Don’t Eat Yellow Snow & Other Water Purification Techniques

Access to safe and plentiful H2O is critically important on any outdoor adventure, especially for an extended timeframe.

One can survive up to 3 weeks without food but only 3 days without water. Unsafe water can cause serious illness or worse and can impede a rescue or safe extraction from the backcountry.

To ensure safe a drinking water supply make sure you have at least one if not more of the following emergency methods with you in the outdoors:

Boil it

The simplest way to purify water is to boil it for five minutes and let it cool down naturally. All drink ware should also be sterilized if in doubt.

Purify It

Water purification pills are handy, easy to carry and can effectively purify 1 liter or more of water per tablet, based on the brand. I keep a bottle in my gear bags and as part of a home first aid kit.

Life straw

Lifestraw water bottles remove 99.99% of bacteria (including E.coli, Salmonella), 99.99% of parasites (including Giardia and Cryptosporidium), 99.999% of microplastics, silt, sand, and cloudiness.

Makes any water source potable and safe to drink.

I own several of these water bottles and have used them in the field.

And finally, don’t at the yellow snow!