Survivors

mgcycleguy

My mind was wondering today, as it does when you are riding about on a holiday ride, and I drifted to thinking about those post apocalypse type programmes... the sort when 98% of the population are wiped out by some killer virus... anyway I was thinking you never see people in them riding bikes WHY ?... You see them walking about with rucksaks, or driving about in Land Rovers with shotguns,

... I mean i wouldnt have a clue about keeping a modern car running (computerised electronic ignition systems etc etc), also without the keys they are impossible even to get into these days, so how could you cyphon fuel to keep yours going!.... and I dont know much about horses either how to ride em or feed and look after them, so really all that leaves is cycles.... I reckon with one visit to a cycle shop to get some bits, tubes, tyres, bit of chain oil, most people could keep a bike going for years...

... think of the distances you could cover on the motorways with no cars... and the roads would last forever without the trucks destroying them !

... would the bike save humanity ???

Mike Healey

There would be any number of cars with keys available - check any car sales showroom, not to mention your recently deceased neighbours.

You would be able to access petrol stations tanks by bolt-cropping (possibly) the pipes used by delivery tankers, not to mention the umpteen loaded tankers which would be lying around at depots.

The motorways wouldn't be in such good condition after about a year as there would be nothing to stop weed, shrub and tree seeds from settling and sprouting.

They also never mention the fact that water from reservoirs would run out quickly after the first winter - think of all those pipes (insulated or not) in every house in the country, which would burst after the first heavy frost. The streets would be awash and/or sheets of ice as the water would freeze more readily as the winter temperature in towns would be colder than at present (towns/cities are heat islands because of all the energy going to waste)

Then there's the problem of pests/vermin. In the first year, plagues of insects (flies/beetles etc.) (bodies), rats mice, ditto and so on. Much more unpleasant than depicted on tv or film

Cressers

Your priorities would be getting out of the cities, foci of infection, and avoiding the militatised rump goverment. Then you'd need to find a farm, and stock up with tinned food for the winter. Come the spring you'd need to start planting for the next season. You'd be fortunate not to starve before you became sustainably self-sufficient...

And as for bikes, they'd be useful, but only in the short term. Long term , if you lived that long, horses would be the transport of choice.

Anonymous

Yeah but if you could get to a good bike shop you would get a really good bike for nothing. And hardly any drivers to run you over either.

Sounds good.

pedylan

dmclite wrote:

Yeah but if you could get to a good bike shop you would get a really good bike for nothing. And hardly any drivers to run you over either.

Sounds good.

And the drivers who did come up behind you would know there was nothing coming and could over take you on blind summits, sharp bends etc.

Just like now really.

dbb

you guys have put far too much thought into this!
:shock: :roll:

Smokin Joe

Most cities would also be ravaged by fire. Anything already burning would have no means to extinguish it and gas mains which fractured would continue to leak with no one to repair them.

Cressers

Anyone riding a bike in that sort of survival situation is likely to be seen as vunerable.

Anonymous

Plus you could get lots of guns and shoot stuff when you wanted to.

And blow stuff up.

TRASHCAN MAN.

Cressers

Though it's unlikely ther'll be that sort of total wipe-out, what does concern me is the sort of thing that may happen, a continual worsening of what we have now. Take for example widespread power cuts. I remember as a child being taken shopping during the miners' strike and power cuts of the early 1970s. In a Woolworths', lit by oil lamps, and using mechanical cash registers, life continued despite it all. Today, in our interdependent, electrical and electronic dependent society, I don't think it'd be too long before things unravelled quickly...

finchy

Would this disaster basically mean just humanity being wiped out? Or would there be triffids or zombies chasing us? I reckon that you'd be OK on a bike with zombies about - you'd be moving silently and quickly (unless one of them gets you on a hill), but would a triffid be sensitive enough to pick up the noise from a bike?

In the case of triffids, any attack is likely to come from the front, so it might be possible to fix up some sort of defence based on piano wires stretched over a frame, or alternatively we could just use one of those covered recumbents.

