It’s always the little things, isn’t it? I see folks stockpiling radios, food, big gear, but forget about spare batteries—especially AA and AAA for headlamps or handhelds. People can have the best comms setup, but if the batteries die and you don’t have backups or some rechargeable option, you’re out of luck fast. I like to keep a couple of battery organizers in my main bag and rotate fresh ones every few months.
Another one that gets ignored: pencil & waterproof notepad. Electronics are great until you’re wet or outta juice. There’s been more than one field exercise where I ended up scribbling radio frequencies or instructions on whatever scrap I could find because I left my notepad behind. That’s something I try to drill into folks during my workshops: don’t skip the analog stuff.
Ever tried using a radio log
