Monday, October 29, 2012

Cigarettes Can Help You Survive?

As my very first post (besides my welcome post) I am going to get the ball rolling with an item that quite a few people have with them. Cigarettes. It is estimated that a third of the world's population smokes. That's roughly 2.4 billion people so, the odds of someone having cigarrettes or being with someone who has cigarrettes with them is pretty high. I myself am not a smoker but if I were in a survival situation I would want to have them with me and not for the "feel good"affect it elicits  First, let's look at the medicinal qualities of tobacco. The plant Nicotina has been used for centuries for more than just smoking. It has many different medicinal qualities. If you find yourself in a situation where infection is a high possibility rubbing tobacco in a wound can help. Tobacco can be used as an antiseptic to help to prevent infection. When it enters your blood stream through ingestion or smoking it can act as a sedative and a muscle relaxant which, in the event of a trauma, can help. This is helpful especially with dislocations and fractures. When the body experiences trauma like a fracture it is prone to muscle spasms which can only make it worse.  Tobacco will calm the body and help to prevent it. Tobacco also has qualities that made it useful as an insecticide. If you find yourself being chewed up by insects rubbing it on your skin in the exposed areas can help fight them off. Cigarrettes can also be used as a tool. If you are low on matches or have trouble making fires you can use it to carry an ember. By just lighting the cigarette it will slowly smolder because of chemicals that are found in the mixture however, if you doesn't have a steady flow of oxygen it will extinguish itself. Most cigarrettes have filters on the bottom of them. These have numerous uses. If you allow them to dry you can use them as tinder to start a fire, they can be put into a straw and used to filter water, if you have a trouble with small flying insects you can plug your ears, if your nose it bleeding they can be used to slow or stop the bleeding. If you still have the box you have a container or another thing to help to kindle your fire if there isn't a lot of small dry stuff to help start your fire.


This is the average cigarette, as you can see there is a small
filter in the colored end.  It has many uses. 

EDIT: I did a test and found that a cigarette when lit and not smoked will last for 20-25 minutes. When I did it there was no wind, it was night time, and it was 43˚ F outside. Also, the average cigarette lasts about six minutes when you do smoke it. I'm sure that depending on the wind and temperature it these times will vary. 











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