ESEE Knives, and Randall’s Adventure Training teamed up to form a line of products with survival in mind. They offer a variety of blades (depending on your need), survival gear, Escape and Evasion gear, and training. The training (for civilians) includes such courses as: land navigation, field survival, advanced bushcraft, rope rescue, defensive handgun (1), parent/child class, wilderness medicine, single rope techniques, intro to search & rescue, jungle course, off-trail backpacking, SAR technician, tracking (human), and protective operations. If you’re a Law Enforcement Officer there are even more courses available to you.
For the purpose of this article, I am going to focus on their Wallet Escape and Evasion Kit. As you can imagine with Escape and Evasion, an extra consideration is given to this kit’s size (its tiny). You aren’t simply surviving a situation, you may also be on the run from a pursuing force.
Contents of Wallet E&E Kit
- Wallet container
- Floss card (with E&E tips printed)
- Non-magnetic razor blade
- Kevlar cord
- Signal mirror
- Non-magnetic handcuff key
- Fire starting rod
- ESEE AH-1 arrowhead
- Fish hooks
- button compass
- Rare earth magnet (cylinder)
- Survival instruction cards
- Land navigation cards
Specification of Wallet E&E Kit (courtesy of eseeknives.com)
- Kit Size: 4.24” x 3.75”
- Weight: 4 oz
An important consideration about this kit. These guys designed this kit into a compact case only for storage. In the event you actually need to E&E they want you to take all items out of the kit and layer them on your body. The idea is if you are captured it is likely the enemy would find the kit, and less likely they would detect all the items separately.
Having non-magnetic items can come in handy. In the case of the handcuff key, it appears the key is made out of polymer. Using this type of material will make it undetectable by metal detectors, making it a perfect illegal restraint device. The drawback is strength, be careful you don’t break the key while trying to use it. The razor blade is also non-magnetic, but it still appears to be metal. According to Metal Detectors Incorporated, “Non-Ferrous metal is non-magnetic metals (copper, aluminum, brass, lead, etc.) It will take approximately 50% more of a non-ferrous metal to be as detectable as a ferrous metal (magnetic).“ (metaldetectorsinc.com).
The rare earth magnet is perfect for creating a gross direction compass. With this kit you simply separate the rare earth magnet, place a section of dental floss in-between the two parts, let the parts click back together and the marked (red) end will be North. If you have used all your floss try a leaf in some water for the same outcome. These instructions, as well as many others, can be found on the provided cards of this kit.
Probably the best idea I have encountered in a Escape and Evasion (or survival, medical, etc.) are the instructional cards. Having experienced attrition situations I can tell you first hand when you are sleep deprived, and nutritionally depleted (hungry) you forget a lot. Having these cards will help with this. Provided on these cards are instructions for: basic navigation, fire building, rare earth magnet usage, E&E tips, ground to air signals, morse code, concealment tips, signaling, basic traps determining distance across a river, and more. These aren’t just tips, everything on the cards can be used with what you have in this kit.
So just buy the kit, and you are guaranteed to escape an E&E scenario right? Sadly, no. Like most things the skills needed to operate this kit will take practice before you become proficient. Like other skills, these are perishable and will need to be maintained. I was able to find this kit on Amazon in the 50$ range, so not unreasonable considering the content.
Even if you don’t think you will find yourself in an E&E scenario, I’d still considering purchasing this as a survival kit. Signaling, land navigation, and fire building, are all things which will help during any survival situation. On the plus, if it’s just for survival, you wont need to layer it all over your body. Do you already have a survival/E&E kit you love? I’d like to hear about it in the comment section below.
