Don’t Eat Snow, If Possible

• Ice is good for numbing pain, but avoid it when it’s so cold that frostbite can set in in record time.
• As the film Arctic shows, snow can be used to plug wounds preventing hemorrhage as it induces vasoconstriction. It can still cause frostbite but it might be better th...

Arctic explorers would carry their water bottles under their coats, on the ridge between their shoulders, right at the bases of their heads. That would keep it from melting without getting in the way of other stuff they had to carry.

They would also not drink their bottles all the w...

In an Arctic landscape, you won’t run out of water. But you will run out of food. Getting to sea ice means you’re over water, which means you’re over fish.

In Arctic, the pilot uses wire and a battery from his plane to generate heat and melt through the ice.

To avoid having to sit exposed while waiting for the fish to bite, make a bell by suspending a portion of the fishing line between two stakes, then string two things onto it ...

Radios or transponders, especially those powered by a hand crank, are limited in range and direction. So you should regularly rotate transmission locations around your base camp.

Arctic shows us that the pilot has been stranded for weeks by revealing the map on which he tracks his...

Signal for help in a way that can be seen from the sky, even a mirror will do.

In Arctic, the pilot moves snow to render an "SOS" from the underlying black rock—but then has to spend time every day clearing snow that has blown through and obscured the message.

Tells the story of the lone survivor of a plane crash in the far north. Living out of the carcass of his plane, he hones a routine for staying fed and attempting to signal potential rescuers eventually leaving the plane to increase his odds of being rescued.

A lot of research on surv...