Like Capt (where's) Wally
, I am similiarly equipped, however I'm with Atlas and Tinnie - the immediate moments after the noise and chaos and while the dust is still swirling around or worse - the water rushing in - and possibly you're upside down - immediate survival versus longer term (PMA)survival always gets me thinking long and hard.
If the worse case exists - no LJ on (under my seat), didn't get the survival grab bag (under the seat at the emergency exit), didn't grab the personal ELT (behind my head) - then in my pocket with the prayer wheel/calculator is a small sealed sandwich bag containing:
a few waterproof matches.
a thin pencil torch.
a few caps of Nurofen.
a very thin whistle from an old life jacket.
a thin signal mirror
a couple of glucose lollies
and....
a couple of yellow and a red balloons.
As a person who wastes many a day chasing barra and anything pelagic and full of attitude, I have watched many a balloon used to float bait off the shore disappear over the horizon. And that's the realization - those balloons
stand out like the proverbial in the water and over an incredible distance.
Plus may be handy to use to wave around when most of my LJ is submerged or just to rest on.
If nothing else what is in my pocket will help if I have absolutely nothing else with me for the next few hours due to ending up in the the worse situation and losing everything - even my mind for a few moments.
All of it fits in my pocket, very light and I never know it's there.
Just as an aside, and it might be just me that ponders on this, but sometimes I observe pilots putting themselves into difficult survival situations because of the ease at which we can 'DIRECT TO' nowadays and the 'time/fuel' benefit creeping into our lives.
Before GPS I can remember more legs added to the trip because of the need to include helpful visual features (obviously this is not always the case - some passage over tiger country comes with the job) when available, and this would sometimes indirectly bring into the picture more opportunity for receiving assistance - roads, tracks, homesteads, bores etc.
Not intended as a drift - just hope that a little extra thought goes into the consequence of 'direct to' now taking one 'direct to' a very difficult environment in which to survive in.
Oh forgot - select the ELT switch on (if so equipped) while you're in the air for a few minutes.