From Flashlights to Fire

"It’s the craziest thing. Every year hunters and anglers alike head out into the great outdoors without carrying so much as a pack of matches on them. Yet I have always stressed that, depending on the circumstances, above all, give me a no fail way to get a fire going and I can make it through most survival ordeals unscathed. Being caught without matches or a lighter in the wilderness is a serious mistake. Trying to make fire without them is nearly impossible no matter how cool I make it look on Survivorman.

To me, fire is one of the most profound advantages you can have in a survival situation. You can get warm. You can cook your food. You can boil your water. And most importantly; it keeps away the boogieman. But how do you make it without a lighter, matches or any other kind of fire starter? Well, there’s rubbing two sticks together. A perennial favorite of the Boy Scouts everywhere, the fire bow, hand drill or fire plow, remain some of the most difficult methods to learn. But hunters carry a few items with them that can be manipulated to make a life saving fire."

• It can be dangerous – but it works in a pinch.
• Take the projectile off the end of a bullet with your multi-tool
• Dump out some of the powder
• Stuff back in some cotton or fibrous material that is dry and should burn well
• Shoot the “fire bullet” into an enclosed spot
• With luck the fibrous material have ignited into a glowing red
• Now you must transfer it into a big tinder bundle and blow into flame

• Siphon a small amount (quarter cup) of gas out of your vehicle (ATV or whatever)
• Make a small cover for the receptacle with the gas in it (to hold in the fumes)
• Now use the vehicle battery and two pieces of wire or long thin metal
• Touch one to the positive – one to the negative – and bring them together for a spark just above the gas vapors in your little cup of gas for ignition
• Be ready – it will go up in a big poof
• Remember – it is the vapors that ignite – not the liquid

• Take your flashlight (Mag lite or any other type of tube flashlight) and gently remove the bulb and lightly tap the glass until it breaks – careful not to break the filament inside
• Now you have a bulb with an exposed filament
• Put the flashlight back together broken bulb and all
• Put a little cotton ball on and around the filament
• Turn the flashlight on and you will have one shot at the cotton igniting
• Transfer to your ready to go tinder bundle on fine dead and dry material