So there was a thread of a guy in GD who dug up a 870 that he buried in 2001 after 9/11. He opened it up and was shocked on how great everything looked minus a few small issues and changes he would make it the future. This made me remember that I have a BOB over at my moms house I put in her shed back in 2008 that I never brought to my house after all these years. Shit planning on my end of course so I figured I would open it up and see what was in it.

Forgot some of this stuff was in there and really shocked on how many ways I could make a fire, kinda over kill . All food and medications are long past expired minus the MREs which have no date listed. Clothes are 1 size too small and most of battery’s leaked

Things I missed: no extra set of batteries for said flash lights, duck tape and zip ties, better gloves, jacket of some sort, clothing that would allow me blend in. Everything in this bag is “high speed low drag in appearance” but if I needed to blend in I would be limited to the clothes I hopefully had on when I had to bug out. Extra gun that could be packed away in the BOB just in case I didn’t have time to grab anything in the safe.

Changes I need to make: Getting married soon (date now pending this virus as we had to cancel out wedding in Alaska due to this fucking shit) and now have a toddler. So I will need to make 2 more bags that will account for my soon to be wife and child. Definitely need to look at some others ideas on what I can pack to make sure I have all my bases covered in that department. Add a gun that can be packed and forgotten, a snubby would be perfect and now I’m not a broke college kid like I was that should be easier and a portable USB battery pack along with a phone charging cable.

If anyone has ideas on what to pack for a 1.5 to 2 year old that would be great. Nevertheless here’s a little glimpse into my 2008 BOB

511 Tactical 72 hour RUSH back pack
Knock off camel pack bladder
511 Tactical First Aid MOLLE bag with the basics
Israeli bandage
Cold compress
Knock off Advil
Snake bite kit
Anti chaffing cream
Bug repellant
Gold bond
Sun screen
Compass
Gerber K Bar like knife
Azor knife
Knock off multi tool
2 lighters
Chapstick
Batteries for sure fire
TP
Dryer lint
Steel wool
Cotton balls/vaseline
Fishing line
Fishing hooks/weights
Magnesium striker
Water proof Matches
Home made Shelter
2nsnap lights
Sharpie
Pen
Mini mag light
Nalgine bottle
Army Poncho
Katadyn water filter
Leather gloves
1 belt
Parador did bracelet
Disposable poncho
W pairs of clothes (now 1 size too small)
Beenie
5 pairs of socks
3 pairs of boxers
Foldable hat
2 bandannas
100 of 550 cord
Eton micro link FR160 hand crank radio
Headlamp (main light non led)
Emergency Shelter
Hiking bowl
2 MREs (grilled chicken / chicken Fajita)
2 Mountain house backpacking meals (Rice and chicken / chili with Mac and beef)
Wet wipes
Spoon/fork
Trash bag
3 small 1 large zip locks
3 N95 mask
Army field rifle cleaning kit
1 small bottle of rem oil
50 rounds of 40 cal ammo
1 cheap set of Binos
1 multi carabiner

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NIce. more prepared then most.

Similar sitch.    I put a Big Bob in my truck after Katrina in case I get caught in open ground after an earthquake - which is a real possibility with my regular commute.  It's a big bag.  Full on camping kit.  Tent, sleeping bag, bivy, pad, water filtration, fire starting, MREs, cooking kit, hygiene kit, change of warm clothes, some tools.

But I made it back in 05-06....it was definitely time to go through and revise some stuff.  And yeah, my clothes didn't fit...

also, Gold Bond...

I scanned the list...

Quality tactical flashlight
Leatherman
Quality hunting knife

I sold/gave away my 2001 pickup truck to a friend’s son.
Apparently my Truck box must have had some water seepage when I stored it under the garage overhang.
Expensive first generation Victorinox LED flashlights were trashed.
Blankets were a mold fest.
Even with zip lock bagged clothes, there was some water damage and clothing loss.
Expensive poncho smelled like monkey butt, hung outside for a week but good now.
Lesson learned, occasionally check your kit and leave batteries OUT of you stored lights.

If I lived in California I would have bugged out long ago

Spent a lot of time planning it out, think I did ok from what I knew back then.

As much as I want to say a tent or shelter is good a emergency blanket would be suffice for use city slickers. I will also ditch the water filtration kit for a life straw. Definitely give your back a quick look

Should replace it with the green one

Definitely agree on the light and leatherman. For a knife from the reviews the Gerber LMF II ASEK Fixed Blade Knife I have on the backpack should work I think.

Yeah definitely leaving battery’s out going forward.

It’s in the near future, just not at this time.

I would consider skipping surefire and mini mag light both.

Pick a battery.  Store those batteries.

