Apologies in advance for the mini-novel here.
First, I'm so pleased to learn that your area was spared a worst-case incident.
Like the OP I am also concerned about earthquakes in planning for emergencies. I'm involved in emergency preparedness and disaster relief here in a major west coast city. I shall admit up front I have a huge bias to AA format cells.
My city (Vancouver, Canada) and region is at risk of major seismic events (7+ magnitude earthquakes) so we have to contend with the possibility that our neatly planned emergency kits are not accessible to us. The city has prepositioned around the city relief supplies that are regularly maintained and kept in locked steel containers around the city; individuals should attempt to do the same - have some supplies at friends or in the car and at the workplace, and some supplies in different locations in your dwelling in case the emergency prohibits access to part of the structure.
While most wood frame construction homes and small apartment buildings here should survive well enough, many schools and older (40 - 100+ years old) buildings have not yet been replaced or seismically upgraded. Buildling codes in Canada did not gain seismic safety provisions until the 1970's. Some relatively modernish looking buildings dating from the 1960's are in fact at high risk due to construction type and the ground they sit upon. We have an unsettlingly large inventory of 50 - 100+ year old buildings, including many where large numbers of people congregate in on a regular basis - schools and churches. Most 100 year old structures here were built using the popular materials of their day -- unreinforced masonry construction -- which is pretty much the worst structure to be in during an earthquake. Gable end and interior wall collapses of the sort seen in Christchurch would be expected in at least some of these buildings in any quake in the high 6+ magnitude, and in many of these buildings as the magnitude increases, depending on epicentre depth and location of course.
If more than a handful of full or partial building collapses occur while they are occupied, first responders are likely to be completely overwhelmed. The emergency plan for the city in the event of a massive earthquake doesn't even anticipate that fire and rescue services will respond to calls until an initial city wide assessment determines if critical situations are very localized or widespread. How fortunate that affected areas in New Zealand were not visited by a worst case scenario.
On to lights and emergency kits. Readers digest version:
- AA (and perhaps AAA) cell format is probably the most commonly found in any household; it makes sense to have at least some of your lights in this format.
- You'll need more lights than you think in your kit. Pack a few for neighbours or family that may not be so prepared. Assuming you like them, and maybe even if you dont!
- Check your kit a couple times a year, when replacing smoke detector batteries at daylight savings time change could be used as a cue.
- You'll need lights (and other supplies) elsewhere in case your kit can't be accessed.
- Replace water supplies on a predetermined schedule. Replace batteries as needed. Don't just park it in a corner and forget about it.
- Whatever you put in your kit, consider also getting an every day carry light, something small enough you'll always have on your person or at arms reach. You never know when and where an emergency will strike.
Since you are asking for opinions, the clearest one I can give is that I would not depend on any emergency light if it can't be powered by a readily available AA (or AAA format for small key chain or headlamps) cell.
When you get right down to it, almost any light you might buy is going to do the job. Some better, some worse. The choices available today are miles better than 10 or 20 years ago! After all, it wasn't so many years ago that the only options readily available were incandescent driven lights and fairly small capacity cells. (
Just happened to see part of the movie "Magnum Force" last night -- watch the bad ops hunting down with incandescent lights Clint Eastwood's Harry Callaghan character inside a dark derelict ship -- Dirty Harry would be dead if those cops had been equipped with even a simple 5$ multi-5mm LED floody light!)
There is lots of value in having a least some 1.5v AA and AAA lithium (like the Energizer L91) cells in your emergency kit(s!) for longevity and cold weather operation if that is an issue in your locale. Their storage advantage alone is worth the price and if you live in a less temperate climate, you really need to have some of these available at all times. In addition to Lithiums, some on-sale cheap Duracell alkalines, I also rotate 20 Eneloop rechargables into the kit every 3 months and recheck all kit contents twice a year.
Here freezing temperatures are less of a worry but cold weather operation is still something to consider for a part of the year. What many of us worry more about is availability and accessibility of emergency supplies in the event of a large disaster.
Availability / accessibility is made easier if your emergency light and other devices (radio receivers, two-way radio transceivers, and so on) can also be powered by commonly available cells and for that reason most of my gear is driven by AA cells with smaller lights and headlamps driven by AAA format.
If a lengthy emergency were to hit our locale, based on my emergency caches and regular "stock" I figure I've got way more than an entire year's worth of useful night time runtime with usable lights, the emphasis being on lights as a plural. If you have family and neighbours or friends who have no light, you are going to want to help them help themselves by providing lights otherwise you'll be in more demand than you care to be. Stocking for these folks some cheap older tech LED flashlights is a viable approach that won't break the bank.
Again this underscores the value of the ubiquitous AA and AAA formats - your friends and neighbours are likely to have some of these on hand even if they do not have a usable flashlight(s). TV remote controls suddenly become a cache location for usable power for a light.
Cell format is just as important as cell chemistry when planning for extended emergency use and in this regard the AA, and to a lesser extent the AAA, format is a clear winner. They are everywhere. They are cheap. And they can deliver a ton of light in the right device, or a long run time in the right device, and a decent amount of output with decent runtime in almost any simple low tech LED device.
