So, in the previous post I talked through how little we knew about the situation my friend and I were walking into. We knew there was damage, and we knew he lived in an area where he had serious security concerns for the first night after a major disaster.
We wanted to have enough equipment on us to be self supporting for at least 48 hours, but we also wanted a fair amount of equipment (nods, rifles, kit) due to how unknown the situation was going to be.
We also knew that we might have to walk in over a mile, past police checkpoints. Walking around in a chest rig with rifle and helmet with nods didn't seem like a wise decision. Especially when everyone locally was going to be on edge due to the state of emergency we were in.
Pictured is the kit I took with me and how it was carried. I have a baltoro 65l hiking backpack that houses all of my sleeping and layer gear, and I dropped out some equipment to make room for my helmet, trex arms ready rig, and daypack.
I was really thankful to own the ready rig in this situation. My main chest rig was far too large to pack in. This ready rig is a great solution for a small capable chest rig to pack in that takes up very little space.
We realized going in that all of this gear was probably too much, but we had no idea what we might get into. This is as close to a situation without rule of law as I have ever been, and I hope that stays true the rest of my life.
The rifle was a different challenge. My main rifle is a 16" AR with cloud defensive rein 2.0, dbal d2, lvpo and piggy back red dot. This is not a small setup, and it's something I had not thought about how to carry in a "non permissive environment".
Pictured is the solution I used for this situation. These camping chair bags actually fit my rifle perfectly. It looks normal enough that most people won't give you a second look walking around with one of these.
We were able to get fairly close to our friend's house and only had to hike several hundred feet. The next post will work through how that initial response when on the ground went.