Book Review: 98.6 Degrees--The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive!

 
Book: 98.6 Degrees--The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive! by Cody Lundin (2003)

Overview: In this book, Cody Lundin teaches the reader about how to stay alive in when cut off from civilization until help (e.g., Search & Rescue) can arrive.

    I've previously reviewed Lundin's book, When All Hell Breaks Loose, as well as having watched him on the cable television series Dual Survival, and various YouTube videos that have featured him. He is a nationally recognized survival expert and director of the Aboriginal Living Skills School in Prescott, Arizona. I still consider When All Hell Breaks Loose to be one of the best, if not the best, disaster preparation guide out there; and it is definitely the best one for people who don't know much about prepping and need a quick and dirty guide.

    So, with that, it is somewhat strange that it took me so long to read his book on wilderness survival. It probably is because I have read so many other books on wilderness survival, watched both Lundin's program as well as others, that I thought I already knew the subject well enough. But whatever the reason, I'm glad I finally got around to reading this book.

    The first I want to make clear about this book, and something that sets it apart from others ostensibly on the same subject, is that this is a book about emergency survival in a wilderness or remote area. That is, it is about keeping yourself alive until rescuers arrive. It is not a book on bushcraft or primitive living. In other words, this is not a book about living off the land. Lundin has the assumption that you want to be found and rescued, and that the rescue will occur within a matter of hours or days, rather than weeks or months. 

    The best way to give you an overview of the topics covered in the book is simply to list off the chapter headings:

1. Survival Situations: How Do They Start?
2. Survival vs. Primitive Living, Or "Living Off The Land."
3. Survival Psychology And The Importance Of Proper Prior Training.
4. Why Fear Sucks.
5. Dealing With The Survival Scenario: Attitude, Adaptation, and Awareness.
6. Reducing the Threat of the Survival Situation: The Seven Ps.
7. What It Takes To Stay Alive: Common Powerful Personality Patterns.
8. The Most Common Way To Push Up Daisies In The Outdoors.
9. How Your Body Loses And Gains Heat: The Physics of Freezing Your Fanny or Backing Your Bones.
10. Your First Line of Defense.
11. About Your Rescuers: An Introduction To Your Saving Grace.
12. Helping Rescuers Bring You Back Alive: Leaving Rescuers A 5-W Game Plan From Day Hikes to Epic Backcountry Bonanzas.
13. What Is A Survival Kit?
14. Survival Kit Components.
15. Summary.
16. The Amazing "The Drawings and Photos Are Really Cool But I'm Too Lazy to Read This Book" Cliff Notes.

    As you can probably guess from the title of the book as well as some of the chapter headings, the primary concern of someone in a survival situation is to maintain their core body temperature at normal temperatures: not too hot or too cold. Lundin explains what happens to the body when it gets too hot or too cold, even down to the cellular level where the cell walls can break down. 

    Tied closely to this concern is keeping hydrated. Thus, there are no chapters on how to track and hunt animals, tan animal skins, make improvised bows and arrows, or comprehensive guides to identifying edible plants or, conversely, poisonous plants. This is not to say that food items are totally ignored, but that most people have more than enough fat stores to survive several days without food. What food you want are those that can give you a quick burst of energy to help you maintain your sharpness and, surprisingly to me, to get your metabolism a jump start in order to start accessing fat stores.

    Water, on the other hand, is of paramount importance. Dehydration degrades a person physically, mentally and emotionally. So Lundin spends a substantial amount of the book on the importance of hydration, how and why you can become dangerously dehydrated, the importance of having containers to carry water and different ways to access water (for instance, he recommends carrying a few feet of plastic or rubber tubing so that you can access water that might be in a small hole or crevice). Importantly, he also bursts some bubbles about methods to find or gather water that are popular to include in survival books but that will actually cost you more water (in the form of sweat, puke or the runs) than you will obtain from the source. 

