What's in my air raid bug-out bag?

My earlier post about my air raid response protocols prompted some interest in what specifically is in my “alarm suitcase” (тривожний чемодан in Ukrainian), or what English-speaking preppers would typically call a “bug-out bag” or “BoB”. This post is a quick bag dump for those of you who are interested in such things.

Let me first make clear that I do not know any Kyivans, either Ukrainian or foreign, who have put as much thought and effort into a bug-oug bag as I have. I do not hold up my kit as typical of what civilians in Kyiv will have by the door, and honestly if you’re a foreigner in Kyiv in the center of the city surrounded by air defenses, you probably should not follow my example. I have a pretty strong prepper streak by nature, and I like to be prepared for various eventualities however unlikely they may be. I’ve always maintained a bug-out bag when living in peaceful American cities, so why would I do any less when living in an actual war-torn country where actual hostile forces fire actual ordnance at civilian targets every day?

Next let me be explicit about the threat model here. This bug-out bag is not in preparation for the typical bug-out scenarios in the US, like heavy weather, riots, civilizational collapse, zombie apocalypse, or boisterous American football hooligans running amok. It’s not intended to sustain me on foot across long marches through the wilderness or an urban landscape, nor is there any offensive component at all. The scenario here is that Russian bombardment necessitates taking shelter in an underground bomb shelter (in my case that is a Kyiv Metro station), possibly for a day or more, and with a non-zero chance that my apartment could be destroyed and I would have only those possessions that I placed in this bag. There is also a vanishingly small but very much non-zero possibility of a nuclear weapon being used against targets far enough away that I’m not immediately vaporized, but close enough that I have to worry about the fallout. The threat model presumes that civilization remains intact and that the Ukrainian government and economy are still functioning enough to provide food and shelter in the aftermath of any attack, albeit possibly delayed by several hours up to a couple of days. If you live in a stable Western country, particularly in the US, it’s very unlikely that most of the considerations that went into this particular bugout kit will apply to you.

Finally, for some of these items I will link to the item on Amazon or other sites. I don’t belong to Amazon’s affiliate program, so I don’t get anything if you buy via those links. They’re just for convenience.

With that preamble out of the way, here is my air raid bug-out bag, fully packed in the state in which I keep it by the door at all times:

The backpack is a 5.11 Tactical RUSH 24 37 liter pack. I’ve owned it for many years, it’s well made and holds up to abuse. Before the war I used this as a sort of range bag, which is why it has a name tape in Ukrainian on it. I haven’t removed that because it’s not an opsec issue in my case and I think it looks cool.

I haven’t weighed the pack fully-loaded, but I would guess it’s between 30 and 40 pounds. I’ve worn this pack while walking on the treadmill at max incline for 45 minutes, which was challenging but didn’t kill me. I can climb the 12 flights of stairs from the street to my apartment while wearing this pack and not die, although it’s not a joyful experience. I would not want to walk all day in this pack, and I couldn’t run very far at all with it on, but as I’ve noted above this pack’s use case doesn’t involve either of those things.

I have a few pieces of gear affixed to the outside of the pack:

• Lashed to the left and right sides of the backpack via MOLLE, I have bottled water stored in Vanguest Hydra collapsible bottle holders. These are great; they hold the bottles securely (I cinch the shock cord around the neck of the bottle, so they are fully retained even when running or if the backpack is upside-down), and when empty they velcro flat against the side of the bag.
• Affixed to the MOLLE field at the lower back of the pack is a Dark Angel Medical EDC Trauma Kit. This has a CAT Gen 7 tourniquet, trauma shears, and inside it contains nitrile gloves, a compression bandage, a pair of Hyfin chest seals, and hemostatic gauze. Given that the threat scenario here is large-scale bombardment of civilian population centers, it’s not impossible that someone (possibly me) would sustain injuries before making it to shelter. This minimal kit is at least enough to stop serious bleeds.
• The longer nylon straps below the trauma kit are add-ons from 5.11 called the RUSH Tier System Kangaroo Kit. These are intended to be used to add another “kangaroo” pouch to the pack, but I use them to lash the Helinox chair (below) to the pack securely with quick-disconnect buckles for convenience.
• The black bag labeled “Helinox” contains a Helinox Sunset Chair. Laugh all you want you armchair commandos, but know this: once you’re in the shelter, you do a lot of sitting around waiting. The Metro stations don’t have any seating, so you’re either sitting on the stairs or the floor. This gets very old very quickly, at which point you really wish you had a chair to sit in. This Helinox is very lightweight (remember I’m not marching with this bag, I’m taking it to a shelter a few hundred meters away) and easy to deploy. When I am sitting in this chair in the shelter chilling comfortably, the Ukrainians who wisely also brought camp chairs and I look at each other knowingly, while everyone else shifts uncomfortably on the cold hard ground wondering where their lives went wrong.
• Not visible in the “packed” photo but located behind the Helinox bag, I have lashed a Kifaru Woobie in its compression sack to the loops at the bottom of the RUSH pack which are there for this specific purpose. This is lashed with GEAR AID Fast Wrap velcro straps which also are fed through the straps sewn into the Kifaru compression sack so it’s very securely affixed. This is useful as a pillow, and for long stays in the Metro, or air raids that happen at ungodly hours like 4AM one sometimes wants to just lie down and go back to sleep. In winter having a blanket makes that much more comfortable. The Kifaru woobie is quite possibly the epitome of blanket technology; impossibly light and yet warm and very durable. It makes a Rumpl look like a scratchy wool blanket from the Civil War.

