Prepper Home Defense: 10 Ways to Create an Impenetrable Home Security after an EMP

Jeremiah Johnson | Comments (11) | Reader Views (20717)

ReadyNutrition Readers, I just wrote an article detailing the importance of having a “closed” security system for your home.  The reason for this was to maintain your privacy and not have all your home viewed by law enforcement via CCTV cameras.  I also touched on the fact that at any given moment, you may lose such capabilities with an EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) weapon, a war, a power loss, or all of the above combined.  If you have been watching the news between your summer activities, you may be aware that North Korea just successfully tested an ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) successfully.

It’s time to prepare for the worst-case scenario with this best-selling preparedness manual

“Damage control” in the media and government are now reluctantly admitting that North Korea “can hit Alaska,” but of course, happy consumer-taxpayers won’t have to worry about an EMP or a nuke reaching the “inviolate” U.S.!  After all, some dogmas survive even the people who parrot them, don’t they?  Just be aware of that.  What about security then?  Well, there are a few “Uncle Caveman” measures that I wish to share with you that can help in this regard.

Firstly, I’m sure many of you wish to see photos and diagrams of exactly how this kind of thing is done.  I’m sorry, but I don’t do that kind of thing regarding my own property.  I don’t merely “preach” OPSEC: I live it, no offense intended.  Here are some options for you to consider for emplacing an early warning system on your property and to help protect it during a “low tech” scenario.

10 Ways to Create an Impenetrable Home Security after an EMP

  1. “Tin Can Alley” with tripwire: Aluminum cans, more accurately.  You want to pick up aluminum cans that are dark colored, such as brown root beer cans, or dark green Sprite cans.  Whatever your beverage of preference.  This is so that no light is reflected off them.  Poke a few holes in the bottom to allow for drainage of water.  Then throw in about a half dozen ball bearings.  Stones can become wet and stick together.  Ball bearings, no.  String these cans up everywhere: to the entrances to your house, out on the property, and so forth.  Run tripwire (nylon or coated steel) at a fixed point, and have the cans either suspended on the horizontal line, or “propped” on a ledge where the tripwire will cause them to fall.  You can use nails for this kind of thing, and small eye screws.  These are excellent for changing direction on your trip wires and allowing for tension to still be maintained.
  2. Trips to “deadfall/shelf” with noisemaker: This means to use the tripwire so when Mr. Bad Guy comes creeping along, he hits it, and it causes a large/medium-sized noisy object to fall when its support is taken out. Good examples are big metal #10 or coffee cans filled with bolts, nuts, and one or two smaller cans.  Metal is great for this kind of noise maker.
  3. Obstacles: Make it difficult for them! A nice camouflaged “pit” in the direction of travel with all kinds of noisemakers, such as scrap metal, dug to about 3’ deep will work wonders!  It will make noise and most likely hurt them badly.  Also, show your “smarts” by placing tripwires to the sides of the obstacle.  If Mr. Goon sees the trap, it’ll fix his attention so that he trips off a noise-making tripwire.
  4. Ball bearing mat: This is one of my favorites. Take a strip of plastic about 3’ wide by 6’ long and place it near the front door mat.  The key is to make the plastic be the same color as the front porch, as close as possible.  Then spread out the bearings.  When they approach the door, they’ll have a great surprise.
  5. Trip wires and noisemakers all over the front porch: If your front porch doesn’t have a gate that closes, then get one, or build it.  Make it difficult for Mr. Creep to approach your residence.  We’re talking a grid-down scenario.  Your friendly neighbor isn’t friendly anymore.  Especially wearing a ski-mask or nylon stocking in July, stalking outside at midnight.
  6. Small-scale battery-powered contact sensors: The kinds that make noise when you separate them. Cheap and easy to set up on windows and areas of access, the EMP will probably not have much of an effect on them, since their circuitry is more primitive.
  7. Door Braces and Window Locks: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Make sure your entranceways are locked and braced for an intruder.
  8. Capability to switch floodlights to a battery box: This will really make them “S” their pants when the S hits the fan and they come calling! This will take a little bit of doing, but there are plug panels that can connect to a car battery that you can power a flood light on.  Imagine how happy Mr. Creepy will feel when your Night Vision devices (the ones you bought “doubles” of and stuck in a Faraday Cage as JJ asked you to) work, and then you see him…and hit the floods on.  Family, there he is!  Watch your lanes and empty your mags!
  9. Pre-position all points of engagement with firearms: That’s right…when Mr. Bogeyman is creeping around, everyone in the family needs an assigned place to be able to give him the lead when the time is right.
  10. Active patrols: What? Did you think you were all going to sleep the entire night?  Think again!  One of the family needs to actively patrol for an amount during the nighttime divisible by the family members able to patrol.  Eight hours of darkness with 4 family members able to pull a patrol?  Each has a two-hour shift, plain and simple.  If it’s mom and dad and the two kids, well guess what?  Four hours for mom and four hours for dad.  It is not negotiable: there must be a security element in a fixed location to watch the whole house and/or actively patrolling on foot.

These are the arrangements to follow when the cameras, sensors, and robot bodyguard break down due to the EMP.  Always rely on low-tech to begin with, and the punch line is this: these measures should be in place already, even if you have an exisitng alarm system. Also, be sure that every family member living in the home knows where all the obstacles are.  Some you will have to forgo until the time comes, as there’s never an end to nosy, friendly, chatty, pain-in-the-backside neighbors staring, sniffing, and treading on your property.

