Couple of questions

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Sep 14, 2002
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Was hoping if you lot could help me with a couple of things. I've recently been discussing preparedness with my dad. Hes never really seen a need for it as him and my mum are of the 'we managed in the war (which they did), we'll manage now' attitude. But since that little ricin thing in London last week hes suddenly sat up and taken notice. What he wanted to know is; are there any hygiene/safety issues for long-term storage of clean drinking water in clean new unused steel 5 gallon jerry cans. He would treat it with plain bleach first. Hes thinking it would be useful to have 10 gallons of clean drinking prepared to sling in the back of the car if ever he and my mum had to evacuate and thinks that they would make good durable water transporters.
Secondly, over the past few months I've put together an altoids tin (PSK?) I was wondering if removing pills from their blister packs (immodium, nurofen etc) had any adverse effects on the lifespan of the drugs.
Cheers for any help on this
D.
 
Originally posted by donn
What he wanted to know is; are there any hygiene/safety issues for long-term storage of clean drinking water in clean new unused steel 5 gallon jerry cans. He would treat it with plain bleach first. Hes thinking it would be useful to have 10 gallons of clean drinking prepared to sling in the back of the car if ever he and my mum had to evacuate and thinks that they would make good durable water transporters.
Secondly, over the past few months I've put together an altoids tin (PSK?) I was wondering if removing pills from their blister packs (immodium, nurofen etc) had any adverse effects on the lifespan of the drugs.
Cheers for any help on this
D.

Good questions Donn -

Steel is a bad ideal for long term water storage. Even if the inside of the cans are treated/coated to prevent rust the treatment can degrade over time and leach into your drinking water. Particularly if a little bleach or iodine is added. If these are jerry cans meant for gasoline they will likely rust over time. Steel is short term only for drinking water. Been there, done that.

A better solution is to use a clean plastic barrel. A 30 gallon barrel doesn't take up much space in the garage and you can transfer the water into smaller containers quickly in a "bug out" situation.

Pills and capsules exposed to atmosphereic humidity in an Altoids can will degrade rather quickly and probably be useless or worse inside a month or so. Many OTC drugs are available in those little single dose foil pouches. Ask a friendly perscription counter attendant for help.

Ricin is bad mojo. It's incredibly easy to make and there's no antidote.
 
Ricin is bad mojo. It's incredibly easy to make and there's no antidote.

And very difficult to diagnose, unless there is a reason to suspect that ricin is involved.
 
I should have mentioned that there are heavy plastic jerry cans that are readily available. They are made to carry water and even have "WATER" molded into the sides of the can.

You can get them both new and as good used military surplus.

If your father doesn't want to mess with syphoning water out of a barrel, this is the way to go.
 
Originally posted by Bodyhammer
And very difficult to diagnose, unless there is a reason to suspect that ricin is involved.

Of course it's also ridiculously easy to kill yourself while making ricin. That being said, would it matter to a fascist religious fanatic? In these times, probably not.
 
Thanks for the advice Stormcrow I'll pass it on. I guess plastic jerry cans must be dirt cheap. Regarding the drugs you think if I just snip the blister packs into singles, being careful not to puncture the seal between the tablets, that would work just as well?
And Ricin. If all these bloody idiot fanatics were going to do is kill themselves with it then they could make tonnes of the stuff as far as I'm concerned. No loss.
 
Originally posted by donn
Thanks for the advice Stormcrow I'll pass it on. I guess plastic jerry cans must be dirt cheap. Regarding the drugs you think if I just snip the blister packs into singles, being careful not to puncture the seal between the tablets, that would work just as well?
And Ricin. If all these bloody idiot fanatics were going to do is kill themselves with it then they could make tonnes of the stuff as far as I'm concerned. No loss.

In my experince, a plastic "GI" water jerry goes for US$12-15, good used surplus.

Yes, if you're careful not to break the seal, cutting them into singles ought to work fine. A small Zip-Lock bag would also work if you're scrupulous about getting them closed.

It's the one's that don't kill themselves that concern me. A couple of Oh Zees of ricin dumped into the ventilation system of a mall or a large building could kill thousands. And it sounds like the wogs already have the stuff, else why the decontamination concern where the Brit cops were stabbed?
 
Donn, I trim my OTC sealed card/strip stuff down to get it into PSK's. You can see the seal line, and can just trim it to within a mm or 2 to the edge. IF they're sealed they should keep their potency for at least the box listed expiration period.

Hope this helps.
 
Of course it's also ridiculously easy to kill yourself while making ricin.

That's some small blessing, I suppose.


I love your sig, by the way. I almost stopped scanning it because it looked like the old cliche.
 
Cheers for the help folks. Friday night is a teeny weeny knife and a pack of immodium. Oh the fun of it :rolleyes:
 
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