Survival Skills: How To Prioritise In A Survival Situation

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How do you prioritise in a survival situation? If you find yourself in an emergency situation in the great outdoors, if you are lost or stranded or become involved in a situation which ultimately becomes a survival situation, what do you do? How do you break things down, prioritise, keeping yourself and others alive?

Well, it's probably fairly obvious that you deal with medical emergencies first. Someone will die of a blocked airway or profuse bleeding more quickly than exposure. But once you have administered first aid, what's next? Is the priority always the same? Or does it vary depending on geography, terrain or other factors?

Something to guide you is the acronym "PLAN". That is Protection, Location, Acquisition and Navigation. To find out more about what this means exactly and how to apply it, please watch the video.

This video forms part of a series of 20 FREE videos I've made to help people with wilderness bushcraft, survival skills and general outdoor life.

To get instant access to the other free videos, you should visit

http://paulkirtley.co.uk/free-tips-and-advice/

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Tags: Survival,Survival Skills (TV Genre),Survival Situation,Survival Scenario,Worst Case Survival,PLAN,Outdoor Emergency,Outdoor Safety,Protection,Location,Acquisition,Navigation,First Aid,Medical,Wilderness,Outdoors,Camping,Recreation,Hunting,Hiking,Canoeing,Kayaking,Off Roading,4x4,Holiday,Summer,Weekend,Bushcraft,Bushcraft and Survival,Safety,Survival Plans,Skiing,Ski,Mountain Biking,Mountain Bikes,MTB,Travel,Mountains,Forest,Remote

Video Transcription

hi there I'm Paul curtly founder of the award-winning frontier bushcraft and author of Paul Kurt Lee's blog the leading source of wilderness bushcraft advice and information on the net if you're in an emergency situation in the outdoors if you're lost if you're stranded if you're in a situation that may ultimately become a survival situation what do you do how do you prioritize well that's what I'm going to share with you in this video it's raining you don't have the right equipment you're lost one of your party's injured nobody knows where you are

what do you do how do you prioritize what you need to do first is deal with any medical issues any first-aid that needs to be done that's your priority somebody's going to die of a blocked airway or bleeding they're going to do that before they die potentially of hypothermia or lack of food or lack of water if they're bleeding or if they're not breathing that's going to kill them first and once you've dealt with the medical issues and I'd strongly recommend anybody going into the outdoors particularly

off-the-beaten-track

to have some good first aid and medical training once you've dealt with the medical issues what you need to remember is plan that PL a and and what they stand for is protection location acquisition and navigation and we're going to look at those each in turn one of the biggest risks we face outdoors is hypothermia particularly when faced with wet windy and cold conditions our first line of defense is our clothing and it's up to us to manage our clothing properly by ventilating adjusting our layers and regulating activity protecting yourself from environmental conditions isn't just about the cold you also need to take care to avoid dehydration overheating or getting too much Sun the highest priority is likely to be shelter particularly if anybody's injured a good shelter can provide cool shade or protect us from cold wet or windy conditions fire is very important for staying warm outdoors we can warm ourselves directly we can heat a shelter we can produce hot drinks and hot food as well as dry our clothes therefore fire lighting is one of your most important skills make sure you practice various techniques before you really need them a shelter and a fire makes for a very protective combination it's a combination that will keep you alive in conditions where you might otherwise perish

and wherever you are as the Sun Goes Down you'll appreciate a fire not only for its warmth but also its light plus it's a fantastic boost to your morale you don't always sleep well outside without sleeping kit but a fire makes it unbearable and will warm your bones until the first rays of Sun burning there's a plane going over maybe it's looking for me but I don't have anything ready I don't have a signal fire I don't have anything to signal with I'm wearing drab clothing nobody's going to see me not in all of these trees so you need to have some way you see ready before you start looking for food before you start looking for water and there's no point having loads of food if people can't find you do everything you can to maximize your chances of being seen by searches or passers-by make sure that you can actually see the searches when they come looking for you if there's more than one of you take it in turns to keep watch

next comes acquisition of resources the most important is water sometimes gathering water is obvious and easy other times it needs more ingenuity then comes food and unless you have a weapon your best bets are carbohydrate-rich puns small game and fish the greater your bushcraft skills the more you'll be able to improvise from nature tools materials and other useful items

it's never been easier to reach wild and remote parts of our planet and we're doing it more and more for recreation and adventure

the question is though what do we do when things go wrong walking out to safety is commonly most people's first thought but there are often advantages to stay input these include materials equipment food and water that might be carried in vehicles or other modes of transport provided you told someone where you were going people will know where to look for you so in many situations it pays to sit and wait for your rescuers and remember covering rough unknown terrain can be arduous at the best of times so be realistic ask yourself are your navigation skills up to it are you used to negotiating this type of terrain and will you cope out in the open if the weather deteriorates or will you put yourself into an even more desperate situation

so there you have it remember plan protection location acquisition and navigation but before you even start with plan remember to deal with any medical issues any first aid that needs to be done and then protection location acquisition and navigation hopefully you never have to put that into action but if you do I hope that serves you well I hope you found this video interesting I hope you've enjoyed it if you have then please go over to my blog at Paul curtly dot co dot uk' where you'll get 20 more free videos like this one full of lots of free tips and advice on bushcraft survival skills and things to enhance your outdoor life that's over at Paul Kirtley co uk and of course if you've enjoyed this video if you think your friends will find it useful then please share it with them too thanks for watching and I'll see you on the next video