That’s it for the outside of the pack; let’s dump it and go over the contents:

Going left-to-right and top-to-bottom:

• Ziploc bag with fresh underwear, socks, and a t-shirt.
• Helinox chair described above
• Kifaru woobie likewise
• Gear Doctors self-inflatting sleeping pad - This is, admittedly, a luxury item. But when you take this guy out of the bag, toss it on the floor, open the valve and watch him self-inflate, it’s worth it. As I alluded to above, air raids often happen at ungodly hours, so you’re tired and cranky and want to go back to sleep. This mattress is easy to deploy, and gives you a place to lie down in relative comfort. Combine that with the Kifaru woobie and it’s possible to get a bit of fitfull sleep.
• USGI MRE (menu 12; elbow macaroni in tomato sauce) and First Strike Ration - I’ve never had to stay in the shelter long enough that food became a serious concern, but it has happened earlier in the war and could possibly happen again. These two items are shelf-stable for years, and I know that I don’t mind eating them. Combined this is well north of 5K calories, with plenty of small items to share with fellow vault-dwellers.
• Illumination - I admittedly have gone overboard on lighting, but I have a phobia about being trapped underground in the dark. Metro stations get priority for electricity, but Russians specifically target power plans and other electrical infrastructure and it’s not impossible for a metro station to lose power for a time. So I have taken the three-is-one-and-two-is-none approach to lighting:
  • NiteCore LR60 USB-C rechargeable LED lantern - This is a very versatile lantern, which has a long life at the lowest brightness and can also be used to illuminate a large area. If the lights go out it’ll be a freakout, so being able to cast a lot of light around might provide some bit of comfort to my neighbors as well.
  • COAST HL8R LED headlamp - This is possibly among the highest quality head lamps on the market. It’s definitely an extravagance, but I had it in my hurricane preps from long ago and brought it with me to Ukraine. I shouldn’t have to explain the utility of a headlamp in this situation.
  • Fenix LD15R right-angle flashlight - this tiny flashlight has a convenient clip that you can clip to the backpack shoulder strap. Because it’s a right-angle light, the beam will shine ahead of you. It’s cheap enough that I could loan it or give it out to a needy neighbor if necessary, while my remaining lighting options will provide me with the illumination I need.
• Two bottles of water (stored in the Vanquest Hydra pouched described above)
• No-name black sleeping mask with ear plugs - The Metro stations are usually rather brightly lit in most places, and very noisy. If one is groggy and annoyed and needs to sleep, even with luxuries like a sleeping mattress and woobie, it will be hard without a sleeping mask and ear plugs.
• Toilet paper - the metro stations don’t have toilet facilities normally accessible to passengers, but during air raids I think they can make them available on request. Do you really want to find out if there’s any toilet paper left?
• N99 respirators - Metro stations have ventilation, but it’s possible there will be smoke and dust to get to the metro station, or afterwards when the air raid alarm is canceled. These obviously aren’t enough to breath in heavy smoke in a confined space, but they will be enough to protect my lungs if the air is breathable but full of nasty particulates.
• GQ GMC-500Plus Geiger Counter - Laugh all you want, but Russia threatens nukes pretty regularly. One of these days they might just be dumb enough to throw a hot rock my way. I have read the Good News About Nuclear Destruction, so I know that a nuclear strike isn’t automatically instant death for the entire planet, or even for the entire city that was attacked. In the first few days after an attack, avoiding fallout is critical. I don’t want to have to guess whether I’m doing a good job or not; this Geiger counter will confirm my level of exposure. Also in the nylon case is a reference card with various levels of radiation exposure and their lethality, to help make an informed decision about what to do in a given situation.
• IOSAT Potassium Iodide pills - These are potentially life-saving in the event of a nuclear blast, and they are cheap and lightweight so anyone who carries a freaking Geiger counter should definitely also carry these!
• Wise Owl Outfitters Camping Towel - Bring a towel
• Various small sustainment items
  • Pepcid AC antacid tablets
  • Wet Ones antibacterial wipes - my hands quickly get dirty down in the metro and there is not usually a convenient place to wash them.
  • FOMIN paper soap sheets - these are handy little “paper” slips of soap. If you have water but don’t have soap, you get your hands wet and this paper slip disolves into antibacterial soap. A single little box has 100 sheets. As long as you can keep the sheets absolutely dry until you’re ready to use, it comes in handy in places with running water but no soap.
  • Lip balm
  • Medicines
    • Advil liquigels
    • My prescription meds, enough doses for a few days
  • PPEasy disposable urine bags (I bought these in Ukraine; on Amazon a similar product is Disposable Urine Bags) - Hopefully I don’t need to explain what these are for or why one might want them in a crowded air raid shelter with limited toilet facilities…

Not visible for privacy reasons:

• Cash in USD and EUR
• Must-have documents like Ukrainian residency documents, marriage certificate, apartment deed, passport, driver’s license, etc

That’s everything. I hope you never find yourself in a situation where you can say that you found this post helpful.