WILDERNESS SURVIVAL The following article is a reprint of an article submitted to us. We switch articles quite often so you can check back often and always have something new. This is a site about how to survive life threatening situations in the wilderness. Everything here is based on many years of experience in the outdoors. I have been in some real bad situations over the years and I have survived every time so far. Hopefully the information on this website will help you survive too. To guarantee your survival under the harshest possible conditions you need to have a few necessary items with you and possess a few basic skills, but mostly you need to keep your mind clear.    Items that you need to bring: TOOL This could be either a Swiss army type knife or a Leatherman type tool. Combined with your brain you can acomplish pretty much anything with a good multi-purpose tool.    FIRE You need to be able to make fire. The easiest way is to bring some cheap disposable plastic cigarette lighters with you. Always bring a few for backup eventhough they rarely break, not even if they get wet. I usually bring three but I have never even had to use the backup lighters, but since they weigh practically nothing it's OK. just in case all your lighters break see the next section for info on how to make fire without lighers or matches.    WOOD STOVE You can cook food and boil water over a fire but you will be wasting precious time and energy. You need to have a good wood powered camp stove. I bought the one to the right from trailstove.com after a friend of mine told me how it had saved his life in a snow storm. I've been trying to find something like it in stores but I haven't had any luck with that. It's a very simple and fool proof design, no moving parts that can break down. It cooks a bit slower than a gas stove but that's no problem at all. It's pretty cheap too.    FISHING NET In most states you're not legally allowed to fish with a net without a commercial fishing license, but in a life and death emergency who cares. With a fihing pole and a hook you could spend all day and still not get any fish. With a net you will catch fish within minutes, I guess that's why it's illegal.       COOKING POT You need to have a cooking pot with you to boil drinking water, killing any parasites and bacteria that might be in it. A lot of people including myself carry a water filter to take care of this problem but water filters have moving parts and a ceramic filter element that could easily break. It's better to carry a light cooking pot, you will probably not need it but if your water filter breaks the cooking pot will save your life.     STRING You should carry at least 50 feet of high quality very strong string. You can use this to make a shelter or to trap small animals for food. But mostly it's always something you need for the most unforeseen reason.     RUBBING ALCOHOL Rubbing alcohol is great for everything. Get it at your local supermarket or drugstore. Disinfect an open wound. Start a fire real quick. Make sure you get 97% or higher concentration. You can usually get 70% concentration at a bargain price but it's not worth the savings.                                                                        Skills you need to have: MAKE FIRE Having a fire during a cold night is essential for your survival. Here is how to make a fire using the teepee method, this is the most reliable way of making a fire.       MAKE SNOWSHOES Usually when people get caught in a snow storm they start walking through the deep snow getting about half a mile per day and end up dying in the snow. But you can make your own primitive snowshoes using some string and some branches from a tree.