Fire Starting 101: The Why and How of Lighting a Fire for Survival

This post is Day 25 of the 30 Days of Preparedness!  See the end of the post for the other 29 days.

In a survival situation, fire is your friend and should be one of your first priorities.  Being able to build and maintain a fire can literally save your life.  If you stink at fire building (as I once did), don’t despair.  The best way to learn is to get some basic instruction on fire starting and what a fire needs and then take that knowledge and go practice.  And practice.  And practice some more.  And pretty soon you’ll be a survival fire building pro!

Why light a survival fire?

The primary reasons to light a fire for survival are:

Heat–The heat from a fire can warm you up, keeping you from possible hypothermia and death.  Fire heat can also be used to cook food, boil water, and dry clothing and shoes.

Light–A bit of light at night keeps most scary thoughts and scary things away.

Signal–Producing smoke by day and light at night, a survival fire can help you be found much quicker by search crews.

Companion–Fire gives you a purpose.  Instead of sitting around shivering and letting your mind wander, you have something you need to be doing.  Keeping busy aids in staying alive in a survival situation.  The noise and movement of the fire helps you feel you are not alone even if you are.

How To Build a Survival Fire

Fire is built in three main steps, Gather, Build, and Light.

Gather

You don’t want to be running around the forest trying to find fuel for your fire after you get it started.  Gather fuel before you begin.  You want wood that is dry, so avoid wood that is laying directly on the forest floor or live wood from trees.  And lastly, gather more than you think you will need.  Better to have too much than to have to go gather again before your fire is established.

You’ll start with very small stuff called tinder.  The purpose of tinder is to catch a spark from a striker or flame from a match and keep it burning long enough to light your kindling.  Wood shavings, pine needles, dryer lint, dry grasses, very small twigs.  You can make your own super tinder with cotton balls and petroleum jelly.  Remember, this part needs to be really dry.

Next, get some kindling.  These are the sticks that are a little bigger around–around pencil size or finger size in diameter to start with and ranging up from there.  Again, you want this really dry.  Get a good armload of these.

Last, gather some larger pieces of wood we’ll call fuel.  These are going to sustain your fire.  Small logs work great.  3-4 inches in diameter.  Large log pieces will need split to burn well, and an axe is probably a luxury you didn’t have with you when you got lost in the woods.

For us visual folks, I have this great infographic on fire building and the wood you need used with permission from ScoutmasterCG.com:

When selecting wood, keep in mind that the faster a tree grows, the faster its wood will burn.  Quick growing trees like aspen, pine, and elm burn hot and fast.  Slower growing trees like maple, oak, or other hardwoods will burn longer and also create coals that burn longer.  You’ll need more of the quick burning woods to keep your fire going than you will of the slow burning woods.

Once you have your wood gathered, it’s time to build that fire.

Build

There are numerous ways to lay out a fire, the more popular being teepee shaped or log cabin style.  The two important things to remember are that fire needs air and it burns more up than out.  So any way you can create a pile of wood on your fire will work as long as you don’t smother it and the newly added wood is in position to catch on fire from the burning wood underneath.

Get the tinder and kindling set up before trying to light your fire.  Once it is burning well, add the larger fuel pieces and you have a fire!

Lighting the Fire

Fire needs fuel, oxygen, and an ignition source to burn.  Matches or a lighter would absolutely be best to get your fire lit.  But what if you’re out without either of those?  Here are some ways to get a fire started without matches:

Magnifying glass

Flint and steel

Bow drill

Fire piston

Cheating

When starting a fire, I believe in cheating any way you can to help your fire get started and burning.  Check out these ideas to get that tinder and kindling fire going strong!  And of course, you’ll want to practice getting fires going without any cheats as well, just in case.

Dryer lint/wax fire starters

Char cloth

Burn snack chips

Dryer lint and petroleum jelly fire starter (also works with cotton balls)

Thanks for joining the Prepared Bloggers as we work our way through 30 Days of Preparedness. September is National Preparedness Month so you will find everything you need to get your preparedness knowledge and skills into shape.

Take one post each day, learn as much as you can about the topic and make it a part of your preparedness plan.

Day 1 – Ready, Set, Get Prepared! Welcome to 30 Days of Preparedness from PreparednessMama
Day 2 – The Family Meeting Place and Escape from Laughingbear Adventures
Day 3 – I’m Safe! How to Communicate with Family in an Emergency from PreparednessMama
Day 4 – Does Your Family Have a Fire Escape Plan? from Home Ready Home
Day 5 – Preparedness For Pets from The Busy B Homemaker
Day 6 – The Escape Exercise from Laughingbear Adventures
Day 7 – It all Falls Apart Without Mental Preparedness from PreparednessMama
Day 8 – It’s a Matter of Emergency Kits from A Matter of Preparedness
Day 9 – Nine Great Emergency Light Sources Other Than Flashlights from Food Storage & Survival
Day 10 – Cooking Without Power from Mama Kautz
Day 11 – The Importance of a Shelter & Staying Warm and Dry from Trayer Wilderness
Day 12 – The Importance of Having The Right Tools In Your Pack from Trayer Wilderness
Day 13 – Practice Living Without Electricity from Food Storage Made Easy
Day 14 – How We Choose The Right Gear – (including the MultiFlame Tool) from Trayer Wilderness
Day 15 – Water Storage & Purification from The Busy B Homemaker
Day 16 – Food and Water for a 72 Hour “Go Bag” from Homestead Dreamer
Day 17 – 8 Foods You Should Be Storing and How from Melissa K Norris
Day 18 – Planning Your Pantry from The Organic Prepper
Day 19 – Stocking Up on Non-Food Items from Living in Rural Iowa
Day 20 – Dutch Oven Cooking: Off-Grid Before Off-Grid Was Cool from The Backyard Pioneer
Day 21 – Pressure Canning the Harvest from Timber Creek Farm
Day 22 – Personal Protection & Awareness from Living in Rural Iowa
Day 23 – KISS First Aid from Herbal Prepper
Day 24 – Mommy, I have to go Potty! from Mom With a Prep
Day 25 – Fire Starting 101: The Why and How of Lighting a Fire for Survival from Food Storage & Survival
Day 26 – How to Filter and Purify Water from Prepared Housewives
Day 27 – How To Make A Shelter from Trayer Wilderness
Day 28 – Put Your Preps to the Test with 24 Hours Unplugged from The Organic Prepper
Day 29 – What Is Char and Why You Should Have It To Start A Fire from Trayer Wilderness
Day 30 – How To Utilize Bushcraft Skills and Forage From The Wild from Trayer Wilderness

Keep preparing!
Angela