Every so often I go through my Bag O’ Tricks and think about each item that’s there and whether it’s utility and likelihood of use warrants it’s inclusion.
One item that I keep that I never question is the classic palm sized little AM/FM battery radio. In an era where, literally, the entire collected knowledge of humanity is sitting in my pocket on an internet-enabled smartphone there is still a need for the simple ‘transistor radio’. (Although, to be fair, pocket radios have evolved tremendously.)
A reasonable question to ask would be “Zero, I have the internet in front of me, a smartphone in my pocket, there’s a TV in the breakroom, and my office plays XM radio all day. Why would I need a tinny little radio to hump around in my already overcrowded EDC bag?”
Electricity. Power goes out and your office loses its XM, internet, and TV. If its a widespread outage you lose your cellphone too. (Because although those cell towers are supposed to have back up generators and batteries.. well…they were meaning to get around to that preventative maintenance but got busy.) Or, if its a big enough emergency, the phone system will be way overloaded.
So what just happened? Why’d the power go out? How widespread? Is it the result of some bad actors? Is it just a squirrel immolating himself on a transformer? Don’t know, right? So…you reach into your bag, pull out your little AA-batt radio, and start roaming up and down the dial listening for news.
This isn’t theory, I’ve had that exact situation. I’ve been sitting at my desk, theres a snapping noise, and all the power in the building goes out. A small battery radio tells me a lot when I start dialing through the frequencies…if theyre all just static or quiet, then I know its a widespread outage. If they’re carrying on like nothing happened, then I know its pretty localized. Of course, in addition to a little AM/FM/SW radio I also carry the ICOM R6 (highly recommend) so I can keep tabs on the local cop/fire response.
The folks at CountyComm have an interesting little radio that seems ideal for the task. It’s not a $12.99 WalMart radio, but then again when the power is out and I’m wondering what all the sirens are about, I suspect I’ll be glad I spent the extra money on something like that.
And, of course, since this thing gets carried around in the Bag O’ Tricks it has to be compatible with the battery logistics for the other electronic devices (and spare batts) I carry. So…AA batts.
(l.) Icom R6…tiny enough for carrying around but has tons of features. (r.) Discontinued pocket AM/FM/SW AA-batt radio from CountyComm w/ earpiece. Always pack earphones…less battery usage using earphones. Both radios fir in the Pelican 1010 case.
Like the Icom R6, the AM/FM/SW radio sits in a little Pelican case to protect it from the rough and tumble life of being in a bag that gets thrown around a lot. Do not make the mistake of thinking that you can just wrap a radio in some bubble wrap and cardboard and it’ll be okay. False economy there. No one hands out awards to the person who made it through a crisis using the cheapest gear… spend the money.
And, as always, periodically inspect your gear! Check those batteries!
And have an idea of what stations actually have news on and when. Most of AM around here is talk all day with “traffic and weather on the 9’s”.
I’ve rediscovered AM as I drive around. There are several low power and more narrowly focused radio stations in town that I enjoy listening to when I’m in those parts of the city.
The lowly baofeng UV-5 variants will receive broadcast FM too, although the way you access it might be different for your exact model and firmware. There are youtube vids about it. On mine, I have to be in VHF when I press the ‘call’ button or it doesn’t work.
Thanks for the reminders Commander….
nick
Good reminder. Maybe a cheat sheet of local channels an resources too for the frequencies just in case
Have you done a bag dump for your “bag o tricks”?
What it’s for and items.
Might be a good article.
The problem is, no matter what I write, some idiot will chime in with “But what about…”, “You dont need…”, “You should have….”, and that sort of thing. I’ll give you an example… everytime someone posts something about how much food they have it goes like this: “We keep enough stored food for [X] months” and someone says “But what if the disaster goes on for [x+1] months?”. Doesn’t matter how long the timeframe is…if I said I had enough food for twenty five years some idiot will jump in with “But what if the crisis lasts 26 years.” Those kinds of conversations annoy me to no end. So…no junk-on-the-bunk dumpout of the Bag O’ Trick. Just a once in a while thing where I pull something out and mention it.
Disappointing but fair.
Tell you what, you’re a nice guy…I’ll dump it and take a pic and send it to you in email later this week.
Since County Comm has discontinued that radio, any recommendations? I tried the generic Sony pocket AM/FM (~$13 Amazon) found it lacked sensitivity and tuning precision and drifted. Amazon has a C Crane pocket radio with AM/FM/WX, anyone know if it’s the corect answer?
I’ll probably wind up picking up the radio thats there on their webpage. Seems to ahve a goodly amount of features.
Just curious, CDR: what’s your take on nutnfancy’s recent video on “survival receivers”?
Beats me, havent seen it. Gimme a link.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=72WvfaeQZXA
Hadn’t seen that.
CZ-
Here is my two cents, any tool you deem to be necessary is necessary. I have buddies who do the same stupid crap, but but what if. I use tools and I get rid of them if they are no longer necessary or found a better item to use. Example, I have a gun bench sonic cleaner. My buddy says if the grid goes down it is useless, well my my back ups are good old hand rags and cleaner. For now, the sonic cleaner is an expediate tool.
Three radios to consider, Sangean DT-400W, CC Pocket, & Sangean DT-800. All are AM, FM, NOAA Weather Radio + Alert. I have the first two and love both of them, slightly different features on the two. Good reviews on these three and other possible candidates can be found here https://www.youtube.com/user/novakpower. A cheaper option could be Kaito KA210 Pocket. For the big spenders there is the CC Skywave, & CC Skywave SSB both have AM, FM, Shortwave, Weather, VHF, Aviation, with the SSB model adding Single Side Band.
I’ve been in storm cells in Iowa and Missouri that were strong enough to takeout my cars GPS and my cell phone reception. Weather radio on a pocket sized $15 radio still worked!
Around the house I get blazing fast internet (I’m right by a university and two hospitals), but you go out in the countryside north of I-94 in Wisconsin and you can lose cell reception. Pocket radios are still a good idea in my book.
Whatever u get be sure it has SSB. It opens up a whole new world on the ham bands you would otherwise miss.
Run those radios on Eveready Ultimate Lithium AA or AAA cells. They cost more than common alkaline cells but:
Don’t leak
Still work below freezing
Have several times the stored energy
Have 20 year shelf life
They are just what you want for an emergency item you may not use for years.