Here's a Diptych Called "At the Grocery Store One Day After the New Yorker Earthquake Article Hit"

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Why buy water? Those flimsy bottles won't last either time or earthquakes.
Water comes out of your tap. Get a sturdy 5-gal container from the camping store and fill it up. Then get three more and fill them up.
We keep 90 gallons in storage at my house of 4 people.

treacle on July 15, 2015 at 12:33 PM

Five gallons of water weighs around 40lbs ...which will come in handy... when your house collapses on top you and the 90 gallons of water you're breaking your back trying drag out.

I think the point of bug-out earthquake kits is that they're portable.

tkc on July 15, 2015 at 12:43 PM

You guys still have editorial meetings?

seatackled on July 15, 2015 at 12:49 PM

@1
Aren't you supposed to mix in a teaspoon of chlorine or something and change it every few months?

seatackled on July 15, 2015 at 12:50 PM

@1's right about those two gallon spouty jugs. I used to keep them on a shelf in the basement and quit because they consistently spring leaks after a couple years. And @2, the week's worth of water isn't for "bugging out," it's for surviving where you are while the utilities are down. I don't know where you live, but in Seattle, your best bet is going to be to stay put, not panic and run in some random direction.

beef rallard on July 15, 2015 at 1:25 PM

I went to REI and bought a filtration bottle (used for camping).

Supreme Ruler Of The Universe on July 15, 2015 at 1:52 PM

When someone starts actively disdaining prudent emergency planning measures, The Stranger should consider its civic responsibility in giving him a public forum.

butterw on July 15, 2015 at 1:55 PM

There's always the lake nearby. Off chance it might make me a little sick but I won't die of thirst.

DJSauvage on July 15, 2015 at 2:03 PM

I have a water filter for backpacking and I expect lake Washington will still exist. if it doesn't I'm fucked.

Max Solomon on July 15, 2015 at 2:37 PM

Get an empty 5-gallon jug (or better, a rain barrel), put it outside. Use it to water once a month. When our drought strikes (as it has) ,or when your plumbing breaks, or you set something on fire with flaming marshmallows, you'll have one square foot of extra water.
Get a square empty juice bottle. Put it in your freezer. It'll keep the temperature even, and next time we have an outage or SPU has a payment glitch, your food wont melt instantly. And if you need water, that's a bottle of water you won't have to purify before drinking.
Get a bottle of distilled water. Put it in your trunk. Next time your radiator overheats, or you need to clean your hands,or the kids make a mess, you have a gallon of water. And if you get stranded, you can drink it.
Get a steel water bottle. Fill it. Drink it on an unusual 90-degree day in Seattle. Refill & repeat.

There. Four handy convenient places you might have a little extra water in case any number of minor inconveniences hit, and you didn't even require an apocalypse to use it. Yes, purify before drinking, but you will want water for other things as well - even if you're just getting out of town after the shit hits the fan. (Because if the shit hits the fan,it will hit the lake as well.)

izzy on July 15, 2015 at 2:43 PM

@5 that entirely depends. After an earthquake you most certainly don't stay in damaged buildings. And if it's a big quake - like the 9.0 everybody is freaking out over - you should assume the building your in is damaged until somebody who knows what their talking about can clear it.

If possible having the 7-10 days supply is great for all sorts of emergencies. But most urban livers in Apartment buildings are not going to be able to do that. And quakes damage buildings.

So in an earthquake you'll need a portable kit to take with you. Hence why having bottled water is great.

tkc on July 15, 2015 at 2:57 PM

Oh for God's sake. I need to refresh our supply of earthquake water, and now if I do it I'm going to look like one of those spazs who is doing it because of this stupid article.

And anyone who thinks they will be able to flee Seattle after the big one hits is a fool. We can't even get through a rush hour on a clear day without a few disruptions. I'll just stay put, thank you. (actually, I'll probably have to work. Ugh)

Catalina Vel-DuRay on July 15, 2015 at 3:45 PM

@8:

No, but you could just as easily die of dysentery or some other bacterial infection as the lakes, streams, and watersheds become contaminated with debris from the tsunami:oil and gasoline leaking from submerged vehicles and holding tanks; toxic chemicals from building materials, industrial plants and hundreds of thousands, if not millions of containers of household cleaning supplies; sewage overflow and fecal matter from tens of thousands of people desperately trying to dispose of their collected excrement; decomposing bodies - both human and animal - and who knows what else.

Simply put, if you don't have a method for boiling or at least heavily filtering water from natural sources in the aftermath of a catastrophic environmental disaster, it should probably be considered unsafe to consume. On the other hand, you can just wait a few days and watch how other people fare on that lake water, and if most of them don't develop explosive diarrhea, internal bleeding, or other similar symptoms, you'll probably be okay.

COMTE on July 15, 2015 at 3:47 PM

What Comte @13 said. After big floods (and that's what a tsunami is), earthquakes, and similar disasters, if you look at what people actually died of, yeah, it was sometime having a house fall on their head, and yeah it's sometimes having their neighborhood go up in flames, but often it was something boring, like cholera. Cholera's not especially lethal if you're in a modern hospital, but the line to get into hospital could be 50,000 people long. And the transmission cycle is fecal-oral: picture no working toilets, and sewage treatment plants smashed, with their not-yet treated contents washing down streets into lakes...

Eric from Boulder on July 15, 2015 at 8:48 PM

Here's a Diptych Called "At the Grocery Store One Day After the New Yorker Earthquake Article Hit"

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