This is why you won't survive the apocalypse

STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects really are the future: turns out those are the skills we really need to survive a potential zombie/alien/nuclear holocaust.

Fewer than half of Londoners know how to make chemical substances like fuel, how to fix an engine, or how to repair broken tools, which are all vital skills after a catastrophic event, a survey from the Big Bang STEM festival found.

Dr Lewis Dartnell, a scientist taking part in the fair, said that while we shouldn't be preoccupied with a potential apocalypse, thinking about how we'd fare both as individuals and as a society was an interesting thought experiment.

He said in a statement:

People’s survival instincts are strong but without a greater focus on STEM skills, the speed at which we’d return to ‘society as we know it’ would be seriously impeded.

According to the Big Bang fair, the top post-apocalypse skills are:

1. Making and repairing tools

2. Preserving food

3. Making chemical substances

4. Making things from wood

5. Basic first aid

6. Growing crops or rearing animals

7. Making clothes

8. How to fix engines and machines

While most people surveyed by the organisers said food would be their priority in an emergency, just 19 per cent of people said they'd think to take matches, and only 11 per cent said they'd remember a water bottle.

According to Dartnell, the most important things to have with you in a survival situation are a fire-starting kit, water bottle, small knife, rope and food.

Things you'll want to be able to make are electricity, soap, charcoal, glass and a lathe to craft things with.

The first places you should hit in the event of the apocalypse include the supermarket, hospitals and vets (good source of medicine), the beach (for glass and materials for making fuel and soap) and your local golf course - gulf buggy batteries can double as electicity generators, apparently.

Now we know, even if knowing definitely isn't half the battle.

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