An Area Study is essentially a piece of “intelligence” that you create about your community which will be useful to your preparedness planning.

I learned about it from Forward Observer. I’ve never made one before and I’m by no means an expert but you, dear reader, may become as familiar as I am by watching this 30+ minute video.

During a disaster or conflict, there is limited time to make decisions, and making the wrong decision can be costly or fatal. Having an area study can help you understand the risks to living in your area, and the routes, resources, threats etc that you are likely to encounter.

I’m making my area study in Obsidian, my favorite note taking tool, and I plan to print two hard copies.

The first step is to define your operating area, for me it’s my city.

The next thing to do is to figure out what you want to monitor and be aware of in your area. For me:

• Police stations
• Medical facilities
• High and low crime areas
• Water sources
• Food sources
• Distribution centers (Amazon, Fedex, UPS, Sysco etc)
• Communication infrastructure like radio repeaters and locations of community centers that are typically opened during disasters
• Military bases, airports, and national guard depots
• Power stations

The next step is to identify the physical terrain and weather. I want to make sure that depending on the weather and terrain that I have proper clothing. It’s a good idea to identify:

• Points of elevation
• Roads, railroads, highways, paths, major easements
• Choke points
• Bridges
• Water access
• Evacuation routes
• Structures that could provide shelter, cover, or concealment
• Precipitation and temperature averages as well as hours of sunlight

Then human terrain, I plan to identify:

• Basic demographics for my area, this would include: race, ethnicity, political affiliation, and religious affiliations
• Known criminal groups such as active gangs and their affiliations
• Registered sex offenders and their distribution
• Political or other activist groups
• Religious groups
• Others such as active militias, law enforcement groups, or other civic groups or charities
• Homeless encampments

After doing this the next step is to identify critical infrastructure. This would include:

• Power stations
• Utility stations
• Hospitals or Trauma Centers
• Schools
• Railyards

The next component is politics and governance. I plan to identify and understand:

1: Local leaders like the mayor, city council, sheriff, and police chief, school board members etc.

2: a breakdown of current political party activities and goals in my local community and things that are likely to impact me, especially in regards to emergency planning and community outreach, mental health and new law enforcement initiatives

The next component is identifying military bases in the area and determining how they may be deployed in the area of interest during an emergency. For me, it would most likely be the national guard.

Finally listing the threats that are likely to occur to better help identify how the people in your area may assist or harm your goals during an event.

For me, my most likely threats are:

1: Civil unrest / riots

2: Pandemics

3: Wildfire smoke

4: Flooding / heavy rainstorms and downed trees

5: Power outages

5: Extreme heat

6: Supply chain disruptions

Less likely but still possible:

• Major earthquake
• Railroad derailment
• Gas line leaks / explosion
• Major chemical leak into the air or water system by a local factory

Things I do not worry about in my planning:

1: Long term grid down

2: Civil war

3: World War III

4: EMPs

5: PHTF (poop hit the fan)

6: Zombie Apocalypses 😆

Sure, black swan events can happen, and it’s likely they will happen to some people every year. These are things I have no practical experience with and should they happen they would be so beyond the scope of what I can prepare for that it would be impossible to adequately plan for any of these scenarios. All of these dramatic scenarios are much likely to extend far beyond any planning I could do. Based on my current abilities and resources, I believe it is practical for my purpose to plan for an event that is 3-5 days long without outside aid.

Why do all this? Well I can think of a few reasons. The first is that by completing the area study, you get a cohesive picture of your community and the issues that are directly impacting it. You understand the big moving pieces that are moving around and affecting the physical, political, and commercial environment around you.

Another reason why is because it saves time. For example if the internet is down and I need a doctor, knowing which emergency medical facilities are nearby, means I won’t have to go scout it out or roll the dice and hope I find one nearby. This could be as simple as looking up local clinics and calling them to see what their hours are, what their capabilities are, if they accept cash or what kinds of insurance they accept etc.

I hope to learn more about the area study as I work through it. Right now I don’t see it as a short term project but a long term and continual process where I continue to learn more about my area.