Boreal Forest Winter Survival Shelter

[Revolverrodger]

Hello guys !
I spent the weekend in a winter survival course at -26 degrees (windchill under -30 degrees).
Alot of hard work building a snow shelter with snow blocks and a huge amount of time was spent collecting a stack of firewood for the night (we ended up with maybe three to four times as much as needed !). No tools (saw / axe) were alowed for that course
Many people had to bail out because of the intense cold... I still managed to sleep maybe 45-60 minutes during the whole night (no sleeping bag) but learned alot from this experience.
It was tough but worth it.
Hope you enjoy the vid

(sorry if the vid is short: I didn't have much free time to film)

[video=youtube;Bi2HD_lc6jg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi2HD_lc6jg[/video]

 

[Currawong]

Wow that's pretty intense. Must have been a tough night. It's still very impressive that you can survive the night without any gear, regardless of discomfort.

I assume you were allowed a lighter and kindling or similar? I'd be interested to know if you could survive temps like that with no fire as well as no gear... I assume not.

Thanks for taking the video and posting.

 

[Revolverrodger]

Wow that's pretty intense. Must have been a tough night. It's still very impressive that you can survive the night without any gear, regardless of discomfort.

I assume you were allowed a lighter and kindling or similar? I'd be interested to know if you could survive temps like that with no fire as well as no gear... I assume not.

Thanks for taking the video and posting.

The instructor said we could only use the bowdrill method or a match to start the fire... I chose a match lol
The only tinder we used was materials found in the forest.
We also build a snow trench shelter to be used it no fire is possible. The snow trench would allow you to survive but you would be much more miserable and cold than in front of a fire !

 

[gadgetgeek]

minus 30 C windchill, no gear besides clothes, and no fire? With really good gear, snow-goose parka, down you can measure in KGs, no sleep due to actively keeping exposed skin from freezing but survivable. With "average" winter gear, frostbite at best, toes, fingers, face. With minimal "walking to the car" gear, hypothermia/dead.

Overnight is a whole other ball game, even in winter, even if the air temp is cold, the sun makes a massive difference. Also in general night is when your metabolism starts to drop, and unless you have heaps of food, its hard to keep the internal stove going for that long.

Even having a windbreak, and the ability to retain any heat around you is an advantage, the more the better. A good igloo is tee-shirt warm with little work. But they have an R-value that is pretty insane.

TL;dr, -40 is the scary number, -25 will still kill ya if you aren't ready.

 

[Currawong]

TL;dr, -40 is the scary number, -25 will still kill ya if you aren't ready.

I've experienced -25C before, in the Himalayas. I was suffering altitude sickness so wasn't really registering it properly, all I knew was it was damn cold. I climbed the moraine hills on the side of a glacier at night to look at the view. The stars were bright enough to light up the snow on the mountains (including Everest), just awesome. I can't imagine staying outside more than an hour though, I went back inside the tea house and huddled by the stove. I remember many of the porters had to sleep outside with just a fire and a pot of rice, some of them die from exposure occasionally I think.

 

[Revolverrodger]

One way to keep warm is to eat all night
I ate salami, cheese, trail mix
Believe it ir not the salami and cheese were frozen solid. Had to thaw them by the fire

 

[gadgetgeek]

Calorie load at those temps can get insane, especially if you are a skinny little ... like me. Once you are used to it, -25 is fine working weather, but its still not fun for the long haul.
Revolver, you did well to do as well as you did, considering. The last time I slept in the snow it very nearly became my last, once hypothermia sets in, so does the stupid. I got the fire lit (planned that in advance thankfully) but couldn't stoke it enough to get it really going. Next time I'll be smarter about it, and have better gear, but it was an eye opener for me. I'd thought I'd known cold before then growing up in Sask, but there is a difference when you get to sleep where its warm.

 

[Revolverrodger]

Calorie load at those temps can get insane, especially if you are a skinny little ... like me. Once you are used to it, -25 is fine working weather, but its still not fun for the long haul.
Revolver, you did well to do as well as you did, considering. The last time I slept in the snow it very nearly became my last, once hypothermia sets in, so does the stupid. I got the fire lit (planned that in advance thankfully) but couldn't stoke it enough to get it really going. Next time I'll be smarter about it, and have better gear, but it was an eye opener for me. I'd thought I'd known cold before then growing up in Sask, but there is a difference when you get to sleep where its warm.

I am by no means an expert or a survival guru !
I took the course to learn and experiment in a 'safe' environment
Now I'm confident I could do it again...

 

[gadgetgeek]

You might not be, neither am I, but the more important part is that you know how tough it is. 6-8 hours, no big deal to the youtube warrior, but all night is a different story as you know. I guess I'm trying to say that I have a little understanding of how tough a thing that was to do, and that you did well at it.

Also now living in Currowong's climate I feel I have a better idea of how to compare what you did to someone who's definition of cold is -10C (still damn cold if thats the 100 year low though!)

 

[Currawong]

You might not be, neither am I, but the more important part is that you know how tough it is. 6-8 hours, no big deal to the youtube warrior, but all night is a different story as you know. I guess I'm trying to say that I have a little understanding of how tough a thing that was to do, and that you did well at it.

Also now living in Currowong's climate I feel I have a better idea of how to compare what you did to someone who's definition of cold is -10C (still damn cold if thats the 100 year low though!)

I agree with that. Living in Australia I had no idea how cold it could get until I went trekking in the Himalayas. Here you don't really get cold unless you get wet and then experience windchill, still not the same thing though.

