Why storm category matters for your kit
Not every storm asks the same of you. A tropical storm might knock out power for a night. A Category 4 hurricane can leave you without power, clean water, or passable roads for a week or more. Building your emergency kit around the category of storm you're preparing for keeps you from under-packing — or over-spending on gear you'll never need.
Below is a practical checklist organized by storm level, based on guidance from the National Hurricane Center and FEMA's ready.gov recommendations (72 hours of supplies per person as a baseline, more for major hurricanes).
Tropical Storm: the outage essentials
Tropical storms (39–73 mph winds) most often mean one thing: the power goes out. Your kit should cover light, communication, and keeping a phone alive.
- Light: A rechargeable solar camping lantern beats candles — no open flame, no batteries to hunt down.
- Communication: A hand-crank emergency radio with a built-in flashlight charges by crank or solar when outlets are dead — and can charge your phone, too.
- Phone power: A 20,000mAh solar power bank can recharge most phones multiple times.
Our Tropical Storm Outage Kit bundles all three at about 10% less than buying them separately.
Category 1–2: add water security
Cat 1–2 hurricanes (74–110 mph) damage roofs, snap trees onto power lines, and can disrupt municipal water for days. Add to the tropical-storm baseline:
- Water purification tablets — chlorine dioxide tablets are designed to make water safer to drink in emergencies; they're tiny and cheap — check the package for shelf-life details.
- A gravity-fed water filter — our 2.25-gallon stainless steel gravity filter needs no power and no plumbing: pour water in the top, collect clean water from the spigot.
- Stored water: FEMA recommends one gallon per person per day. Fill bathtubs and containers before landfall.
See the Category 1–2 Hurricane Kit for the full five-piece bundle.
Category 3: add cooking, documents, and flood defense
Cat 3 storms (111–129 mph) are where "devastating damage" begins — prolonged outages, structural damage, and storm surge flooding. Add:
- A way to cook: A single-burner camp stove runs on widely available fuel canisters and lets you heat food and boil water.
- Document protection: IDs, insurance policies, and deeds in a fire-resistant waterproof document bag — grab-and-go if you evacuate.
- Flood barriers: Water-activated flood barriers swell on contact with water and can be placed at doorways and garage entries before surge or flash flooding arrives.
The Category 3 Hurricane Kit combines everything from the lower tiers plus these three.
Category 4–5: add serious backup power
Catastrophic damage, weeks without grid power in the worst-hit areas. The single biggest upgrade: a portable power station — 155Wh of stored power that can top up phones, tablets, and small electronics during an outage. It recharges from a wall outlet, car, or solar panel.
Our Category 4–5 Hurricane Kit is the complete nine-piece setup. Browse all four kits in the Hurricane Kits collection.
General rules that apply at every level
- Buy before the forecast. Shelves empty fast once a watch is issued. Preparedness gear bought in May is the same gear at the same price — minus the panic.
- Test everything once. Crank the radio, charge the power bank, run the stove before you need them.
- Rotate food and batteries yearly. Check expiration dates each spring at the start of hurricane season (June 1).
- Know your evacuation zone. Gear helps you shelter in place; it doesn't replace leaving when officials say go. Find your zone at your county emergency management site.