Making Water Safe to Drink Video
More Articles Related to WaterWater filters for hikers, outdoorsmen, or anyone who needs to obtain water from untrusted sources have become commonplace. This video discusses some methods to make water safe to drink in a wilderness survival situation.
Andrew Price takes us through a number of methods used to eliminate debris, bacteria, viruses, cysts and parasites that may be lurking in your survival water supply. Starting from the most basic to the more high tech, Andrew gives a good introduction on how to best quench your thirst and continue to survive in a healthy state.
Cloth Survival Water Filter
First Price makes a simple wilderness survival water filtration system from his t-shirt. As Andrew mentions, filtering water through a shirt can only remove some of the larger debris like sand, mud, insects, and leaves but will not protect you from water borne disease organisms such as giarda or cryptosporidium. However this basic filtering of water is a good first step in making water potable in a wilderness survival situation.
Millbank Water Filter
Next up is a Millbank bag used by the British Army to filter debris from murky water. The Millbank is certainly a very handy and easy to operate tool for clarifying drinking water, but it will not destroy pathogens. The water will need a secondary treatment before it is safe to drink.
Hiker Type Water Filter
A typical water filter used by hikers and other outdoor enthusiasts is a hand pump water filter. These hiking type water filters attempt to trap sediment and disease causing organisms as the water is forced through a fine fiber membrane.
One problem with these water filters used by hikers is that many water borne organisms are exceedingly small and can easily get through the pores of many filters on the market today. In addition, this kind of water filter can malfunction in a variety of ways.
MWP Water Filter
Price then goes on to use a MWP water filter. The MWP water filter also uses a membrane but backs this up with iodine to destroy pathogens that escape the filter. However iodine will not destroy cryptosporidium. The MWP water filter is designed to attach to a NATO water bottle.
MSR Mixed Oxident Water Filter
The last survival water filter Andrew Price covers in this video is the MSR mixed oxidant filter. The MSR mixed oxidant water filter uses rock salt crystals and a small charge of electricity to destroy pathogens in drinking water using oxidation, including cryptosporidium. This MSR a very interesting type of water filter for survival situations that warrants closer inspection.
There are a number of other water filters and methods of destroying disease causing organisms in drinking water. One such way is by UV light filters and solar water disinfection. However, as discussed in previous Survival Topics, boiling your water to make it safe to drink is the surest and most foolproof method.
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