In last month’s information guide, we covered the topic of outdoor caching in a two part series. In that series, we arrived at the conclusion that caching or hiding supplies, valuables, or even firearms in remote locations made sense mainly because these items were far away from where you happen to be, and thus would be secure if you were to undergo a personal search of your property.
Still, for some people, especially those planning on bugging in, caching outdoors doesn’t hold much appeal. Some people have no need to preposition supplies far away because they plan on staying put; others do not like the idea of outdoor caching because they simply don’t want the extra scrutiny that burying something outdoors might bring, or perhaps they just don’t feel comfortable placing valuables away from where they are. We get it – to each his own.
It’s fine to want to have all of your valuables close by where you can keep an eye on them – however, it is unwise to just leave things out in the open. Sometimes, physical security means properly hiding or disguising things so that they cannot be found instead of relying on overt security measures. A safe is a good example of the point we are trying to illustrate here. A safe is normally made of steel and often anchored to the floor or structure of the building. As such, it is virtually impenetrable to the casual thief. Hand tools will not work against even the weakest safe, nor will repeated blows from a pick or sledgehammer. Again, your average safe is virtually impenetrable. Or is it?
First of all, most consumer quality safes – i.e. the ones you, as Joe Citizen can buy, are easily breached with locksmith tools, torches, and cutting wheels. They are simply not designed to withstand any real entry effort. In that sense, they really only keep the honest people out. Government and bank style safes are far better at protecting their respective contents, but most of these types of safes are simply out of the reach of the average person. Don’t get us wrong, we are not disparaging safes at all. Safes make excellent sense for storing firearms, documents, valuables, and for providing a measure of fire resistance. For most applications, a good safe makes perfect sense.
