Emergency Flashlight Now

Check out what LED has to offer.

Maybe you hate the thought of flashlights.  Typically, flashlights don’t last very long, the bulbs are fragile, and batteries are expensive and require the right storage conditions.  Maybe you’re confused by the wide variety of flashlights available and frustrated by the poor reliability of traditional flashlights?  If this is the case, you’ll want to check out what LED has to offer to the world of emergency lighting.

LED stands for Light Emitting Diode.  This technology was developed in the late 1990s and is still undergoing changes to enhance it’s brightness, color, and various other features.  But LEDs are already good in flashlights, good enough that we recommend them hands down over traditional incandescent bulb flashlights for basic emergency preparedness.

What’s so great about LED Flashlights?

Well, they use less energy, last longer, and are more shock resistant than any other flashlight you have in your house, so read on to find out what the big deal is, and then go invest in an LED flashlight!

Brighter Flashlights

First of all, LED lights produce much more light per watt which means they are a better choice in battery powered devices.  Batteries in an LED flashlight can last for days while those in a typical, incandescent bulb flashlight will last only hours.  This is a big deal when it comes to planning for emergencies–if you’re using LED flashlights, you can store many fewer batteries, saving you space and money.

Bulbs last longer.

In addition to using less energy, LED bulbs last longer.  The typical incandescent bulb is expected to burn 1-2,000 hours; a flourescent bulb about 30,000 hours.  Compare those numbers to a the expected lifetime of an LED bulb: 50,000 to 100,000 hours!  Additionally, these lights fail by dimming over time rather than burning out suddenly like incandescent bulbs do.

Shock resistant.

Finally, it’s difficult to break an LED light.  In an emergency situation, it would be awful to have a need for your flashlight and find the bulb broken.  LED bulbs seem to be about as shock resistant as the flashlight they are housed in.  That little fact is good for peace of mind, which is pretty much what emergency flashlights are all about!

Good Emergency Flashlight

So, if you’re preparing for emergency situations at home, in your car, your cabin, or wherever you are, you’ll want to consider LED flashlights as one source of backup light for your family. They are dependable, energy efficient, long lasting, and durable, everything you want in an emergency!

Will it be an earthquake, a tornado, a fire, or a hurricane? Maybe it will be a blown tire on a dark stretch of highway.  Maybe it will be a flood, or just a late summer brown out. While you can’t predict the time nor the reason you’ll need some emergency lighting, you can be sure that at some point you’ll need it and it won’t be convenient, it might even be life threatening. One way to take away the stress and the fear of those possibilities is to be prepared, to be ready to provide your own sources of light no matter the situation.

We Need Light

One of our most basic needs as humans is a light in the dark.  Whether we’re chasing away the boogey man or trying to complete a task after sundown, we need light because our eyes just aren’t equipped to see in the dark.  These days we depend on electricity for light, which is fine as long as the lines are connected, but in the case of natural disasters or overloads to the system, it’s important to have a backup or two. Generally, your back up will be flashlights, lanterns, or candles.

Emergency Lighting

According to the Department of Homeland security, you need some kind of battery powered lights in case of emergency.  And most likely, those are going to take the form of a flashlight.  Let’s look at the different types of emergency flashlights on the market today.

Traditional Flashlights

The traditional flashlight uses batteries to power an incandescent light bulb.  This technology has worked for years and will continue to work.  The upside is that these flashlights are the cheapest and most common.  The downside is that  incandescent lights use the most energy and the bulbs burn out the fastest.  You’ll need to store a lot of batteries if traditional flashlights are your source for emergency lighting.  Additionally, incandescent light bulbs are fragile, so you have to be careful with them.

Manual Power Flashlights

Relative newcomers to the flashlight market are manual power flashlights.  These lights require the user to shake, crank or squeeze them to produce the power to light the bulb.  These are great for when you have no light and no batteries, but they are not great for providing reliable, long lasting light.  I recommend people include these lights as a backup for their emergency lighting.

LED Flashlights

LED flashlights have been on the market for a few years and they are showing themselves to be the best choice for emergency lighting.  LED bulbs are the longest lasting and use the least amount of energy. They are shock resistant and offer both broad and narrow beams.

If you are relying on traditional flashlights now for your emergency lighting, make sure you have plenty of batteries and perhaps a spare bulb or two.  If you’re thinking about upgrading, we recommend a quality LED flashlight for lasting light and fewer batteries.  Additionally, we wouldn’t be without our crank flashlight which provides peace of mind if we were to run out of batteries.