so ive been putting together a go-kit for maybe 8 months now and every few weeks i add something else and now the thing weighs like 35 lbs and i honestly dont think i could carry it very far in an actual emergency. started thinking about this after our ARES group did a drill last month and i was completely gassed just hauling it from the parking lot to the EOC.

anyway the thing that got me was that like half the stuff in there i have never once touched during an actual activation. i've got a second antenna tuner in there for some reason, a full sized keyboard for the laptop which is ridiculous, two different power poles adapters for stuff i dont even own anymore. but then during the drill i realized i forgot a simple notepad and pen which would have been way more useful than any of that.

so i guess what im asking is — for those of you who actually deploy regularly, what do you consider the real bare minimum that you would never leave home without, and what stuff did you think was essential but turned out to be dead weight. not looking for a perfect loadout just curious what people actually use in the field vs what sounds good in theory

man this is exactly the conversation our net had a few weeks back. I've been doing ARES activations for maybe 12 years and the thing i always tell newer folks is that your go-kit should fit what you can personally carry for a quarter mile without stopping. everything else is wishful thinking.

what i actually never leave without: the radio obviously (ft-891 these days), a roll of coax with connectors already on it, my log book and at least three pens because pens disappear, a small power strip, and a cheap headlamp. the headlamp sounds dumb but i cant tell you how many times ive been setting up in the dark or in a building with bad lighting. oh and snacks honestly. you might be there for 8 hours and the red cross table runs out of granola bars fast.

what i eventually took out: the second HT backup to my backup, a full roll of electrical tape (just carry a small piece wrapped around something), and honestly my fancy logging laptop. i do paper logs now unless the served agency specifically needs digital. way faster to set up and nothing to crash.

yeah the weight thing is real, i made the same mistake when i first got my ticket and thought i needed to be ready for literally every scenario. my first go kit had a freaking soldering iron in it lol.

honestly the best thing i did was just go through it and ask myself "when would i actually need this and can i borrow one if i do" — anything that passed that test came out. trimmed mine down to probably 18 lbs now and its a completely different experience. i use a medium sized pelican-style case and if it doesnt fit it doesnt come.

the one thing i'd add that people overlook is documentation — like a laminated card with your frequencies, the local repeater info, your call sign phonetics if you're new, net control procedures. sounds silly but when its 2am and you've been awake for 18 hours your brain does not work the same way.