10 Items to Always Have on Hand for an Emergency

IMHO, everyone should ALWAYS have these items on hand to deal with an emergency:

1. Cash.  Cash fixes a lot of problems.
2. Water.  When the water stops coming out of the tap, you will need this before most anything else.
3. Food.  You can go a while without food but you won't be happy about it so always have extra food on hand.
4. A weapon.  The police probably won't get to you until AFTER a crisis has occurred so if you want to be able to protect yourself and your family you will need a (legal) weapon to do so.
5. First aid kit/supplies/medications.  You can often stop a small medical problem from becoming a big medical problem by having adequate first aid supplies as well as extra OTC and prescription medications on hand.
6. Plastic bags of all kinds.  There are hundreds of uses for plastic bags from making an impromptu toilet, to water-proofing your gear, to carrying food and water from one place to another, to insulating and weatherproofing your feet during a downpour.
7. A battery pack.  Many things in our lives run on electric power.  Should the power go out, being able to power your phone (to call for help) or your tablet (to look up something in your survival guide) is important.
8. Back up of all of your files and important documents.  More than one emergency has been averted by having a thumb drive of all of my important files with me.  Ditto having a copy of my passport when I didn't have the actual document with me, videos of our home inventory, and the spouses medical records when we ended up at an out of the way hospital during an emergency.
9. Matches.  Fire is very important and while our daily lives rarely involve the need to make fire (fire for heat, cooking, and hot water are usually automatic these days), during a crisis, you may need to revert to the old fashioned way of making fire.
10. Tools.  An assortment of tool can help you survive both before and after a disaster.  A good knife, a breaker bar, tools to use to make repairs after a disaster, tools to install hurricane shutters, tools to dig out of an avalanche...without tools we would be back in the stone age.