Do you know where to hide in the case of a zombie apocalypse?
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Are you preparing for the great zombie apocalypse? It might be a good plan to have an escape route in mind along with that bug-out bag you’ve been preparing just in case. But where might be the best place to go? Judging from the movies and zombie fiction, locations such as secluded farmhouses (armed to the teeth) and highly-secured compounds only serve as temporary solutions during a zombie scourge, and for a very small group of people, at that.
Luckily for Earth’s inhabitants, news from the world of science brings information that could keep a great many people safe. Reports CNET News, March 1, a new study published by a team of researchers at Cornell University called “The Statistical Mechanics of Zombies” says it’s possible to hide from zombies -- and there’s even a specific place that comes highly recommended. According to the study, in the case of a zombie apocalypse, folks should literally run for the hills.
The team at Cornell was inspired by Max Brooks’ book “World War Z.” They were also inspired by their statistical-mechanics class. Those two things combined prompted them to model how an actual zombie outbreak might unfold.
Essentially, the project was a way to study cases of disease outbreaks and the escape of them in a fun context. Researchers asked themselves how an outbreak might spread in a U.S. population of about 300 million people. According to the researchers, though zombie fiction usually shows cases of zombie outbreaks happening concurrently in all locations across the globe, the way outbreaks naturally occur seem to suggest that a scourge of zombies might unfold in another way.
In any case, getting out of the city would be the first life-saving step. According to the Cornell researchers, images of the far off farmhouse aren’t far off base as “cities would succumb to the zombie scourge quickly, but the infection rate would slow down significantly in more sparsely populated areas.” But, folks wouldn’t want to stay in those places. Though there would be fewer people for zombies to bite in remote areas, people waiting out the scourge in the boonies would just be sitting ducks unless they had something like a zombie-proof cabin.
It would take even longer for the scourge to reach areas such as the Northern Rockies and Glacier National Park. The researchers add that putting even more miles between zombie apocalypse survivors and the brain-eating living dead would be even better. Heading north to the Canadian Rockies and into Alaska could increase the chances of survival and possibly even secure them.
Eureka Alert wrote that the Cornell researchers will present their findings at the American Physical Society March Meeting on Thursday, March 5.
*originally published on the now defunct Examiner.com
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