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What this is

Field notes from Tom Morgan (@tomowenmorgan), 22 Oct 2026, 12:10 UTC. About 4,162 likes, 540 reposts, 11,739 bookmarks, 660,000 views at capture. He posted a prompt-style list for a stretch with no internet, then said he had bought the SAS Survival Guide and called it a bush manual.

I checked the list against Ready.gov’s kit page (updated 1 July 2026) and Ready.gov’s water page. Where Tom and Ready.gov differ, both numbers are below. A handbook does not put water in the closet. Buy the water.

The hacking stories from this month are a fair reason to do this on an ordinary weekend. Keys that can spend while the network is up live on /security. This page is for the hours it is not.

One sentence

Paper you can read in the dark, cash in small bills, one gallon of water per person per day, food people in the house will actually eat, a radio that does not need a cell tower, and a meeting place you already agreed on.

This week, while the lights are on

Do these in order. Several days of water and food is the Ready.gov floor. Two weeks is Tom’s aim, if you have the space.

1. Print this page. Write the meeting point in pen before you file it.
2. Cash in small bills. A few days of groceries is a real start if two to four weeks of essentials is a stretch.
3. Water. One gallon per person per day, drinking and sanitation. Several days first, then toward two weeks.
4. Food the household will eat, and a manual can opener. An electric opener is a brick in this outage.
5. Call the pharmacy. Ask what an early fill or a few extra days looks like on your plan. Write the answer in the blanks below.
6. A battery or hand-crank radio that receives a station you can hear at home. Write that station on the radio.
7. One copy of photos, IDs, and files you cannot rebuild. Unplug the drive when the copy finishes. Passport copies go in the same grab bag.
8. Tell one neighbor the meeting point.

The list

Tick these on the paper copy. Tom’s groups, with the Ready.gov items he left off folded in.

Money and paper

• Cash at home for essentials, small bills. Tom’s range is two to four weeks. Ready.gov says cash, with no duration.
• Phone numbers for the bank, the card, and the insurer, on paper. Full account numbers live in the waterproof bag with the passport copies, the same bag you would grab. A complete list on the fridge is a burglary.
• Printed contacts: family, close friends, neighbors, doctors, the kids’ school.
• A family meeting point and a time. “If we cannot reach each other, meet at X by Y.” Write it in the blanks.
• Paper copies of passports, IDs, insurance cards, and prescriptions, in a waterproof container.
• Anything business-critical exported to a machine you still have if GitHub is dark. A remote you cannot reach is not the copy.
• Offline maps on the phone, downloaded now, plus one paper map of the neighborhood for when the phone is dead.

Talking to people

• Battery or hand-crank AM/FM radio. In the US, add NOAA Weather Radio with tone alert. NOAA is a US service. Write the station you can actually hear.
• A pair of walkie-talkies the household already knows how to turn on. In the US, FRS radios need no license. GMRS needs an FCC license: 10 years, $35 application fee on the fee guide effective 23 May 2025, applicant 18 or older, and any family member can use the radios. Other countries have their own rules.
• Test the “landline.” Unplug the router. If the handset goes quiet, it is running over the internet. Tom’s warning is the right one.
• One out-of-town person everyone contacts when a network comes back. Local lines jam first.

Power and light

• Power banks charged. A solar charger or a portable power station if you already have one.
• Flashlights, a headlamp, and spare batteries. Put the batteries in the grab bag, not only in a kitchen drawer.
• The manual way to open the smart lock, the garage, and the building door. Practice it once.

Water, food, heat

• One gallon of water per person per day. A normally active person needs about three quarters of a gallon of fluid. Children, nursing, illness, and heat need more. In very hot weather the need can double.
• In a high-rise, treat the pump as electric. The tap can stop while the street still has water pressure.
• Commercially bottled water, sealed, somewhere cool and dark. Water you bottle yourself goes in a food-grade container and gets replaced every six months.
• Shelf-stable food people will eat, for several days, then toward two weeks. Include no-cook food.
• A manual can opener.
• A camping stove and fuel, used outdoors. Fuel smoke and carbon monoxide are the reason “ventilated” is in Tom’s line. A cracked window is not the plan.

If the stored water runs out, Ready.gov’s order is: drink water you know is clean first. Boiling is the safest treatment they list: a rolling boil for one full minute, then cool. Their bleach method is regular unscented household bleach at 5.25 to 6.0 percent sodium hypochlorite, 1/8 teaspoon per gallon, stirred, then 30 minutes. It should smell slightly of bleach. If it does not, repeat the dose and wait 15 minutes. If it still does not, discard it. Scented bleach, color-safe bleach, and bleach with added cleaners are out. The full page is ready.gov/water. Drink what you need today. Ready.gov says to ration drinking water only when authorities tell you to.

