Water purification
Given that it doesn't take a disaster for a city's water to become suddenly undrinkable (just incompetence), that most people can't afford to buy all of the water they need if city water was unavailable or contaminated, and that most areas of the U.S. have plenty of water available from rainfall, rivers, streams, ponds and lakes, a discussion of some methods for water purification seemed appropriate.
People in areas without basic water service have been collecting and then purifying their water from their rooftops using solar purification and bottle-purification. The method would appear to be cheap and easily adaptable to urban survival use.
Some links:
General discussion of safe water, with anecdotes http://www.earthtoys.com/emagazine.php?issue_number=03.08.01&article=saferwater
Purification methods (boiling, chemical purifiers, water filters)
http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/manual/water.shtml
Purifying murky water outdoors
http://nene.essortment.com/waterpurificati_rsck.htm
Solar still
http://www.txses.org/epsea/stills.html
http://solarcooking.org/sunandwater.htm
Simplest device: a bottle in the sun
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/09/for_water_purif.php
People in areas without basic water service have been collecting and then purifying their water from their rooftops using solar purification and bottle-purification. The method would appear to be cheap and easily adaptable to urban survival use.
Some links:
General discussion of safe water, with anecdotes http://www.earthtoys.com/emagazine.php?issue_number=03.08.01&article=saferwater
Purification methods (boiling, chemical purifiers, water filters)
http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/manual/water.shtml
Purifying murky water outdoors
http://nene.essortment.com/waterpurificati_rsck.htm
Solar still
http://www.txses.org/epsea/stills.html
http://solarcooking.org/sunandwater.htm
Simplest device: a bottle in the sun
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/09/for_water_purif.php