Knowledge is key. That is an overriding truth in a lot of things you may be involved in. Fixing a broken pipe? Knowing about plumbing makes it much easier. This can extend to your preparedness too. While there is not a course to teach you more information about certain situations, there is a wealth of information if you examine present and past disasters.
No one has time to research every disaster that has ever happened. You can use your preparation levels to prioritize. There are things you will already know. If you live in a location that gets extreme blizzards, you have already experienced the issue and can learn from it. This is a pretty basic level. Next you may look into the effects of major flooding that might happen in your area. You may have never experienced it, but may be in a 100 year flood plain. Take a lesson from those that deal with this much more frequently. For example, some of these people prepared by placing an ax in their attic. This allowed them to chop through and climb onto the roof to await rescue. Quite a good thing if surprised by flash flooding in the middle of the night. Continue to move up the levels to examine situations you want to prepare for.
Some of the disasters that exist on the top of the levels may be a widespread EMP, massive social upheaval, war outbreak, or nuclear attack. Knowing how to respond to these will greatly increase your chance to survive them. For instance, knowing the signs that point to an EMP will let you respond quicker so that you can be ahead of those that stand around in disbelief trying their cell phones over and over. Even if this is only a slim margin saved by knowing that modern cars, cell phones, and computer will be useless, this may be enough to get you home. This will increase your safety level before others begin to panic. Alternately, if caught in a social breakdown, you may have to employ tactics like “The Gray Man” to move out of the worst effected areas. These are just a couple of examples.
This short post cannot cover all the issues and situations you may want to look into. It is simply to provoke thoughts as to the specifics you may need to evaluate as you plan for your levels of survival. Knowledge weighs nothing, yet may be your best tool.
What is the gray man?
Gray Man is tactic to blend into your surroundings and be just another person in the crowd. Someone that has no features, clothes, or gear that sparks interest from people or causes them to remember you. If you are traveling through a populated urban area during a disaster, this can be used to avoid confrontation. A minor example of the reverse would be to be wearing the opposing teams colors during a riot after a sporting event. You stand out inviting scrutiny and conflict. This post references more information about it. Hiding in Plain Sight