Starting your own prepping group

If you enjoy prepping or are just getting started in it, you may ask how can I get others involved or how can I join other preppers? Your best bet is to start talking to your neighbors, that is if you trust them. Not all neighborhoods are alike or prepper friendly. In some situations, you may not want your neighbors to know you prep as it may make you an easy target if SHTF and they will immediately come after you knowing you have the supplies needed to survive. But if you do know your neighbors and those close by, they are the ones you will want to talk to prepping about. If one of your friends lives 50 miles away and is also a prepper, they may not be of much use in the event of an emergency. Those close to you are the ones you will be helping or asking help from. Other than your immediate neighbors, how would you find other like minded individuals near you? You can talk to your coworkers about the subject and see where they stand. Another option is to go to your local gun shop or outdoor store and ask about any active groups in your area. One thing I would like to mention is don't go to social media looking for preppers. Most of them don't want to meet in person or do any actual training. This is a sad, but hard truth that we must look at as preppers. When something happens and we need to use our training, how many of those that just stay online and don't actually train in the real world can actually help us? In today's world, the only one you can trust to help you is you.

If you decide to start your own group, what types of people will you need? There are several job titles that every group should have. One of the most important would be to have a dedicated person for medical training and care. Ideally this person would be at least an EMT and can work under pressure. They should be capable of teaching other members basic first aid on a regular basis and be reliable. This person should also know and teach the incident command system for use during an emergency.

Another important member should be one that can obtain food and water if supplies run out. A hunter would be excellent in providing food for a large group of people. They may also be good at getting water from a local stream or lake. Even a local fisherman or small game trapper would be a good choice. This person should also teach their trade so others can hunt for themselves or setup traps in multiple areas at a time to increase the chances of getting food. A gardener should also be involved in growing food for survival.

Having someone that can teach firearm safety and tactical training would also be of great help. This can be someone with recent military or law enforcement experience. Just shooting at stationary targets is not training. Find someone that can teach shooting at moving targets, clearing houses and other skills you might think the military would use. Just shooting at paper targets at the range is a waste of time and ammo. You should also become proficient in several types of firearms. Don't limit yourself to just what you have. Also think about learning land navigation and hand signals.

A radio operator should also be in every group. This person should hold at least a general class ham radio license so they can have access to the HF bands and be able to reach long distance if needed. They will also be responsible for teaching others about radio operation and getting other members their ham radio license. This person will also need to come up with a set of frequencies for their group and getting the radios programmed. If you are looking for a great starting place for this, check out AmRRON at https://amrron.com/. They have an excellent radio Signals Operating Instruction manual geared just for preppers. If every group follows the guidelines in this manual, contacting other preppers will be easy. Your radio operator should also keep their ears open on the airwaves to get news about major events either locally or around the globe. This is generally more reliable information than what you would get on the news.

If you are lucky enough to find someone to help with logistics, that is moving equipment or supplies from one location to another, they would be great to have. This would be someone with a trailer or truck that can move a good amount in one trip or even long distance. You may also want to consider having a boat available to the group. Think of the Cajun Navy and how many people they were helping during the aftermath of hurricane Harvey in Texas and Louisiana in 2017. It wasn't the government that was helping people, it was the locals and others that came from neighboring states and helped the flood victims with their boats.

A mechanic would also be a great person to have at your disposal. Most machines will break down sooner or later and in a disaster scenario that will be a bad thing. Having someone that can fix most things will be invaluable to have. This person should also be assigned to do maintenance on things like generators, pumps or vehicles to make sure they don't break down in the first place.

Once you start to get people in your group, start to have regular meetings and communicate face to face. This will start to build camaraderie between the members. Everyone should meet together and train at least once a month. Get your members to teach a topic in each of their fields at every meeting. For example, have your main medical person teach a medical related topic at each meeting. The same goes for the other members that can provide any information related to their field. Once you get a few members together and up to speed on their training, you have the foundation to expand and add more people to your group.