Anonymous

You wouldn't freewheel too much, especially if you had fulcrums on, they are pretty loud.

Mccaria

I am sure I read somewhere that within a couple of weeks the lack of electricity would mean there wouldn't be the water available to cool down the nuclear reactors so that they would start over-heating. Having already survived one pretty bad situation you would be about to see things get really, really bad.......

The good news is that with only a couple of weeks to go it would be worth splashing out on a Pinarello Prince or Colnago EPS - put it on the credit card knowing you will never have to pay the bill!!

Porgy

There was a BBC programme about just this sort of thing - a year or two back. They used CGI to show the typical decay you would expect in a major city once humanity had vacated it. And - yes - it was much worse tan depicted in fiction.
The film AI is a good example - I could never take that film remotely seriously - not least becasue they depicted New York's skyscrapers suriving millenia intot he future - even after being flooded. Skyscrapers are particularly vulnerble as it happens and probably wouldn;t survive 100 years, let alone a 1000.

The problem with bikes would be the extra time taken to drive into town making you more vulnerable for longer - cyclists aren't bullet proof - but many landrovers are. And your ability to carry looted supplies for you and your community - and weapons and to pick up new people - which would be important as a plot device in any post-apocolyptic tv show.

That said - there must be opportunities for bikes - hunting trips - tending to the farm - reccies around your property where you'd want to stay quiet and as hidden as possible.

Of course if Zombies were involved then I don;t think a bike would be a healthy option - they can all too easily take you by surprise and a cyclist would be no match to a whole mob of the bloodthirsty bast@rds.

And according to that BBC programme - the good news for cat fans is that our feline friends should do rather well without humans - they still have the hunting instinct and food will be all too plentiful after a few years of no humans. Cats, apparently are likely to take to living in the uppermost parts of skyscrapers.

Cressers

I'd hope that most reactors had been designed to 'fail-safe' and keep a steady temperature thanks to a closed -loop coolant system. But no mechanical system can last forever...

...and of course there's the problem of the stored nuclear waste, some of which must be continuously cooled for the forseeable future. Just remember that the next time you hear someone tell you that a 'Hard CHoice' must be made in favour of nuclear power...

Porgy

Cressers wrote:

I'd hope that most reactors had been designed to 'fail-safe' and keep a steady temperature thanks to a closed -loop coolant system. But no mechanical system can last forever...

...and of course there's the problem of the stored nuclear waste, some of which must be continuously cooled for the forseeable future. Just remember that the next time you hear someone tell you that a 'Hard CHoice' must be made in favour of nuclear power...

I read recently that the majority of nuclear waste is placed in areas vulnerable to the rising sea levels - and that if as is predicted the sea levels do rise as much as 5m in the next century or so - then we're going to have to rethink our nuclear waste options pretty quickly - and move the ones already stored in vulnerable locations.

damnedinflames

I found this to be an insightful read

http://www.worldwithoutus.com/did_you_know.html

Also the excellant zombie survival guide by max brooks - always have a well oiled bike and a cricket bat handy : )

finchy

Cressers wrote:

I'd hope that most reactors had been designed to 'fail-safe' and keep a steady temperature thanks to a closed -loop coolant system. But no mechanical system can last forever...

...and of course there's the problem of the stored nuclear waste, some of which must be continuously cooled for the forseeable future. Just remember that the next time you hear someone tell you that a 'Hard CHoice' must be made in favour of nuclear power...

+1. A nuclear power station near me closed down recently, and they can't even START cleaning it for another hundred years. The cost is expected to be in the £10s of billions at today's prices. I wonder how our descendants will cope if they don't have the technical or financial means to cope with the mess?

Cressers

I've just finished reading the book of this website

http://www.worldwithoutus.com/did_you_know.html

I have a morbid interest in this sort of thing...

