Reddit mentions of Augason Farms Water Storage Barrel 55-Gallon Drum

There's a lot of information to learn. I don't have all of my favorite links at work with me, but having gone on that learning journey I can tell you that it's easiest to break down prepping into categories in order of importance. Then learn and address those categories in order.

For example, first would be food or water depending on your location and overall situation. Food/Water because that's one of those thing that, in an emergency situation, you either have or you don't. People hit hard by Harvey or Katrina weren't hopping into the water with a rifle and searching for squirrels. They had what they had, and in most cases where you'd need your preps that will be the case.

Food:

• Learn about keeping a well/over-stocked pantry full of things that you normally eat. Learn about rotating foods out oldest to newest.
  
  
• Think through alternate cooking methods that you'll need to have available. Maybe extra propane tanks for the grill, or a separate burner that can work with those tanks.
  
  
• Learn about specialty foods that are great for bug out bags or on the go like Mainstay/Datrex bars, Mountain House foods, and MRE's.
  
  
• Learn about long term storage foods like white rice or beans in mylar bags inside of 5 gallon buckets. Or if you have the free floating cash, the pre-packed "food for X people for a year" packages (though be on the lookout for how many calories per day they're advertising, because for some it's 1200 and that's too low).
  
  
• If you're looking to get really deep into it, and really this would become a hobby at that point, you can then look into homesteading.
  
  Water:
  
  
• Look first for options on how you can maintain some clean water in the house for general use. My SO and I rotate flats of bottled water for example so that we always have a couple of weeks worth on hand, and if you know bad news is coming you can look at things like a Water BOB (ignore the price, they're normally $20-$30). You can also know to fill up otherwise empty containers at home ahead of an emergency.
  
  
• Getting a little more into it, look at ways to treat water. A Sawyer Water Filter is a great cheap way to get started that is also portable enough for a BOB, but depending on your concern level you can eventually look at things like a Big Berkey. Do your own research and find what's right for you.
  
  
• If you want to go beyond that, look at things like 55 gallon water drums, or to keep things smaller and more portable, 5 gallon water containers. This is more long term bulk storage stuff for the really bad situations.
  
  After that, things like security, weather preparedness, communications, power, transportation, bug out bags, get home bags, everyday carry kits, etc can all come as you learn and can squeeze them in. Focus on the things that will most realistically be needed in events that are most likely to occur to you as an individual. If that's flooding, maybe life jackets are high on your list. If that's riots, maybe guns and excess fire extinguishers are. If it's job loss, maybe you really want to focus on getting bills paid down and having a hearty backstock of food that you can rely on during the job hunt. If it's a cold weather are, maybe secondary heating sources should be high on the priority list. Once you've covered yourself on the most likely scenarios that you'll have to deal with, usually you'll find that it's not too many more steps to cover the next most likely, and so on. If you want some reading links let me know and I'll try to remember to drop some of my favorites when I get home.