My surefires all use cr123a batteries and when stored in cool temps they have 80% of their charge after 10 years.

I also store aa and aaa lithium stuff as well, not sure what mini maglight options are out there anymore.

Rather than different stuffs, same stuffs.

Lithium won't leak but I did skim thread so maybe it is already mentioned.

I have some old surefire with malkoff drop ins and I have some newish surefire led stuff that was on a big discount.  

Nothing against mini mags, but pick something and have batteries they can share.  To some extent having a single cell light helps as well, it can run the batteries down to nothing while the double cell light may do better at having a high and low option.

Good info and I didn’t not know that Liths didn’t leak, consider me educated. Back in 2008 I was a broke kid so a mini mag was affordable but a few surefires might be in order. Both weapon lights I have are sure fire so c123a would be the obvious choice and a great recommendation. Thanks for the feedback

I'd add some cash and a photo ID.  (I've been considering a spare credit card/prepaid visa, as well.)
For many issues, money solves the problem (at least until you get to full mad max).

Also, for containerized preps, add a full set of normal clothing and toiletries.  You don't necessarily need to take it, but if the stuff you are wearing when things go sideways isn't great, you can simply change clothes.  Further, if it's a lesser SHTF, you now have extra clean clothes.

Great feedback and agree with all of those suggestions, gonna be adding that in there. Thank you

I have another thread going on this....I opened up a BOB I packed 15-years ago and found a vial of $5 in quarters.  Apparently I thought I would be making long distance calls during the boog...or maybe catch a bus with exact change...

Mini mags are not that bad, I just bought a lot of used 2 cell cr123a surefires and then got some led ones on a clearance.  I have some other lights that use the same batteries.

If set on aa or aaa then you can buy those in lithium as well.  I buy energizer brand usually but there are others I am sure.  For headlamps and stuff these will be more common.

My weapon lights all tend to use cr123a batteries.  So if I notice those dimming I pull the batteries and put fresh ones in.  A single cell led light that can use those batteries still will run em dead and provide a lot of light for a long while.

Watch miss matching pairs of batteries and what not.  Lithium batteries are interesting when they fail.

We have a ton of old threads you can play search on and read opinions on all this stuff.

I don't even buy today's alkaline batteries on super sale for name brand.  I don't like alkaline they keep leaking.  Had some sitting new in pack leak.

I buy lithiums and rechargables.  If I had some item that used a battery and no other option than alkaline existed, I might cheat and run some wires out to a home made battery pack for it.

Are my car batteries alkaline?  I just call em wet cell but maybe I have some.

On needs for the toddler: Down side is that they grow really, really fast at this stage. Upside is that clothing is small. Put to or three sets of clothing in the bag, staggering them current size, up size up and two sizes up. Worst case, you can layer the larger sizes over the smaller in colder weather. If you have a kid in diapers, invest in a set of "Chinese Pre-fold" diapers rather than cloth. Add several pairs of plastic over pants. Cloth can be washed, and if you buy the larger size cloth diapers, they will accommodate a wide range of sizes of kids. The importance of items to occupy the toddler and keep him/her distracted and engaged cannot be overstated. Felt/cloth toy sets are light, small, and take up next to no room, and they become worth far more than their weight when you have a cranky toddler on your hands whose routines have been disrupted.

P.

If flashlights were damaged due to leaking batteries, consider contacting the flashlight and/or batt mfr about a replacement.  I have replaced a few MagLites which were damaged by leaking batteries.  Cost a couple of bucks for shipping, but overall much less than a new light.

Concur with storing individually-wrapped batteries outside the device(s)s.

I have a life straw too...in a last ditch fanny pack.   The Big Bob is more of a base camp bag and the water filtration kit does a LOT more volume than the life straw

Might have to give them a call, they are down the street from me.

Most definitely. I think the life straw will be just what I need to reduce weight and simply the setup.

Thanks, I’ll give it few updates and I’ll give it a bump.

I think OP did pretty well, all things considered way back then,  I look forward to his revised BOB load-out.

If anything, I suggest that Op closely look into shelf/storage life of individual components.

Here's what's in my Big Bob.

Note: I had removed the 2nd row seats from my truck.

Much appreciated. I spent a long while planning my BOB back in the day but figured I might of had to use it sooner so I wasn’t focused on shelf life so much

Gonna be my project this week

How much for the N95 masks LOL.  My thoughts is if you can turn a survival situation into a crappy  camping trip you have succeeded. Seems like  a decent core of stuff but you might need to shed weight.  NOT A FAT SHAME for that watch my youtube video and be mean I need the motivation.  I would go for a mora knife paired with a  separate firesteel.  Good for you leaving mom supplies.  Good son!