When things get tough…

If you put your ear to bunker doors across the nation in the quiet before the dawn of the apoc­a­lypse, you will hear a fer­vent mantra whis­pered by many diehard sur­vival­ists as they pol­ish the bar­rels of their pump-action shot­guns just one last time.

“Please let there be zom­bies. Please let there be zombies.”

Since their first appear­ance in mod­ern form in George A. Romero’s 1978 film Dawn of the Dead, zom­bies have eaten their way into our hearts and minds to become pop cul­ture icons. Dis­miss zom­bies from the dooms­day equa­tion at your peril. If life teaches us any­thing, it is that you should expect the unex­pected. And as there are few apoc­a­lypse sce­nar­ios more unex­pected than zom­bies, this may be the one to place your bets on, even at astro­nom­i­cal odds. It would be a fool indeed who does not, at very least, have a con­tin­gency plan in place to deal with an undead world. Heaven help those who sneer at the thought of a zom­bie apoc­a­lypse, for they will invari­ably be the first ones clasp­ing their entrails as they try and drag them­selves away from a rav­en­ous horde of liv­ing
dead on Z-Day.

Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

There are a few things that you prob­a­bly need to know to avoid becom­ing a mobile Happy Meal.

Don’t Panic

Of all the pos­si­ble apoc­a­lypse sce­nar­ios, zom­bies are, at least ini­tially, one of the least dra­matic. The chances of you actu­ally see­ing a zom­bie on D-Day is quite remote. The most you would be likely see is the tail-end of a tele­vi­sion news report of a bizarre mur­der some­where in the Alaskan tun­dra or an SMS from a friend direct­ing you to some shaky YouTube cell phone footage that “just has to be a hoax.” But don’t let the lack of fan­fare fool you. A zom­bie apoc­a­lypse may have a slow start, but it will soon snow­ball into a
gorefest that will leave the major­ity of human­ity as walk­ing left­overs in just a few short weeks.

While the first media broad­casts of peo­ple being eaten alive in the streets will be greeted with skep­ti­cal dis­be­lief by most, con­sider it a sign to imme­di­ately imple­ment your sur­vival plan. Time is still on your side. You have up to twenty-four hours in which to escape to your rural retreat or moun­tain refuge before the roads from the cities are choked with those flee­ing the undead hordes.

Although it will, at times, be dif­fi­cult to believe a zom­bie apoc­a­lypse is actu­ally hap­pen­ing, the sooner you accept the real­ity of the sit­u­a­tion, the greater your chances of sur­vival. You may not be at ground zero on Z-Day, but how you react on the first day will deter­mine if you still have all your body parts by the end of the week.

Know Your Enemy

It is impos­si­ble to know the exact nature of the zom­bie threat prior to the apoc­a­lypse. But one thing is for sure: They won’t be run­ning. Pop­u­lar though the fast so-called zom­bies of recent cel­lu­loid fea­tures may be, real zom­bies are slow. Think about it. Death is the
ulti­mate inhibitor. If one comes back from death, one is hardly likely to be imbued with super­pow­ers. You would be a mere shadow of your for­mer self. Zom­bies sham­ble, shuf­fle and stag­ger; they don’t sprint, vault over aban­doned cars or launch chore­o­graphed
attacks that look more like the New York City Marathon.

You can eas­ily side­step a zom­bie. Run rings around one if you like. But it’s the moment that you become over­con­fi­dent and let down your guard that you will feel the shat­tered teeth of some leg­less ghoul latch­ing onto your ankle.

Zom­bies should never be under­es­ti­mated. They are relent­less, mer­ci­less and almost unstoppable.

Pick Them Off From a Distance

Pro­jec­tile weapons, such as bows and arrows, guns, RPGs and even nuclear mis­siles were invented for a rea­son: to put as much dis­tance between you and your adver­sary as pos­si­ble, while still inflict­ing a mor­tal wound. The closer you are to your enemy, the greater the chance that they can inflict an injury on you. Close-order com­bat with zom­bies should only be engaged in as a last resort; it poses sig­nif­i­cant risks to your safety. But some­times, there will sim­ply be no avoid­ing it. You will just have to get your hands dirty.