    But that is jumping ahead. Lundin begins his book by describing how easy it is to get into a survival situation. Often, it can be simply the result of taking the wrong turn and pushing ahead when common sense tells you to turn back. We all have read or seen the news stories of someone following their GPS or misreading a map and getting onto a back road and breaking down, getting stuck, and so on, and dying of exposure. Lundin begins his book relating the story of a couple that took the wrong road, their car broke down, and the husband died trying to walk to a freeway a few miles away while the wife died in the hot car. I've heard similar stories from Idaho and Nevada of couples following GPS directions onto rarely used roads and getting stuck in the snow. A twisted ankle or broken leg can also turn a hike into a survival situation.

    Like his other book, Lundin spends the first part of his book on the psychology of survival: those mental and emotional attributes that distinguish the survivor from the dead. Much of this has to do with controlling your fear and panic. But he also discusses the importance of being able to improvise and adapt, make decisions, endure hardship, and a positive mental attitude.

    Another large portion of his book is on planning. Lundin addresses planning more generally, but then goes into detail on planning or preparing so that if you do find yourself in a survival situation you will both have the tools to help you survive the situation and help searchers find in hours instead of days or weeks ... or months.

    Part of planning a trip is to make it easier for people to know when they need to start looking for you, and easier for searchers to find you. Some of you already know this, but Lundin recommends that you should tell at least two people where you will be going, when you expect to return, what vehicle (or other transportation) you are taking (including plate number and description), who is in your party, and why you are taking the trip.

    Since Search & Rescue may need to track you, Lundin has a clever trick to help them. Take a clean unwrinkled sheet of heavy duty aluminum cooking foil, and step onto it with each foot so that you leave a clear imprint of the footwear you will be using. This should be done at the trail head so that it is a fresh and accurate copy, and then the foil should be left in your vehicle.

    The final portion of planning is to put together and carry a survival kit. The primary importance of the kit is to help you maintain the correct body temperature and avoid dehydration. Thus, you will want items such as tarps, space blankets, cordage and so on that can be used to shelter and keep you warm and dry in cold weather, or shield you from the sun in hot weather. You will also want multiple ways to start a fire. And you will want ways to gather, carry, and purify water.

    In addition, you will want to include tools for signaling, whether by building a fire (either for light or smoke), signaling mirror, loud whistle, and similar. And a basic first aid kit. 

    Anyway, Lundin discusses the types of items you will need, as well as what factors you should consider when you pick the particular items. He also describes what he carries and why.

    Lundin is careful to note that what may work for him many not work for you. Obviously, for instance, Lundin is very experienced, so that might impact what he carries (although when I read through his list, everything was simple to use ... provided you had practiced with it). Other items might need to be changed out due to your personal situation. For instance, Lundin notes his preference for disposable butane lighters over other types of lighters. However, being a colder climate, I would favor a refillable lighter like a Zippo. Also, although Lundin discusses how to select or modify a butane lighter to get one that has a decent flame, I like the fact that a Zippo or similar gives a good flame that you can leave burning. 

    And there are some items available now that were not (or not easily obtained) when Lundin wrote his book. For instance, one of the reasons that Lundin does not like Zippo lighters is that the fuel will typically evaporate within two or three days (which is why I would carry a small bottle of fuel with me). But there are several companies today that sell refillable lighters that are sealed so that the fuel will be much slower to evaporate away. Similarly, Lundin likes 550 paracord because you can split it apart and have different types and numbers of thinner cordage. However, you can now buy survival cordage that looks and functions like 550 paracord, but incorporates within the sleeve not only the polyester cord that you find in 550 paracord, but also fishing line and kevlar thread.

    One point that Lundin makes is about choosing equipment and clothing that allows you to be spotted. Thus, he recommends not only having a bandanna for all its multiple uses, but that it be brightly colored. Similarly, for a heavy duty space blanket that comes with one side colored, he recommends getting the bright orange over camo or olive drab. He recommends that other items be brightly colored. 

    This can seem strange to the standard prepper who, if like me, generally attempts to be the "grey man" including buying subdued, natural colors or camouflage patterns for clothing and packs. But it raises a good point (which could probably be an article in itself) that sometimes you want to be easily seen. 

    In any event, this is a good book. I recommend that you get a copy and study it. I know that I will be going over the survival kit that I carry with me when hunting to see what I can improve with Lundin's comments and ideas in mind.