Scenario-based training: You are injured in the wilderness

This is an excellent thread with a lot of good responses.
I like the fact that we are talking farther north, because, as has been stated already, down here the fire ants are a factor.
Also, I agree you can often do more than you think when injured. I injured myself at the start of a group campout last fall. I knew it was bad, but I toughed it out and managed to function well enough. Monday the dr. told me I had a dislocated collar bone and torn rib cartilage, a sprained knee too.

It is the very scenerio we are thinking about that I think about when packing a day hike kit. Water, snacks, lighter, tinder, flashlight, and vet-wrap always have a place in my pack. When I am injured, I don't eat much, so I could be okay for quite sometime on the snacks I carry. Getting water would be my main concern if hours turned into days.
 
Brian Jones said:
One great way to train for this is to tape your legs together and one arm to your side and try doing skills with one hand. You'd be surprised at how hard it is to do these things even without pain. But, like any other scenrario, dirttime and training will give you that familiar "I've been here before" feeling to a degree if it ever happens.

I made this one particularly hard because I believe you can CREATE ways to handle it, which is why we are discussing SURVIVAL, not laying there, giving up, and dying. The idea is to think about your options now to replace the "give up and die" method. :D
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Some Boy Scout troops are really good about training for this...
 
I think I would go into shock and most likely die. Really. First thing Id do before blacking out is lie down supine and elevate my legs on a tree or something.
 
Certain breaks you can work through the pain. Some people have a higher pain tolerance than others. What I can do with a broken leg another may not. Kids are especially resilient. My son broke his collar bone and barely batted an eye. That being said....2 broken legs and an incapacitated arm:eek:
My friend broke is leg in 2 places while he and my Wife and I were out camping. Early summer, remote location BAD break. Both the tibia and fibia...his leg was sticking out sideways. He did not break the skin though. I have grown up around being careful in the bush and knowing what to do in a "survival" shtf situation. It was a 20 minute hike from the car down hill. He was calm(obviously in a bit of shock) and I told him we had to get back up the hill and into the closest town(5 minutes down a dirt road and then 10 mins down the highway) I got him up fine but there was NO WAY we could move. I could not even touch his leg to make a splint for him. He screamed in agony just lifting his pant leg for me to check if he had broken the skin. LOOOOOONG story short, I made a fire, my Wife stayed with him and I went in to town for help. It took 11 guys to get him out. My friend is only 210 lbs. I broke the trail bigger, one guy breaked and the other 9 carried him on a stretcher. In the middle of the night to boot.
Could he have survived...not for long. Having people know where you are and when you will be back will save you many times over. Staying where you say you will be is key to that. It is one thing to spend a wet night outside and be found the next day but if you are injured as badly as said scenario, you are going to hell and back...maybe back. I am well aware of what the human body can endure and go through and still come through.
If that was me, in my friends situation. I know he could stand PAINFULLY. I would have imobilzed the broken leg as best I could, rested with a fire(he fell down an embankment with...yes, kindling for the fire) and then attempt to make a crutch or cain to aid in getting up the hill. I don't think I would have made it back to the car by noon the next day but once there you could safely rest and attempt to drive out to the highway and honk/flash lights to flag someone down. Now that is only one badly broken leg....not 2 and a gimp arm.
I would try to stay hydrated and calm and using my always let someone know where you are and when you will be back hope that they find you a few days later. I would hope I was lucky enough to be within grabbing distance of my sleeping bag or survival kit and use the space blanket to keep me warm. Leaves off the trees means colder nights....hypothermia sets in. Staying warm and hydrated would be key. I don't think rolling around would be an option for gathering fire wood so hopefully there would be enough wood on the ground to keep a fire going through the night.

Oh and pray:)
 
Brian, I had to reread your post on the spear and the fact it could be done. My question, and I am not meaning to be rude but making a spear or any other type of tool would be the furthest thing from your mind in that situation. The pain alone would be nauseating.

I know there are those stories of how said person cuts own arm off to survive but DAMN there are a lot more "hiker found dead" stories in the papers.

I do think staying warm and hydrated while you waited to be found was all you could hope/strive for.

This is the first thread in a long time that has really got me thinking. Being in the above posted situation it really has me thinking back to what I should have/could have done better. Thank you.
 
CKE2 said:
Brian, I had to reread your post on the spear and the fact it could be done. My question, and I am not meaning to be rude but making a spear or any other type of tool would be the furthest thing from your mind in that situation. The pain alone would be nauseating.
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Agreed on not making a spear. It was part of an exercise on trying to do various skills while incapacitated...
 
I think a lot of the outcome to this scenario really depends on the nature of the injuries. When I was 14, while skiing, I suffered a spiral fracture of both the tibia and fibia in one leg. I was told later that people many many yards away heard the distinct sound of my bones breaking. The pain from this injury was truly incapacitating and I was a very active child-teenager who was no stranger to injury. I had fallen out of trees, been stung by a swarm of wasps, been bitten by snakes, cut myself with a chainsaw, ripped my face open on a barb wire fence and countless other mild to serious accidents. In this case I had the embarrassing pleasure of being taken down the mountain in a sled and was well attended to but since I was 14 and my mother couldn't be reached all they were able to give me for the pain was two aspirin, which had, as you can imagine, absolutely no effect. I then had an hour long ride in the back of a station wagon down a bumpy mountain road to the hospital. I was delirious the whole time. My friend later told me that I was literally screaming in agony the whole way. I'd like to imagine that if I was alone and had to deal with this situation in a survival context I'd rise to the occasion but honestly I truly doubt I, at least, would have been able to pull through. My only hope I fear would have been that someone heard my anguished screams.

When I finally got to the hospital and my mother was contacted and I was given that blessed shot of painkiller, everything changed and I could finally think straight and started to ask questions and become involved with my surroundings. Thinking back on this experience I wonder if maybe having some kind of heavy duty painkillers that have the minimal effect on cognitive functions as possible might not be such a bad idea to bring along in a survival kit.
 
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