Thus if you buy into the AA cell as being the primary power source for most or all of your emergency lights (and other devices such as emergency radio receivers, radio transmitters - I've got power packs that accept AA primaries and rechargables for my communications equipment - and so on) then you can move on to light selection.
Rather than spending a lot of money on fewer lights in my view it makes more sense to have more lights, and in more locations than just the emergency kit and go-bag. In a protracted emergency you are going to want to get lights into the hands of more people than just yourself.
Most of the lights in the kit and around home, auto and office are older 5mm LEDs. Most of them I'd be happy to loan out or give away. Strictly speaking they all could serve as proper light in an emergency. I've also put AAA format lights on the keychains my wife and kids carry when not at home.
That's not to say there isn't value in having some very well made and extremely rugged light(s) on hand in the kit(s), and ideally at least one within arms reach at all times.
Of the better lights I have one fully meets your requirements for a submersible capable light - the Pelican 2410 StealthLite. It is submersible up to 150M according to Pelican. It takes 4 AA cells. It is too big to carry around all the time but at the time I purchased the 2410 it was ideal for our emergency kit as a primary tool. Was around 80 - 90$ CAD when I bought it, believe it can be had for less today. No doubt Pelican has some updates available but haven't checked.
I'd bought this this light with urban self-rescue in mind -- it has a very tight beam that should penetrate a dusty situation well. Buildings generate a lot of dust when the collapse, especially brick buildings.
Would I buy it again today? Maybe not - more modern lights will produce more output for longer runtimes in a smaller yet very durable package. That said I'm glad I have one light in the kit that I could dive into a lake with, but that isn't a situation I'm likely to be faced with during an urban emergency here. The Pelican light does travel with us on holiday though. What would I buy today for the emergency kit "main light" instead of the Pelican? I'm leaning towards the Fenix LD40 (
thread), a new 4xAA model they are just about to start shipping.
An
every day light - Recently I was looking for a smaller and more powerful light than my Mini Maglite 2xAA LED which had been living in my disaster assistance responders vest. We don't just plan for "the big one" - there are plenty of little disasters on a regular basis in a big city. I attend a lot of fire scenes and more often than not these incidents occur in the middle of the night. The Maglite served well but I knew I could get more output from a single AA light these days so I considered a bunch of lights from the usual names talked about here.
Naturally I wanted something that catered to my AA format bias, that was small and able to be in a pocket - jeans, shorts, or a suit - all the time, not just in my emergency response vest. I would not consider carrying a 2xAA (lengthwise) light *all the time* - just too bulky. That left me looking for a 1xAA durable light that could run well on virtually any cell I had available to me. I also wanted to purchase an "off the shelf" product rather than a custom or modified light in the event that I elected to buy more for family and friends or recommend to others. I'm a fan of mass production (when done right) and ubiquity I guess, when it comes to emergency planning.
What I ended up buying for this purpose is a Fenix LD10 R4. What sold me on this particular light was the amount of usable light I could get out of a single AA cell from all types of chemistries, and that it was small enough, but not too tiny, that it could live in my pocket forever. I don't even always carry my key chain (too bulky!) but a light with a good clip I can live with.
I was briefly tempted by the "moon modes" offered by the Quark and some others, but only briefly. True, 1 or 2 lumen output would be nice for reading in bed without waking my wife, but this light isn't for that purpose... I've got plenty of others for that sort of thing.
No, in an emergency you need decent quality and quantity of light. Stuff isn't likely to be orderly. Things move around in a quake. You won't be wandering the scene in "moon mode" if there's been a major quake.
In a protracted emergency (or just one of my run of the mill all-nighters) if I need more than 3 or 4 hours of 40-50 lumen output I toss in another cell. I can't really imagine not having a spare cell (or 8!) near me, but if I did happen to venture out on a call with only one installed cell I still have up to 17 or 20 hours of highly usable light out of that single AA cell or more depending on the cell type.
The LD10 R4 will deliver ~ 17 hours of 10ish lumen output on low running an alkaline; 2 1/2 hours on 40-50ish lumen output on medium on the same cell. More runtime out of a quality rechargable like the Sanyo Eneloop or Powerex Imedion (more than 4 hours on medium). Even more output and runtime out of a lithium cell like the Energizer L91. All out of one AA cell. See
this review for runtime charts demonstrating run times to 50% of initial output.
Small size and a reversible pocket clip allowing the light to slide on to the brim of a ball cap or hard hat and thus becoming an instant headlamp are other nice features of the LD10 which are wholly unique to this light of course. I didn't think I'd use the fast strobe feature but in fact it has proven to be very useful - on the bike for leisure time, and in the field I've used it more than once to signal someone else on my team from a distance.
I'm sure there are other off the shelf lights that will do more or less the same thing but at the time I bought the light (and as of this writing) it seemed to me that the LD10 R4 had the best mix of size, capability, output, and output regulation so I bought it, no regrets, and plan on buying several more.
(PS: The LD10 (and LD40) like most lights discussed around here meets the IP standard level 8 - will be usable even if submersed in more than 1M of water. Would it survive as the Pelican supposedly can at 150M? No, it wasn't designed to do that.)