 

Additional Reading:

Inside the Mind of a Looter

Prepper’s Blueprint: The Step-By-Step Guide to Prepping For the Worst-Case Scenario

Zombie-Proof Your House

What To Do When Your Survival Shelter Has Been Compromised

This article was published at Ready Nutrition on Aug 15, 2017

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11 thoughts on “Prepper Home Defense: 10 Ways to Create an Impenetrable Home Security after an EMP”

  1. Use passive and active deception.

    One approach is to establish a secure CP inside the house then run fishing line out to both overt and obscure locations – shed in back yard, small guard tent in front yard – tied to a hammer or other object. In accordance with the trip alert lines – with cans or run to the house and tied to your big toe – these can be activated by a slow pull causing the intruders to hear things but never see them. The lawn mower slowly rolled back; the sleeping bag rustling.

    Regarding obscure locations, tie a line to a stick in the woods or one in a dense tree…will drive infiltrators nuts…and will assist in covering “dead spaces”.

    The purpose here is to get the infiltrators to look over their shoulders. Helps with perception of combat multipliers too.

    There are other deceptions too. Just imagine what would drive you nuts when coordinating an attack or infiltration.

    There are numerous other mind screwing actions to take that will make attackers wonder and wonder about the competence of their cohorts. Regular signs indicating house containing an illness or sewage slit trench. Believe that the attackers will probably recon your location once before the attack.

    Dave

    1. Jeremiah Johnson

      Dear Dave,

      All very true statements. In addition (as you mentioned) the “baddies” will probably recon your area, if it’s not too remote. It might be good to switch things around a bit to throw them off.

      Thanks for good positive comments that will help people.

      Respectfully Yours,

      JJ

  2. Lol, as far as government this stuff is useless, as for large gangs, this stuff is useless, you’ll just be overwhelmed with superior weapons they have stolen, for a couple of badly armed or drunk robbers this would work.

    1. Yesssss! Be sure to change your sheet rock and plastic walls to a foot or more of concrete or we will just use a sledge hammer to let ourselves in

      1. Even the concrete homes all over the middle east doesn’t seem to stop government munitions, though it usually makes big w
        holes and most the building still stands.not like sick buildings.

  3. if you’re going to dig a pit, 3′ is kinda silly – go for leg breaking depths with a pungy stick

    coupe d’etat !

  4. I have thought about this. what are looters looking for? food and shelter. if they have no food available and the shelter proves undesirable they will quickly move on because they are not gong to spend time in cleaning up a shelter when they have others that will take less effort. hod to make it undesirable? how about a large dead dog with rats feeding off it. it could be totally fake but are they going to take the time to investigate? if there were no other shelter around then not having a choice possibly. if they have a choice they will select the one that provides the best shelter and one they are sure isnt infested with rats. it wouldn’t take much to rig a motion detector and photocell to react from a flashlight to make a fake rat move. Rats cause a repulsfe reaction to flee. the attention is directed at the rat and if it is coming their way. little else would be looked at upon seeing this infestation and they would exit looking for something better. these parts needed are in many children’s toys and it wouldnt take much movement to get the desired reaction. a voluntary exit is much better than a forced one. any expansion of my thoughts or improvement on this idea?
    Grampa

    1. It is a good idea. Doing whatever you can to make your home appear inhospitable to any unwanted guests is better than wasting ammo trying to fend them off.
      If a few people try to get into your home, and you engage them with firearms, even if you get all but one of them, that one is going to run off. Only now, whatever he thought could have been inside, he will know that it’s worth defending. He will now know that there are people living there, he might know how many, what firearms they have, and he will be able to prepare for a second attempt to get inside to get your food, guns and supplies. The idea of getting what you have will be now be more enticing because whatever it is, it was worth going through all the trouble to put in booby traps and have several people shooting from covered or concealed locations.
      By contrast, a place that looks abandoned and possibly contaminated can better keep your family and your stuff safe because it will continue to be unknown.
      FEMA uses certain symbols to mark houses they’ve checked. It’s an “X” with numbers painted in one of the four spaces around the “X”. Each number me and the number of people, and each space represents how the people were found. One spot is for how many dead, one is for how many are alive but sick with a contagious disease, etc. I forget which space means what. They will paint the X on the front of the house and put numbers in it after searching the house and doing what they can for whoever is there. I’m sure that a quick search on the internet will turn up something about how that works.
      Then, the idea is to paint these on all the houses in your neighborhood to make it appear as though FEMA came through and cleared out a bunch of sick people, leaving behind a bunch of contaminated houses and possibly corpses. The only issue that I can see is if these people don’t know what that means, and they go in anyway. But perhaps you could add a biohazard symbol next to the FEMA Mark. The idea is to make all the houses look like something people would really want to avoid.

      1. perhaps a sigh posted at the entrance to the subdivision time takento make it look official would help I will try to find what these markings are. I didnt know about them so I need to find out. it is your information I need Even if it isnt complete it sends me in the right direction. Thanks
        Grampa

        1. That’s what we do. We share information and help each other out. Sorry I didn’t have the complete information about the FEMA markings, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find out the rest. It’s been a while since I last read about it, so I would have to do the same thing. I have a little notebook that I write these things in in case I need to know something, but the internet is no longer available. This will be one of the things I write in it.
          A professional looking sign is also a very good idea. It could be posted at the beginning of a subdivision, entrance to an apartment complex, or in a parking lot of a condo complex.
          Keeping people from wanting to get in is much less trouble than wasting ammo for a gun battle to keep them out. Not to mention the fact that the sound of gunfire will attract every lowlife for miles, and eventually you will run out of ammo trying to fight them off. Then it’s game over.
          Hopefully we won’t have to get to that point. But it’s better to be ready anyway, just in case.

          1. I grew up taught that an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure. this came from my mother who could just read and write. all the knowledge in the world is useless if we dont have the wisdom to use it. I am looking for that FEMA sign language. I suspect it may be in their training archives but isnt listed as separate information. thanks again
            Grampa

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