Winter Is Indeed Coming

As I write this, Moore County is still without power and may well be long after the promised December 8th end date. You can’t guarantee electrical repairs on a timeline, and if you remember back to Covid, we were told 3 weeks and we’re on year 3.

Friends, I’ve been warning about this scenario since about an hour after the Metcalf Incident. The Metcalf Incident wasn’t meant to take power down, it was a “proof of concept” attack to see if it could be done. The attack in Moore County was done in such a manner as to suggest that the attacker or attackers knew of the Metcalf Incident AND had done extensive recon to find the most impactful target. Military veterans from the sharper end of the spear will recognize this as the attackers having used the CARVER matrix to pick their targets.

I’m not telling you to put on your tin foil hats, but I WILL point out that the “powers that be” have been warning you of looming power outages this winter, and suddenly we have a power outage. Parts for these substations are hard to come by, meaning it could be out for a while. They’re going to get those power outages, no matter what. I guess we finally get that “Cold, Dark Winter” he promised us.

As people into preparedness, use the Moore County incident as wake up call. It can, and it WILL happen again, with absolutely no notice. For our purposes it doesn’t matter who attacked the substations or why – what matters are the second and third order effects. Focus on that. Make sure that you are ready.

In addition to all of the physical preparations, we need to talk about some mental preps that need to be made. For no apparent reason, the Sheriff immediately imposed a curfew from 9 PM to 5 AM. The looting the media claims is the reason turns out to be no more than a single professional shoplifter apprehended.

What this curfew means is that if you and your neighbors planned on setting up an Entry Control Point to your neighborhood, as my TW-03 Defensive Operations, and the Civil Defense Manual advise, your personnel manning the ECP would be in violation of the curfew. Security observation posts would be in violation. The security personnel on gun store rooftops that I KNOW are there, would be in violation. Decide right now at what level you will comply with unconstitutional orders.

As a side note, a local council in the UK is about to declare a “climate lockdown” in their town, requiring you to prove a need to leave your house. Decide NOW how you will react to that.

I can’t stress this enough, now that someone pulled this off, more power infrastructure attacks will occur, especially as we ramp up the prelude to WW3 in Ukraine and Taiwan.

Have a plan for alternative heating. If you have a fireplace or wood burning stove, great. There are indoors-safe propane heaters (mine is below) that you can buy – but if you buy one, buy a bunch of propane NOW, rather than waiting. When the power goes out, there will be riots at Wal-Mart over the propane cans.

Get wool blankets and actual government issue (not “GI-Style”) poncho liners. It doesn’t matter which NATO government, either. My Dutch poncho liner is every bit as warm as my US ones. A lot of development has been done in the area of US Military Cold Weather gear (all that time in the Hindu Kush paid off). The newer layering system is very warm and modular. You can get it in colors that don’t look overtly military. I have the Level 7 PCU vest in green and it looks like a normal ski vest, but it’s packable and super warm. Don’t get me wrong, I have a camo one too, but gray man does happen some days.

Get batteries and put flashlights in every room. If you want a good story as to why, read Mongol Moon by Mark Sibley (I’d tell you to read the sequel, too, but….). Lanterns are a good idea too, as they provide heat as well as light. Even the little UCO candle lantern gives off good heat.

If the power goes out in your house, collapse down to as few rooms as possible and close them off. You can heat a smaller space much better, especially if there are warm bodies in it. If you have pets, bring them into that space as well. A true “prepper” tip is that dogs are like mini furnaces, let them sleep with you and you will not get cold.

Update your “Get Home” plans to account for getting home without power and in the cold. Keep in mind that if the power is out, they probably won’t be out salting and plowing roads in the dark (it gets dark early). Update your Get Home Bag with cold weather items (you should have already).

Make sure everyone in the family or group knows everyone else’s get home or bug out plans. Maybe one person has to pass another’s work or school location and the one could wait. For example, our son lives in another town to the north. His plan is to get home and then monitor the radio for when we are headed into his area on the way to our northern location that is better stocked and prepared to weather a long-term outage. If he hasn’t heard from us in a certain length of time, he is to just start moving along our planned route. We can all work remotely from there if needed.

Reach out to your key people and your team to touch base. Finalize a grid-down communication plan NOW. Carry radios (I know, I keep saying that) and a spare battery. Speaking of radios, go and buy NC Scout’s new book by clicking this link.

I cannot stress this enough; federal law enforcement is warning of more attacks. The DHS put out an alert last week on potential attacks. Get over the normalcy bias and start raising your awareness. The “event” you’ve been prepping for is GOING ON NOW.

then if anyone hears the trumpet but does not heed the warning and the sword comes and takes their life, their blood will be on their own head.

Ezekiel 33:4

I know I say it a lot but fill up your tank daily and consider storing some extra gas. In Moore County, most gas stations didn’t have generators, and the ones who did are already out of gas. I keep a hand pump operated siphon kit in my car (in case I have transfer gas between my own vehicles, FEDs).

When a large area is suffering from a power outage like this, law enforcement will be too busy protecting retail areas, gun shops, pharmacies, and critical infrastructure (hospitals, utilities, government centers) to patrol your neighborhood, so develop a security plan. Understand too, that the cell phone towers will start dropping about 24-36 hours after an outage, so have that communications plan well in hand before then.

I will leave you with a piece of Tactical Wisdom that Ned Stark knows from warning people that “Winter Is Coming”:

While people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

1 Thessalonians 5:3

Don’t be like those who think Peace and Safety are permanent & guaranteed by geography.

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