John F. Haslett

When things go wrong while exploring the great outdoors, some basic wilderness knowledge and tools can radically improve your chances of surviving.Six essentials for surviving in the wildIt takes just an hour or so to gather a few basic items that can help you survive many serious outdoor situations. Put these wilderness essentials in a waterproof baggie and carry them in your backpack, in the glove compartment of your car or snowmobile, in your canoe, etc.

To call for help in an emergency situation, you can use any radio transmitter you have access to, and you can tune it to any frequency to call for help. When in need of rescue, the law gives you unlimited access to radios and their frequencies. However, you’re much more likely to get a faster response if you send a distress signal on a distress frequency.

When you’re in the wild and need help, you send out a signal –- basically anything to get noticed. A good signal not only gets the attention of search-and-rescue teams but also of people not looking for you — passersby who can help before professionals arrive. The following methods show you how to get people’s attention with signals.

Using the sun, the stars, and a little ingenuity can help you find your way in the wilderness and is easy to do more often than not. Remember, people have been using the heavens to navigate for thousands of years. The following techniques can be used anywhere on Earth and are sometimes incredibly accurate, but give you only general direction: Stick and shadow Plant a long stick in the ground and mark the tip of its shadow.