Residents close to the derailment were alerted and the story goes that many tried to escape the harmful fumes by getting in their cars and driving off. Unfortunately, the chlorine gas saturation level in the area was so high that many vehicles would not start. Families were poisoned sitting in their cars, their lungs burning from the inside out. A total of eight people died and 138 were injured.

The same thing (railroad accident, chlorine gas spill) happened in Graniteville, South Carolina, in 2005. Nine people died and at least 250 were treated for chlorine exposure. Residents in the area were forced to evacuate for two weeks.2 Naturally, there is concern that rail-transported toxic gas could be used in a terror attack. According to a report in USA Today, Navy researchers say an attack on a chemical-carrying train could kill 100,000 people.3 Bottom line: Gas masks are a good idea for a bug-out bag if you can afford them. You can fi nd child-sized gas masks at www.armynavydeals.com and http://approvedgasmasks.com.

What to Tell Your Kids

These preparations will not go unnoticed by your kids-neither will the extra bag you're carrying around in your car.

What you tell your kids depends on their ages and how comfortable you are being honest with them. You don 't want to scare them, perhaps unnecessarily.

On the other hand, kids love being involved in projects. If your kids are anything like my youngest, they'd like a special job helping prepare for a super-secret spy mission that we can't talk much about. It requires him to choose clothes and toys to go in the spy bag on a monthly basis. He also enjoyed picking most of his foods for the three-day spy mission.

Now, he doesn't believe Daddy is really a spy. He just knows we're preparing for something like a spy mission. Pretty mysterious, eh? Pretty fun, too!

The Final Word

You've made it to the end of the book. I hope you found it informative, entertaining, and useful. If you haven't already, start preparing for the worst! I don't think you'll find it overwhelming or scary. In fact, I've found that it's empowering and liberating. It's better than sitting on the couch, doing nothing as you wait for the world to end.

The end of the world as we know it may come next week, or it may not come for decades. But by using the information in this book, you should be better prepared, you should be better positioned to profit in the bad times as well as the good times, and you should be able to save money in the process.

The Least You Can Do * Get an old backpack. Pack at least some of the following items:* First-aid kit * Package of Wet Wipes * One set plastic cutlery and cup per family member * One poncho per family member * Flashlight, with batteries separate * Hand-crank radio/emergency road hazard flasher/flashlight * a.s.sorted packed peanut-b.u.t.ter crackers and cheese crackers * Put this bag by the door and keep some bottles of water in the refrigerator.

* Plan your basic escape routes ahead of time.

Notes.

Introduction.

1 Jim Jubak, "Higher Food Prices Are on the Way," MSN.com, March 17, 2009.

2 Lisa Friedman, "Coming Soon: Ma.s.s Migrations Spurred by Climate Change,"New York Times, March 2, 2009.

3 Siobhan Gorman, "Electricity Grid in U.S. Penetrated by Spies, " Wall Street Journal, April 8, 2009.

4 Jane Sutton, "Recession Fueling Right-Wing Extremism, U.S. says," Reuters, April 14, 2009.

5 Dimitry Orlov, "The Five Stages of Collapse," Cluborlov.com, http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2008/02/five-stages-of-collapse.html.

6 Jared Diamond, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (New York: Penguin Books, 2005).

7 Joseph Tainter, The Collapse of Complex Societies (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1988).

Chapter 1: The Most Likely Disasters You' ll Face.

1 FEMA, "Floodsmart Consumer Campaign Highlights Risks, Consequences Of America's Most Common And Costly Natural Disaster," June 29, 2004, www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=12786.

2 FEMA, "Flooding Season Around the Corner: Are You Ready?," April 26, 2006, www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=25518.

3 Department of Defense, Joint Operating Environment, "Challenges and Implications for the Future Joint Force," 2008. www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2008/JOE2008.pdf.

4 Sean Brodrick, "Oil, Water and Wheat, " Money and Markets, April 2, 2008, http://earthhopenetwork.net/forum/showthread.php?tid=532.

5 MSNBC, "Food Price Hikes Changing U.S. Eating Habits," April 1, 2008, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23882299.

6 "Timeline of the Great Depression," PBS.org, www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/rails/timeline/index.html.

7 Dale Allen Pfeiffer, "Eating Fossil Fuels," From the Wilderness, 2004, http://fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/100303_eating_oil.html.

8 Robert Felix, "US Food Riots Much Closer Than You Think, " www.rense.com/general78/riots.htm.

Chapter 2: The Quick and the Dead-and the Survivors.

