the insulating garment. That pumped out heat may be essential to your survival and
efforts must be made to retain it. Slow exercise, done constantly and consistently as needed will help.
If you find that you cannot stay still for some reason and you must move about to stay warm, by all
means do so. First take some precautions.
If the pumping of warm air is taking place, that means there is some sort of insulation leak. These
leaks most often appear in places like the collar of the shirt, or coat, and down through the pant cuffs.
The simple prevention is to tighten all the areas that will allow heat loss to occur. The pant cuffs can
be tied loosely around the ankles, or simply stuffed into the tops of the sox. Sleeves can be buttoned
and tied loosely with cord. The collar should be fully extended over the neck.
The head and neck area is the most frequently overlooked heat loss area of the body. It is also one of
the easiest areas to protect. You may have heard the old dictum "If your feet are cold, cover your
head" this is a highly accurate analysis of the response of the body to cold.
You already know that as the body gets cold, circulation to the extremities is reduced and you feel
cold. The feet are often the first extremities to feel this cut off. If the head is uncovered a great deal of
heat energy is being radiated into space and that energy must be made up in some manner. Reduction
of heat loss in other less important areas is the physiological response. If the feet feel cold and the
head is uncovered, cover the head. The extra energy will now be sent back to the feet, warming them.
Many backpackers refuse to wear a hat until they feel miserable. They depend upon their thick down
jackets for protection. Forget it, people have dropped into hypothermia while wrapped in down jackets
because their heads were bare.
Remember, the head and neck can radiate as much as 60% of the body’s heat production. This is a
direct loss and can be easily reversed. If you find you have no hat, make one. If you happen to be
wearing two pairs of sox but have no hat, remove one pair of sox, replace your boots and tie them
lightly so as not to restrict blood flow to the skin (Loose boots also offer more insulation in the form
of trapped air than do tight boots). Take the two sox and try to pull one over your head. If it doesn’t fit,
cut both socks and stitch the two halves together to make a hat. Stuff the hat with extra insulation. The
thread and needle? Remember innovation.
Since we are dealing with internal sources of heat and the conservation of that heat it is useful to
remember a few other points. Almost any dry material can be used as insulation. This is to say that
you can use dry leaves, cattail tips, pieces of fabric, feathers and fur between the layers of your
clothing to reduce heat loss. If you are wearing a long sleeve shirt and long pants, the pants can be
sealed as has already been mentioned. Then a fill of dry leaves or other material suitable for insulation,
can be poured down the pants. This will be uncomfortable and temporary but the additional insulation
may make the difference between seeing only the night and seeing the morning too. Fill the shirt with
the same material. Almost anything can be used to increase the insulating value of clothing as long as
it is dry.
If you have no gloves and your hands are cold, your head gets first dibs on the sox. You need to
survive, not have comfortable hands. One way to protect your hands is obvious, put them into your
pockets. You can also pull your arms up into the shirt so that the arms and hands are close to the body.
By removing your arms from the cold environment you have acted to reduce heat loss through
radiation.
Don’t overlook anything you have with you as possible insulation. If you happen to be carrying a
small pack but are without storm gear, the contents of the pack should be inspected for possible use as
insulation. In addition the pack itself can be used as a short shelter. You can slide your feet into the
pack and protect the lower portion of the body. It may also be useful as a seat to raise you off the
ground. This too will reduce heat loss through conduction.
Stop…Did you notice? there are more ways to lose heat than just the three we already mentioned,
cold, wind and wetness. Remember, there are five active heat loss mechanisms working to deprive the
body of it’s energy.
The five heat loss mechanisms, revisited
I cannot stress the importance of this issue too much. Remember, the five ways the body can give up
energy are heat loss through conduction, convection, radiation, respiration and perspiration. Now that
the considerations for body temperature maintenance are more refined. Lets take a quick look at the
big five.
Conduction
Heat loss through conduction is the result of contact between your warmer body and some colder
object or body. A good example is conduction heat loss to the ground. Countless times I’ve seen
people spend significant amounts of time constructing a wind tight, rain protected shelter with no
ground insulation. They always seem to survive the night but mostly they feel like hell in the morning
and complain of stiff cramped muscles. The blood flow to those cold muscles was cut down by the
reactions to cold that you already know. When blood flow as restored in the warmer morning hours,
stiffness and aches are common. In extreme cases, conduction loss can kill.
Convection
Convection heat loss is the wind chill effect we’ve spent so much time with. The cooling effect of the
wind upon the body is a serious survival factor.
Radiation
Radiation heat loss is a little more difficult to spot but once you become aware of it and look for the
problem, it is very apparent. To really understand radiation heat loss you should try an experiment.
Some cold clear night step outside with your head uncovered. Stand still until you feel slightly cool.
Then walk to a nearby overhead protection. This can be a tree, a shed roof or any other non heated
overhead barrier. Within minutes you will feel either warmer or a slowing of your heat loss.
In the open your body heat is radiated into space. As soon as something comes between you and space
this heat loss is reduced. This is the reason that cloudy nights with freezing temperatures, feel warmer
than clear nights with the same indicated temperature. The clouds reduce heat loss through radiation.
A hat will reduce radiation heat loss.
Radiation heat loss was recognized by the body long ago and through some act of genetic engineering
the head grew lots of hair (some are luckier in this respect than others). Hair grown to full length will
cover the head and neck with a good insulating material that maintains its some value even when it is
wet. If you have long hair and it can cover your neck, try to arrange it to give your neck maximum
