Also, dear god, put a couple cases of bottled water in your car. I do that even when driving around the Bay Area (if nothing else, $0.10/bottle water vs. $1.50/bottle water at the gas station is a win), but it was weird being in SW NV seeing people with absolutely no preparations in their car.
Bottled water, a blanket or two, food that stores well, and a first aid kit. None of that takes up a lot of space, and it could easily save your life. Plus just about all of it is handy to have around for non-emergency needs anyways.
A flashlight and a reflective vest or jacket also helps. (I also have flares, a tool kit including jumper cables and patches, but that might be overkill.)
Not really, depending on where you are. I live in the pacific northwest, there's some long lonely stretches of road required to go see some of the awesome sights out here. Plus for me flares, jumper cables, and patches all store in the spare tire area anyways.
A few years ago a grass fire broke out near where we live (Upwey). Folks were up in arms because The Gummint hadn't set up nice comfortable shelters for them to drive their SUVs to post-evacuation and be waited upon at the taxpayers expense.
So: it's not just that people don't keep a bottle of water in their car. Many locals who know they're living in a fire risk area don't have enough kit in their cars - or even the right type of cars - to safely evacuate them and their loved ones for a few days should the fire risk become extreme.
We're not talking about fleeing an incoming fire (almost never a good idea), but simply going someplace else for a day as the fire risk is so great. But, apparently, many people choose not to prepare for such a simple operation.
Doesn't work as well in a car, in my experience (I have a fair bit of experience with being in the desert, cars breaking down or being destroyed, etc.)
Opening and closing the container leads to contamination, and consequently it is generally "emergency only" use, vs. something you use routinely (and thus maintain automatically). If you end up having to walk some distance, you can't really take the container comfortably, vs. throwing some bottles into whatever bag or pockets you have.
I like bottles because they fit in cupholders, and it's easy to give out bottles of water to people (e.g. a broken down other car, or someone injured, or drunk people after a party, or whatever). A case of water is $3-5 from Costco.
Those are good points. Perhaps an alternative is to have many multi-use small containers, like I have for hiking. Something's got to be better than always using one-time usage plastic bottles. Of course recycling them helps, but so few people do that.
I have a stainless water bottle (hydroflask; insulated) that I use myself for water and tea, but reusable = expensive = can't just give to people and not get back.
The energy and environmental cost of ~6-12 cases of water per year isn't really that big a deal. The extra fuel burned by carrying 5kg might be more than the cost of the water bottles.
