Cyclone Gabrielle

[C_T_Russell]

Most people now are unlikely to have a torch or a transistor radio as their communication is totally based around smartphones and computers. A great number of people have just received a rude awakening as to how vulnerable their 'normal' life is to a failure in electricity and broadband infrastructure. Expecting people to have a CB radio (with battery backup) as emergency communication is totally unrealistic. Most don't even possess, or even know about, a bug-out kit to sustain their requirements in the case of emergency evacuations.

The failure of modern electrical infrastructure is well described in books about EMP/Coronal Mass Ejections such as One Second After
 by Dr William R Forstchen or Unprepared by Gavin Shoebridge. Both portray the extent to what modern society is totally unprepared for the loss of modern technology which essentially rolls back everyday life to that which our ancestors had to live in 150 years ago before the arrival of refrigeration, electronic control systems and modern communications. Either book is worth reading if you have an interest in modern reliability on 'gadgets' and how different life becomes when they fail to work.

Well Civil Defense have been telling us for decades to keep this sort of stuff on hand. Perhaps not the walkie talkies, but its a no brainer to me.
You can't rely on the authorities to try and make family contact, so we are taking our own precautions.
Lots of preppers have these radios and know how to use them. My one also has a built in FM radio and a flashlight built into it too!
Your right about the risk of an EMP.
We dodged a bullet recently, I believe a few years ago there was a massive CME from the sun, but the position in the sun's orbit was out of its path.
It happened back in the 1800s and fried telephone lines. If that happened today, it would be even worse.
We do have a little warning to shut down critical infrastructure, NASA do monitor the sun, but it still would be devastating nonetheless.
We have seen what it has done to power grids in the northern hemisphere with much smaller CMEs.

Yes that is what we learnt in Chch after the earthquakes, the only thing that worked for communication most of the time was the the old wired phone network which they are accelerating the push to get rid of down here and apparently all over America as well.

Wood burning stoves also being phased out so when the electric power goes out there will be no heating, no cooking, no lights. no internet, and as  in last disaster, cell phone network so overloaded, ceased to function.

I'm old, so is my dog, if we lose power in Winter we will both freeze as we rely on a heat pump.

I have an old kerosene heater I saved from my parents garage after Mum died as last ditch back up heating for a day or two.

You can't even trust a landline in these situations  especially with flooding, and they are almost nonexistent these days anyway, that's one reason I looked into the walkie talkies. They give surprising coverage.
Your smart with the kerosene heater, I have a drum on hand for emergency use and have a multi fuel cooker that will run on almost any fuel I can get my hands on.
As you say, wood burners are another good option if you have one, you can at least boil water on one if it's got a flat top.