this post was submitted on 04 Jun 2025
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I feel like boiling PLUS the Brita would be a pretty solid combo. Boil to kill everything then Brita to remove the remaining inert sediment. I can't think of any metals or anything that there would be enough of in river water to hurt you after you've killed anything that was alive.
We're talking about rivers like the one in Cleveland that they caught on fire?
Twice?!
IDK what's in that but I'll leave my cup for you haha
It happened 13 times. But not since 1969. The Cuyahoga is now a shining example of environmental restoration with even the most polluted sections meeting the standards of the water quality act.
"we must make america great again. The woke mob has stolen our beautiful burning rivers. We aim to bring them back bigger and better!"
US right wingers when the invisible hand of the free markets somehow fails to un-pollute their rivers:
Cuyahoga is also a great track on REM’s album “Life’s Rich Pagent”
Don't look at Lake Eerie too closely tho lol
everything has outliers
Yes, this is what I was told in a survival course (as a company team building). You have to filter out large particles, even a few layers of cloths is enough. Then you boil it to get rid of bacteria or other problematic stuff.
Wouldn't boiling first be better so you don't end up with a bacteria colony in your filter?
My mostly on my gut feeling based counter argument would be:
So what? You are cooking the water afterwards cross-contamination between water samples isn't a huge deal. Additionally, Filters (especially things like cloth) are cleanable and potentially sterilisable via cooking.
cooking is a violent process, grinding down particles, lessening the effectiveness of the filter. So you are potentially worse off, for no real gain.
You can't always cook. Sometimes you have to sterilise water another way. E.g. via exposure to as much UV/Sunlight as possible. Particles in the water lessen the effect or prevent this from happening
Boiling isn't necessary. They make antimicrobial tablets you can add as well. We used them when I was on a 2 week backpacking trip and basically just used a bandana folded over 4 times for sediment, fill at the top of the water with the neck facing downstream, and then add a disinfectant tab and let it sit for however long it says. It tasted a bit like pool water if you drank it immediately, but if you filled all your bottles at once, they usually didn't taste very chlorinated and it was pretty amazing water.
I mean, everything that kills the bad stuff works. If you had a strong portable radioactivity source, that would probably work just fine, too. Sadly, the people at the airport don't like it when I bring my enriched uranium to the camping vacation.
Jokes aside, I would say that chlorine tabs are nice for an emergency, but for a planned trip I'd assume I'd have access to heat anyway. Or, just bring a filter.
When we're hiking 15 miles per day and were drinking 4 gallons of water per person in the New Mexico heat, stopping to set up a fire and boil ~40 gallons of water in the middle of the hike wasn't really an option. I also appreciated not having to carry 32lbs of water on me all day long.
Fair point. My last camping trip was in mid-temperature weather, and rather relaxed, so I basically lived off instant coffee and tea. Plus, the water was really clean, so in some cases I just risked filling my bottle from like the middle of a lake without treatment. But a filter is definitely on my to-buy list.
The chlorine tablets taste like ass IMO getting a good filter is the way to go.