stickmaker: (Default)
Stickmaker ([personal profile] stickmaker) wrote2006-10-31 07:15 am

Preparation Exercise

A recent set of surveys by emergency agencies found that people
asked to prepare a list of what they would pack in a three-day disaster
kit only included two days worth of food. People asked to list what they
would pack in a seventy-two hour kit only packed enough for a day and a
half. (These values are both averages and typical.)

Now, in my emergency kit I don't include enough full meals for
three days (or seventy-two hours) but that's a deliberate choice. I pack
enough to keep my energy up, balancing that against having a light load
for faster/easier movement. However, I suspect that wasn't what the
people in the surveys were doing.

More likely, this speaks of a combination of US psychology (most
people don't have an accurate idea of how much they need to eat, even
though they do it several times a day) and innumeracy.