The library
Every flagship guide on the site, newest first, with drills, pass/fail standards and sources you can check.
Long-form guides with drills, pass/fail standards and sources you can check. Agency figures link to the agency; our own results are labelled as ours.
Sprains, blisters, cuts and heat and cold illness dominate backcountry incident patterns. We build the kit in that order, flag every item that needs training first, and cover the rare severe bleed.
Ferro rods and lighters behave very differently once tinder is damp. The ignition sources and tinders that hold up in rain, the preparation that decides the outcome, and the combinations that simply never light.
Before shopping, measure. Metering the fridge, furnace fan, medical devices and router, converting to watt-hours, and choosing a battery station, an inverter generator — or neither.
Bucket kits sell fear and expire in a closet. A rotating deep pantry of supermarket food, with calorie and protein targets per adult per day and the storage temperatures that decide whether any of it lasts.
One gallon per person per day is a floor, not an answer. Where the figure comes from, how heat and medical needs change it, and boiling, bleach and filtration ranked by what each actually removes.
Most published kit lists are copied from each other and never opened. We rebuild it item by item against agency guidance and a carry-weight standard, then cut everything that cannot justify its ounces.