 

[Revolverrodger]

I agree with that. Living in Australia I had no idea how cold it could get until I went trekking in the Himalayas. Here you don't really get cold unless you get wet and then experience windchill, still not the same thing though.

Theory is important but as you say real world dirt time is more important
Probably the mist dangerous weather is rain at cold temperatures
I would love to visit Australia one day... looks like an awesome place

 

[bore]

How many others stayed the night? Did everyone set up their own shelter? Were the shelters similar? How deep was the snow? Very interesting outing. What gear did you have on?

 

[Revolverrodger]

There was a total of arbour 30 people
I'm not sure of the number who stayed in their shilter the whole might. I would say maybe 50%
Shelters were similar, some larger some smaller
The snow was packed hard about20-24 inches I would say
The only gear I used were the clothes I had on and food I brought

 

[Rick Marchand]

I went through similar training exercises. Every single time I left, I said I'd never go back. After a week or so, you realize what you've accomplished and the urge to take it further kicks in. Lowest it ever got at night for me was -34C (-43C with windchill)

You will learn a lot about yourself... Great job!

 

[TheMadIndian]

what a cool way to challenge yourself and learn, thanks for sharing

 

[Herlock]

Hi! Very interesting, it looks a good training program and it’s good to challenge ourselves sometimes ! Thanks for sharing your experience :thumbup:.

Did a lot of this during my military service in the Alpine Troops, though with a little different techniques. Fire was, most of the times, a big no-no so the building of snow shelters was more a shovelling job rather than a trees sawing and cutting one, also because we mostly camped above the tree line. The shelters we were building basically resembled small igloos but built under the snow cover, so that nothing was “sticking out” and easily noticeable, even from the distance. Normally two people were sleeping in each one and the only fire permitted was a small tea light, mainly for safety reasons (kind of oxygen depletion check) rather than for warming up. I did again, just for fun, sometimes in the years after .

I have spent many nights in those snow shelters and, overall, I consider a snow shelter a good shelter: it keeps you reasonably warm and doesn’t take huge efforts to build up an effective and safe one. The most extreme outside T° I remember I have experienced has been – 18°C, sure the wind-chill effect at 2500/2800 m is significant but, in the shelters, T° was about -2°C / 0°C and no wind which meant almost “warm” . With issued standard clothing/gear I could perfectly survive the nights . Toughest were the “ski holidays” weeks where this was the set-up for a week long happy camping : 10 km march in the mornings, cold lunches and dinners, 10 km march in the afternoon, some target shooting in the fresh breeze or under snowfall, overnights in the Ice Hotel, what’s not to like ? Sure when 20 yrs old it’s a different ball game . Great times though!

 

[mete]

People were confused when I said a Norwegian relative was sleeping on the ground in winter at the Norway/Russia border .Yes , in the army. But if you learn to do it correctly it's not too difficult !
As kids we had a hard and fast rule when building forts etc. NO ROOFS ! I was reminded recently with a news item with a death from such a structure collapsed the roof !!

I'd like to see some comments on the forum about 'snow knives ' or is it easier to just use something like a machete ?

 

[Rick Marchand]

People were confused when I said a Norwegian relative was sleeping on the ground in winter at the Norway/Russia border .Yes , in the army. But if you learn to do it correctly it's not too difficult !
As kids we had a hard and fast rule when building forts etc. NO ROOFS ! I was reminded recently with a news item with a death from such a structure collapsed the roof !!

I'd like to see some comments on the forum about 'snow knives ' or is it easier to just use something like a machete ?

I see a snow knife as a specialty blade. Unless you are in an area that warrants it's limited use, it's better to use a crossover tool like the machete.

Snow shelters are always at risk of collapse. You should be building it with that in mind. My kids make them in the back yard and I always enforce the 4-6 inch rule. Pat down the outside and insert sticks 4-6 inches into the mound like a pin cushion... then dig to the sticks. We did a few collapse scenarios to stress the point.

I also stress the importance of not having too large of a heat source in a snow shelter. A candle at the most. There is nothing worse than being in a cold humid snow shelter.

 

[Revolverrodger]

Hi! Very interesting, it looks a good training program and it’s good to challenge ourselves sometimes ! Thanks for sharing your experience :thumbup:.

Did a lot of this during my military service in the Alpine Troops, though with a little different techniques. Fire was, most of the times, a big no-no so the building of snow shelters was more a shovelling job rather than a trees sawing and cutting one, also because we mostly camped above the tree line. The shelters we were building basically resembled small igloos but built under the snow cover, so that nothing was “sticking out” and easily noticeable, even from the distance. Normally two people were sleeping in each one and the only fire permitted was a small tea light, mainly for safety reasons (kind of oxygen depletion check) rather than for warming up. I did again, just for fun, sometimes in the years after .

I have spent many nights in those snow shelters and, overall, I consider a snow shelter a good shelter: it keeps you reasonably warm and doesn’t take huge efforts to build up an effective and safe one. The most extreme outside T° I remember I have experienced has been – 18°C, sure the wind-chill effect at 2500/2800 m is significant but, in the shelters, T° was about -2°C / 0°C and no wind which meant almost “warm” . With issued standard clothing/gear I could perfectly survive the nights . Toughest were the “ski holidays” weeks where this was the set-up for a week long happy camping : 10 km march in the mornings, cold lunches and dinners, 10 km march in the afternoon, some target shooting in the fresh breeze or under snowfall, overnights in the Ice Hotel, what’s not to like ? Sure when 20 yrs old it’s a different ball game . Great times though!

Very interesting shelter
I will try it out one of these days