Peter Kummerfeldt: The Importance of Water to Survival
To drink, or not to drink? That is a critical question. Suppose you are in a survival situation in a North American desert and you come across a spring or a water seepage area. The water looks kinda funky, with mud, insects and scum on the surface. You don’t have any way to purify or boil the water. You’re very thirsty.
Is the best idea to drink the water and worry about getting sick later? Or should you avoid drinking the nasty-looking stuff and risk getting more dehydrated? Survival expert Peter Kummerfeldt gives some practical advice.
By Peter Kummerfeldt
In priority order, after shelter and the need to defend your body temperature, preventing dehydration is the survivor’s next most important necessity.
This spring in the Central Oregon high desert is the only water for miles around. With no way to purify the water, should you drink it anyway?
The Institute of Medicine currently recommends a daily intake of approximately two to two and a half quarts of water to replace water lost through normal body functions – urination, defecation, breathing and sweating.
Remember that all of the chemical and electrical activities that take place in the human body take place in a water environment. When water is in short supply these activities begin to malfunction – you are dehydrated!
Many survivors begin their emergency already dehydrated and continue to dehydrate further when water supplies are limited and the available water quality is suspect. There have been cases where people needed water, but feared the water source was contaminated with Giardia, Cryptosporidium or other harmful pathogens. So, they delayed drinking , or chose not to use the water at all.
Here’s the quandary: Should you drink possibly impure water and prevent theimmediate physiological impact of dehydration? Or should you not drink the water, and risk dehydration, but eliminate the chances of becoming ill? This is a dilemma that many survivors have faced!
In North America, as a general rule, it is usually better to drink the water, since dehydration can very quickly reduce the survivor’s ability to function.
If the water contains harmful pathogens, the onset of symptoms will usually be days, if not weeks away. By then the individual will have access to medical care. Remember “Doctors can cure Giardiasis and Cryptosporidiosis but they can’t cure dead!”
In other parts of the world, especially the developing countries, drinking water that has not been disinfected is NOT
After a rain shower, you may be able to find water caught in a depression in a rock
recommended. Viruses such as hepatitis, (not commonly found in North American waters), are more prevalent and can cause incapacitating illness very quickly.
It should also be noted that the incidence of gastro-intestinal problems usually attributed to drinking contaminated water are commonly a result of poor personal hygiene habits!
Editor’s note:
- Peter Kummerfeldt has walked the talk in the wilderness survival field for decades. Peter grew up in Kenya, East Africa and came to America in 1965 and joined the U.S. Air Force. He is a graduate of the Air Force Survival Instructor Training School and has served as an instructor at the Basic Survival School, Spokane, Washington, in the Arctic Survival School, Fairbanks, Alaska, and the Jungle Survival School, Republic of the Philippines. For twelve years, Peter was the Survival Training Director at the United States Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado. He retired from the Air Force in 1995 after 30 years of service.
In 1992, concerned with the number of accidents that were occurring in the outdoors annually and the number of tourists traveling overseas who were involved in sometimes life-threatening incidents Peter created Outdoorsafe.com He is the author of Surviving a Wilderness Emergency
- Peter Kummerfeldt has taught wilderness survival for more than 40 years, all over the world, in different environments.
Recommended Reading:
Surviving a Wilderness Emergency
Build the Perfect Survival Kit
water purification
water bottles and carriers
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Tell me more! What is SODIS and what is a PET bottle? I don’t know what the acronyms mean, and I’m sure many of our readers don’t either.
I really like the SODIS method of water disinfection. All you need is a PET bottle filled with the infected water and six hours of sun to completely disinfect the water.
The rule of 3s is a good baseline, but ANYTHING related to survival has to incude a healthy dose of common sense. I fell into the Mississippi River years ago, and was instantly chilled. Within minutes I was shivering so hard it almost hurt! It all comes back to the “Be Prepared” mantra of the Boy Scouts if you want to be around for the end of the game!
It is too often people refer to the “law of 3′s” as if they are tolerance windows…
3 Minutes without air
3 Hours without shelter
3 Days without water
3 Weeks without food
These are, as rules of thumbs, maximums, and the next state is END GAME
You cannot function and perform the myriad of tasks necessary to go on surviving and living if you approach these thresholds.
You may be comatose or in stasis (likely with long term damage or loss of mobility/ability) until rescued, if within those timelines.
If you go more than a day without water your performance will be very hampered – inability to think clearly or, in some cases, move with any semblance of agility.
A couple days without food and you may devolve into a near psychotic state where all you can think about is food.
After an hour in the chilly rain, you may shiver and convulse so violently that you lose voluntary control of your extremities.