1 Michael Holman, "One of the Millions of Hurricane Katrina Stories," Sept. 5, 2005, http://michaelhoman.blogspot.com/2005/09/one-of-millions-of-hurricane-katrina.html.

2 AP/MSNBC "Looters Take Advantage of New Orleans Mess," Aug. 30, 2005, www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9131493.

3 CNN "Racism, Resources Blamed for Bridge Incident," CNN.com, Sept. 13, 2005, www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/13/katrina.bridge.

4 ABC News Online, "Law and Order 'Restored' in New Orleans," www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200509/s1452745.htm.

5 Halifax Live, "FEMA Corrects Error-2 Million People Displaced by Rita and Katrina," www.halifaxlive.com/content/view/410/2.

6 The Economist, "A Decline Without Parallel," Feb. 28, 2002, http://academic.reed.edu/economics/course_pages/201_f06/Cases/argentina_collapse.htm.

7 Ana Simo, "Dirty Money, Big Banks and the Mafia State, " theGully.com, www.thegully.com/essays/argentina/010227corruption.html.

8 Ferfal, "Lessons from Argentina's Economic Collapse," thesilverbearcafe.com, Dec. 13, 2006, www.silverbearcafe.com/private/10.08/tshtf1.html.

Chapter 3: Personal Finance.

1 Mark Pittman and Bob Ivry, "Financial Rescue Nears GDP as Pledges Top $12.8 Trillion," Bloomberg News, March 31, 2009.

2 Grandfather Economic Report Series, "America's Total Debt Report," http://mwhodges.home.att.net/nat-debt/debt-nat.htm.

3 Martin Weiss, "New Treasury Plan: Dead on Arrival?" MoneyandMarkets.com, http://blogs.moneyandmarkets.com/martin-weiss/new-treasury-plan-dead-on-arrival.

4 Lisa Twaronite, "China Seeks Oversight of Reserve Currency Issuers," Market.w.a.tch.com, April 19, 2009, www.market.w.a.tch.com/news/story/china-seeks-oversight-reserve-currency/story.aspx?guid={7C4F805C-C5DC-4666-A1EA-565D8147261A}&dist=msr_1.

5 China Post, "Zimbabwe Stock Exchange Up by Over 300,000% in '07," January 2, 2008.

6 Weiss, "New Treasury Plan: Dead on Arrival?" MoneyandMarkets.com.

7 Linda J. Blimes and Joseph E Stiglitz, "The Iraq War Will Cost Us $3 Trillion, and Much More," Washington Post, March 9, 2008, www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/07/AR2008030702846.html.

8 Line stolen from Stephen Colbert's Press Club dinner. I'll see you in court, Mr. Colbert!

Chapter 4: Gold, Hard a.s.sets, and Alternative Currencies.

1 Science Daily, "American Adults Flunk Basic Science," March 13, 2009, www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090312115133.htm.

2 Mark Twain famously said: "The difference between the right word and a nearly-right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug."

3 Carol Brouillet, "Reinventing Money, Restoring the Earth, Reweaving the Web of Life," www.communitycurrency.org/reweaveWeb.html.

4 Jason Bradford, "Food- Backed Local Money, " The Oil Drum Campfire, March 4, 2009, http://campfire.theoildrum.com/node/5158#more.

Chapter 5: Investing for the Five Emergencies.

1 Energy Information Administration (EIA), "International Energy Outlook 2009," www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/highlights.html.

2 Ismail Serageldin, World Bank Vice President for Environmental Affairs, quoted in Marq de Villiers' Water, 2000.

3 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, "Crop Prospects and Food Situation," April 2009.

4 Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture, "How Far Does Your Food Travel to Get to Your Plate?", 2006.

5 U.N. climate panel study on global warming, April 6, 2007.

6 The International Forum on Globalization, "The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture." 2007, http://www.ifg.org/pdf/ag%20report.pdf.

7 Earth2tech.com, "FAQ: Smart Grid." January 26, 2009, http://earth2tech.com/2009/01/26/faq-smart-grid/ 8 Michael D. Lemonick, "How to Send Energy Across a Continent,"Newsweek, May 30, 2009, www.newsweek.com/id/200068.

9 Alan Drake, "Stop Ignoring Rail America," EV World.

10 PowerShares DB Commodity Index Tracking Fund, www.dbfunds.db.com/dbc/index.aspx.