Anonymous

Makes you wonder, with all the nuclear stuff, whats powering all our gadgets, thin air? Nope a lot of it is nuclear. Don't like it, buy some solar, wind and hydro alternates. Oh but you won't 'cos it costs loads.

Sorry, went off on a tangent there, must be me using my electrically powered, nuclear generated PC, Modem, router and lights.

Cressers

What will power our gadgets? Renewables as the price becomes right.

If nuclear power is The Answer we're asking the wrong questions.

Anonymous

It is the answer, ask the americans, but not the japanese.

Anonymous

Sorry, that last post was in poor taste, but my uncle did time as a japanese POW.

No more inflammable posts, sorry.

finchy

dmclite wrote:

Makes you wonder, with all the nuclear stuff, whats powering all our gadgets, thin air? Nope a lot of it is nuclear. Don't like it, buy some solar, wind and hydro alternates. Oh but you won't 'cos it costs loads.

Sorry, went off on a tangent there, must be me using my electrically powered, nuclear generated PC, Modem, router and lights.

I know that a lot of our electricity comes from nuclear, but I for one would be more than happy if we were told that we can only generate x amount of power per person without leaving a potentially lethal legacy for many, many generations to come, so you're limited to a personal allowance of ...... kw/per year, use it however you want to.

Of course, the calculations for this would be highly complex, and I'll leave that to other people.

Porgy

johnfinch wrote:

Cressers wrote:

I'd hope that most reactors had been designed to 'fail-safe' and keep a steady temperature thanks to a closed -loop coolant system. But no mechanical system can last forever...

...and of course there's the problem of the stored nuclear waste, some of which must be continuously cooled for the forseeable future. Just remember that the next time you hear someone tell you that a 'Hard CHoice' must be made in favour of nuclear power...

+1. A nuclear power station near me closed down recently, and they can't even START cleaning it for another hundred years. The cost is expected to be in the £10s of billions at today's prices. I wonder how our descendants will cope if they don't have the technical or financial means to cope with the mess?

It's the best argument against nuclear fuels IMO - financial. Never mind that there's plenty of good environmental reasons for those who seem to be arguing that nuclear power will save us from climate change - it won't. More than that - we just cannot afford it. Thatcher failed to priavtise nuclear fuels - no one wated to buy it. Now they can only make it a viable business by forcing the public to pick up the rather huge bill while they take the 'profits'.

It's funny that governments and the nuclear fuels industry seem reluctant for us to know the true costs.

Surely it would be cheaper to put all the obvious energy saving measures in place first - and invest in alternative fuels.

With nuclear the costs are mostly in the future while renewables - the costs are mostly at the start - RnD, consultations, equipment, etc. But if the government are able to magic billions out of thin air to save the banks, then why were they so reluctant to stump up the reltively tiny amount to set the renewables industry into motion and potentially save the planet?

Angus444

dmclite wrote:

Yeah but if you could get to a good bike shop you would get a really good bike for nothing. And hardly any drivers to run you over either.

Sounds good.

Us cyclists would inherit the earth!! Fantastic! You could get the bike of your dreams, with unlimited spares.......

Cressers

But not for long as the roads in this doomsday scenario would be covered in puncture causing debris...

Le Commentateur

Have to switch to MTB and go off road then.

Porgy

Cressers wrote:

But not for long as the roads in this doomsday scenario would be covered in puncture causing debris...

assuming of course that the puncture fairy survives the apocolyptic event in the first place.

Cressers

I think it would. From Revelations, 19- if I remember correctly...

This woe is past, but behold, there cometh three others...

That sounds like a cluster of punctures to me...

greasedscotsman

Angus444 wrote:

dmclite wrote:

Yeah but if you could get to a good bike shop you would get a really good bike for nothing. And hardly any drivers to run you over either.

Sounds good.

Us cyclists would inherit the earth!! Fantastic! You could get the bike of your dreams, with unlimited spares.......

Just don't get one with Shimano Di2...