Although an assort­ment of hand­held weapons have been used with spec­tac­u­lar results in many Hol­ly­wood movies, in real­ity, using blud­geons, such as base­ball bats and gar­den­ing tools, is fraught with poten­tial dan­gers and should only be con­sid­ered when there are no other options.

A zom­bie does not need to take a bite out your left arm to con­t­a­m­i­nate you. The facts are that the zom­bie virus is trans­mit­ted through body flu­ids. Any­body slic­ing a zom­bie in two with a chain­saw or impal­ing one with a fence post is likely to be drenched in infected gore. It only takes one drop of blood or other body flu­ids for you to join the legion of undead.

Even with a hand­gun, the chances of you hit­ting a small, mov­ing tar­get, such as a zombie’s head, is very low. At close range (less than three yards), trained pro­fes­sion­als, such as police offi­cers, have less than a forty per­cent chance of hit­ting their tar­get
in a field situation.

Play it safe. Pick them off from a distance.

Keep Quiet

Noise attracts zom­bies. Need I say more?

Wear Pro­tec­tive Clothing

That small scratch on the back of your hand you got while for­ag­ing for food in a dimly lit super­mar­ket but never got round to putting a bandaid on could be more of a threat to what’s left of your life than you may first think. You don’t have to have your left leg
unex­pect­edly gnawed off by a zom­bie postal worker to become infected. Any cut or abra­sion can be an access point for infec­tion. Also, scream­ing for divine assis­tance as you plunge your 11-in. Stan­ley screw­driver into a zombie’s vacant eye socket may not be
as good an idea as it seems at the time. Infected blood or brain tis­sue spray­ing into your open mouth or eyes could see you join­ing the ranks of the undead before the weekend.

It is of vital impor­tance that you be appro­pri­ately attired before engag­ing in any melee with the liv­ing dead. This includes full face pro­tec­tion, such as a handyman’s face shield or gog­gles and a sur­gi­cal mask. Although you may look more like an abat­toir worker than a hired assas­sin, at least you won’t have to worry about wak­ing
up to find your­self dead the next morning.

Never Turn Your Back

It goes with­out say­ing that you can never assume a zom­bie is “dead” just because it is down for the count. Zom­bies have a nasty habit of lurch­ing to their feet again when you least expect it, even if you have pumped a cou­ple of quick rounds into their cra­nium. Bul­lets are strange things and can often be harm­lessly deflected by skull bone, leav­ing a zombie’s grey mat­ter fully intact.

Zom­bies have the remark­able abil­ity to keep going despite drop­ping body parts like the leaves of autumn. It is pru­dent to give even fully dis­mem­bered zom­bies (think, Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail) a wide berth, as they are some­times capa­ble of rolling like tum­ble weeds to sav­age their prey.

Also, bear in mind that, in cer­tain sit­u­a­tions, it can be quite dif­fi­cult to dis­tin­guish between the liv­ing and the liv­ing dead. Those dearly departed, who have not long joined the ranks of the undead, may dis­play few out­ward signs of decom­po­si­tion. You can­not assume that the awk­ward gait and gorm­less expres­sion on the face of the guy from apart­ment 101 means that he is a zom­bie. If in doubt, take eva­sive action.

Aim For the Head

When it comes to zom­bies, any­thing less than a head shot is a waste of valu­able time and effort. Dis­pense with your clas­sic “two to the cen­ter mass, one to the head” rou­tine. “Dou­ble taps” or “ham­mered pairs” to the head are what counts; any­thing else is
just win­dow dressing.

Over­come Your Squeamishness

The post-apocalyptic world of the undead is not for the squea­mish. The sooner you over­come your nat­ural aver­sion blood and guts, the sooner you will be able to take the new world order in your stride and carve a niche for yourself.