Have you ever had a situation where you’ve been in the middle of nowhere and all you wanted was a nice hot fire to cook your dinner on? If you ever travel by motorbike, hike or, crash your private plane in a remote wilderness you probably will find yourself in this situation. So what is the solution? You could carry matches. But what if they get wet or ruined? A butane lighter is useless above 8000 feet or below 40f degrees. In this situation we recommend Blastmatch by Ultimate Survival Technologies.
The Blastmatch is a fire starter originally designed for the USAF for downed pilots. It features a spring loaded multi-metal fire flint and a carbide steel striker. To use it, first gather some flammable items in a pile. Then while applying pressure to the striker, you push the flint into the handle of the unit thus producing a shower of very hot sparks into the tinder pile and hopefully catching it on fire.
In our initial testing it was very difficult to use and we actually could not get a fire started. Eventually, we resorted to watching others on Youtube use it and then realized what we were doing wrong. Our second attempt started a fire almost immediately. Considering the simplicity in design and usefulness we feel it is something that can easily be carried while traveling.
Take a look at this video and see how it works
As you can see, it’s pretty cool and easy to use.
We got our Blastmatch from eBay. It actually took two attempts as the first was a cheap knockoff from Hong Kong that fell apart within three attempts. Do not be fooled by imitations. If you do get one look at it closely. They are made in the USA and clearly have the Blastmatch name imprinted on the side.
Ultimate Survival Technologies BlastMatch Fire Starter (Black)