Health

• Prescriptions you already have, in the grab bag, with a paper list of the drug, the dose, and the doctor.
• The pharmacy’s answer, written below. A 30-day cushion is Tom’s line. @thebellacissa replied the same day that her pharmacy will not refill more than about two days early (118 likes). Plans differ. Ask yours. Do not assume the counter will hand over a month early.
• A first aid kit. Pain relievers in the doses your household uses, including children’s doses if children are there. Anti-diarrhea, antacids, and any daily OTC you would miss.
• Hygiene: soap, sanitizer, wipes, menstrual supplies, toothbrush, garbage bags and ties.
• Glasses, contact solution, hearing-aid batteries. Infant formula, bottles, diapers. Pet food and extra water for the animal.

The apartment and the kids

• A paper copy of the building’s emergency procedures, and the super’s number.
• Books, games, and art supplies that need no screen. Downloaded shows die with the battery.
• Names of a few neighbors you would actually knock on.
• A whistle, to signal. A dust mask. Plastic sheeting, scissors, and duct tape if you might need to shelter in place. A wrench or pliers that can turn off the utilities, and a look at how those valves work before the day.
• A change of clothes and sturdy shoes. A blanket or sleeping bag per person. Matches in a waterproof container. Paper and a pencil.

Copies that survive the machine

• Photos and documents on an external drive. Unplug it when the copy finishes. A drive that stays mounted gets encrypted with the computer.
• Unique passwords and 2FA, which you already want for /security. Print the recovery codes for the accounts you cannot afford to lose. Leave the password list in the manager. On this Mac, day-to-day secrets stay in the login keychain.
• The grab bag’s home is a place every adult can find in the dark. Ready.gov also wants a smaller kit at work (food, water, medicine, walking shoes, enough for 24 hours) and a kit in the car.

What still pays

Small bills. A card terminal that cannot reach the bank cannot approve the charge. A shop that cannot see the Bitcoin network cannot take an ordinary payment either, even when the chain itself is fine. That split is /fiatvsbitcoin. For this page the useful fact is smaller: the corner store runs on cash until its own network comes back.

Ready.gov also lists traveler’s checks. Count them only if a shop near you would still take one.

Keep it current

Ready.gov’s maintenance list is short. Cans stay cool and dry. Boxed food goes in a closed plastic or metal container. Replace what expires. Look at the kit again once a year, because the household changes. Water you bottled yourself gets replaced every six months. Charge the power banks on a normal Sunday.

Where the two lists differ

• Duration. Ready.gov’s basic kit is several days of water and non-perishable food, in a container you can carry. Tom aims at two weeks. Start at several days.
• Prescriptions. “Keep 30 days” is the goal. The refill rule is whatever the pharmacy and the plan allow. Ask this week.
• Radios. NOAA is US-only. GMRS in the US is licensed. FRS is the license-free pair. Walkie-talkies are a family tool inside a building, a weak substitute for the radio that receives news.
• The phone that looks like a landline. Test it with the router unplugged.
• Paper secrets. Recovery codes and copies of IDs, in one waterproof bag. The password vault stays in the manager.
• The backup drive. Offline means unplugged.
• The stove. Outdoors. Carbon monoxide is the constraint.
• The SAS Survival Guide. Tom bought it and described it as a bush manual. Stored water is the apartment version of that book.

Sources

• @tomowenmorgan, 22 Oct 2026 — the list. Engagement above is at capture.
• @thebellacissa, same day — pharmacies often refuse a fill more than about two days early. Her account of her pharmacy.
• Ready.gov, Build a kit — basic supplies, updated 1 July 2026. Printable checklist: PDF.
• Ready.gov, Water — one gallon, boiling, bleach. Their page says last updated 22 Feb 2021. The gallon rule matches the July 2026 kit page.
• FCC, GMRS — license required, 10-year term, family may operate. Fee: $35 application fee on the guide effective 23 May 2025.

Related on this site

• Security desk — keys, patches, and a hidden origin, for while the network is up
• macOS Keychain — secrets on this Mac stay out of chat and off a printed password list
• Fiat vs Bitcoin — why a shop can refuse both a card and a coin when it cannot see a network
• Google Takeout — one export path for accounts you would hate to lose