protection.
Respiration
Even breathing fresh air in the cold can kill you. But then, not breathing will certainly kill you.
Respiration heat loss occurs as we breathe in cold air, warm it to near body temperature in the nose.
throat and lungs , and then exhale it. This loss is increased when we breathe rapidly or when we
breathe thorough our mouths.
The heat loss can be reduced by maintaining a constant respiration rate. We can further protect
ourselves by breathing through the nose and by covering the mouth and nose with fabric. If the face
has been covered by some fabric, the incoming air will be slightly warmed when it meets the
resistance to its passage as offered by the fabric. When the air is subsequently exhaled the warm air
will heat the fabric and provide a certain amount of preheating for the next breath and so on. Care
must be exercised to assure that you do not re-breathe the same air frequently. If your intake of fresh
air is reduced beyond a certain level… well, you know… suffocation.
Perspiration
Perspiration is the method the body uses to cool itself. Wetness due to perspiration, immersion,
condensation or as the result of any other action, cools the body rapidly. Perspiration is a common
problem for individuals who suddenly find themselves in a survival situation.
As we have seen, panic often forces them to perform strenuous and energy wasting actions such as
running. This type of action causes perspiration which then cools by evaporation as the activity
diminishes. The best advice to follow is simply "Don’t sweat it".
It is also important to realize once again how water loss through perspiration can effect survival
potentials. You already realize how much of your ability to do work is destroyed through dehydration.
This work can also be work done by the body while it is rewarming itself. Dehydration often
accompanies hypothermia. The survival situation may make the adequate intake of fluids very
difficult. Even the desire for water is reduced when some people encounter survival stress. Inadequate
moisture in the body can increase the tendency for severe shock after a minor injury.
Perspiration wetness cools the body excessively in some conditions and deprives it of its ability to
cope with stress. Drink often, try to avoid perspiration, and don’t drool onto your clothes.
Heat loss versus heat gain
At first glance it may appear that there are many more ways to lose heat from the body than ways to
gain heat. This is almost true, but not quite. What is true is that the heat loss mechanisms exist in
nature and we needn’t work very hard to experience them. Another fact remains, the heat loss
mechanisms can be used as heat gain devices to assist the body in its battle with the cold.
Sit on something warm for heat gain through conduction, stand in warm air for gains through
convection. Heat from a fire is mostly radiation, while breathing that hot air from the fire is heat gain
through respiration (Possibly heat gain resulting from coughing activity too.) So how does one go
about taking advantage of these possibilities?
When we discuss shelter all of these gains will be built into our shelter with various skillful
manipulations of natural effects. At that point we will be discussing external heat sources. In the mean
time heat loss can be reduced through insulation. The insulation will be devised to defeat the losses we
know about and the body most likely will be able to survive on its own resources.
The resources
A few simple steps will serve to condense all of this material into survival success in cold conditions.
A few preparations will give us the resources to take the steps.
1) Eat: Whenever you travel in the mountains, eat constantly. Not large heavy meals, just continuous
munching on gorp ( A mix of candies, nuts, raisins, etc.) This will assure you of a full supply of
energy should a problem arise. If food is available to you in a survival situation, eat before you go to
sleep, you’ll sleep warmer.
2) Sleep: If you have not entered hypothermia, feel cold, but have food and energy, sleep if you can.
Should you drop into hypothermia in your sleep, you will wake with the first symptoms, the intense
shivering. it’ll feel like a giant fist shaking you awake. Most people will awaken if they feel too cold.
Death during sleep in the cold is the result of falling to sleep after entering the later stages of
hypothermia, or of having trees falling across the sleeping body. Sleep is necessary to rest the body
and to help with the repairs that the mind and muscles need. Your decisions after rest are more likely
to be accurate and you will have the strength to carry them out.
3)Drink: Much has been said about this. It is important for you to consume adequate amounts of
water to maintain efficiency and strength. The water performs many jobs not the least of which if the
removal of chemical poisons that accumulate in the system. If it can be arranged, drink warm liquids.
Snow and ice can be consumed but this will add an additional burden to the heating problems faced by
the body. Try to melt snow and ice in your trash bag. Avoid alcohol and avoid drugs.
4) Bivouac early: As soon as you recognize that you have become involved in a survival situation,
start making camp. This may be one of the most important things you can do. In the light you can act
efficiently to find a good secure shelter and prepare for the night. Do not attempt to push your stressed
body across "one more mountain" in hope of finding help. Tomorrow, that can be done in the light.
You will need a couple of hours of light to make a secure, warm and comfortable shelter. Do it.
5) Carry emergency gear: Much is yet to be said about this subject. When we discuss the survival
kits you’ll begin to realize how simple preparation can be. We already know that the addition of a
large trash bag can spell the difference between life and death. Carry one. If you also have the means
to make a fire and the knowledge to create a shelter you have a good chance. Your survival situation
will have been a fine adventure with plenty of drama and a minimum in of disaster.
Summit up:
Now you know about the number one killer of the woodsy wanderer. "Hypothermia, the killer of the
unprepared". It slides into our souls on icy feet, robs us of our minds, incapacitates our bodies and kills
us while we sleep. We can stop it with foresight and even banish it with treatment correctly and
quickly performed.
Exposure is a serious hazard in the wilderness but there are simple causes and simple cures. Shelter is
the only true preventative and this implies preparation. Lets get prepared for cold weather with a little
examination of the principles of cold weather shelter.
Next: Chapter 5 – Shelter… A cool hang out
Ron Hood
Copyright Ron Hood 1995

