How to pitch a tent in a storm
Add to Del.icio.usby Adam Riser
The storm won’t stop. The water’s rising in your tent’s aptly named “bathtub floor,” and soon one of the flexing poles will snap. You would be sleeping soundly if you knew how to pitch a tent properly.
The world’s strongest tent is just an expensive kite if it’s pitched poorly. I’ve seen tents full of gear flung into crevasses, tossed into trees, and blown out of sight across rolling grasslands. I’ve also seen a tent ripped to shreds in a mountain storm while the one next to it was unharmed. How you pitch your tent determines whether you sleep peacefully or spend all night hoping your shelter doesn’t disintegrate.
Pre-rigging your tent:
Pre-rig your tent at home with 2- or 3mm-thick accessory cord. Thirty feet will do for a basic car-camping model, but a big expedition tent may take 100 feet or more. Reflective cord makes midnight bathroom trips easier. Each anchor point on the tent’s fly needs a cord long enough to reach the ground at a 45-degree angle, loop around a large anchor point (think logs and rocks), and make it back to the tent. If you are using natural anchors instead of stakes, rig the tent’s body too.
Anchors:
Most tents come with pathetic stakes that resemble bent coat hangers. Throw these away, and get some that’ll take abuse. A good stake can be driven into a gravel parking lot with a framing hammer and not bend. Sand and snow call for deadman-style anchors that you bury. If you’re camping around a lot of trees or rocks you can save weight by using natural anchors. On winter trips use skis, poles, ice axes, ice screws, and pickets to anchor your tent. You also need something to drive the stakes; a softball-size rock does the job nicely.
Single-wall Tents:
Most of these steps apply to single- and double-wall tents, but since single-wall tents don’t have a fly, you only have to pitch the body. You’ll still want to stake out the bottom of a single-wall tent before inserting the poles, so it’s less likely to catch the wind like a parachute and sail into the night. In really bad weather, you can actually crawl inside a single-wall tent, zip it shut, and set it up from the inside. Be careful—if the corners aren’t staked out the wind wraps the tent around you like a straight jacket.
Pitching your tent:
This demonstration assumes the worst: howling wind and driving rain on a solo trip. We simulated these conditions by recruiting a gracious volunteer to spray some poor sucker with a hose while he pitched a tent on a windy day. The crew re-roofing his house made excellent imitation thunder. These steps assume wind is a major threat. If pouring rain is not accompanied by wind, change the steps to get the fly on as quickly as possible.
Think about where to pitch your tent. You obviously want a flat spot, but you also want wind protection. Face the front door away from the wind for a nice sheltered entrance. If rain is likely, make sure the tent is not in a low spot or natural drainage. Campers have woken up floating on their inflatable sleeping pads because their tent was in a too-low campsite.
Pull your tent’s body out of your backpack, but leave the fly safely inside where it won’t blow away. Lay out the body and throw everyone’s backpacks on it so it stays put. Now stake out all the perimeter loops starting at the foot end and working toward the front door.
Now set up the poles as completely as possible without pitching any part of the tent. Each pole should be pre-threaded though sleeves and set into one grommet. If you have pole clips, attach both grommets but nothing else.
Pull the packs off and erect the tent body quickly. Tents like to catch the wind like a sail when they’re halfway set up, so make sure the body is well anchored. Every tent has a different configuration, but if you start at the middle and work out they generally shed wind better.
Now get the fly on quickly to avoid soaking. Start by attaching the fly to the tent on the windward end (opposite the front door). Once this end is done, throw the fly to the other side and attach the rest. Most good tents have clips that attach the fly directly to the poles near the anchor points—don’t neglect these. They drastically strengthen your tent.
Cinch down the fly’s cam locks, and then stake out the vestibule.
The mid-height guy-line points on the fly are the most important anchor points on the tent, but many people neglect them. Luckily, you’ve already pre-rigged them with accessory cord, so they’ll be easy to use. After creating a solid ground anchor, loop the cord around it and tighten it with a trucker’s hitch (pictured below). Do this with every guy-line on the tent, cinching them until they’re guitar-string tight.
Tying a Trucker’s Hitch
Remember to check for loose guy lines as the night goes on. This setup is obviously overkill for a crystal-clear night, but weather can always get worse. When in doubt, make it stronger. Practice at home a few times, and you’ll go from hiking down the trail to relaxing in your tent before the rest of the group even finds a campsite. The only drawback to a well-pitched tent is that your friends always want to get in after their tent blows away. But hey, think of all the favors you’ll be able to call in back in civilization.