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Chapter 1

Survival: The Last Laugh

Chapter 1 – The Beginning

Introduction | 1 – Beginning | 2 – Innovation | 3 – Woods Master | 4 – Exposure

Always try to avoid placing yourself in a survival situation.

To Help Assure Your Rescue

2) Tell your friend when to expect you back.

3) Call that person when you return.

You didn’t follow The Rule

The Rule of Threes

A person can live for:

Percentage of Dehydration and Ability to do Work:

% of dehydration = % of work possible

The Body Battery

The Other Priority, Love

Working Out the Priorities

Chapter 2 – Something New… Innovation

Introduction | 1 – Beginning | 2 – Innovation | 3 – Woods Master | 4 – Exposure

The First Step

Some Thoughts for Thought

The walk to survival begins with these steps:

Innovation, A New Idea

Six things that need doing:

Sex and Survival

Chapter 3 – The Woods Master

Introduction | 1 – Beginning | 2 – Innovation | 3 – Woods Master | 4 – Exposure

Heat passes from the body by five heat loss mechanisms:

Conduction, Convection, Radiation, Respiration and Perspiration (or wetness).

Protected from the

Introduction | 1 – Beginning | 2 – Innovation | 3 – Woods Master | 4 – Exposure

The likely victim

The Symptoms of Hypothermia

Figure 1: Symptoms of Hypothermia

The 1-2-3 of Hypothermia first aid

1) Stop further heat loss

The Unconscious victim

The five heat loss mechanisms, revisited

Heat loss versus heat gain

Next: Chapter 5 – Shelter… A cool hang out

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