Survival School SERE

andrew7978 said:
I was watching the second episode and they are working on making a thing to keep the food away from predators. They first start by building a ladder, which they basically build out of logs. They could have used much smaller sticks, which would result in far less cutting. It would take less time, tire them out less, and not wear down their wire saw. It didn’t fully show what they were doing, but it looked like that had logs lashed up in the trees and used a parachute to hang their food. Why not just throw some 550 over a tree branch. That would seem much more ideal especially since all the army seems to care about is doing things fast and efficiently.

I’m not trying to criticize their teaching as they may know something I don’t, but I don’t see much point in how the did it.
Click to expand...

I notice that as well. Especially when the made the ladder to climb the tree for hanging their food.
 
"Anyone here been in the military and had to deal with long marches in issued boots?"

msiley,

I went through the SERE course a few years back, along with various related specialized courses over the years. I'm less than impressed with what the show portrays, but believe it to be poor editing (at least in relation to what this audience would like to see)or "hollywood" ideas of what will be interesting. The course (due to the caliber and professionalism of the instructors) is truly exceptional. One thing to keep in mind, a fairly wide spectrum of people go through this course... Some because the skills will/could be used any given day in their career fields, others because they need the one-time exposure in order to be better able to assist (in coordination efforts, etc) in a search and rescue operation or detainee scenario, others in preparation of worst case "what if" it happened to them (a la downed-aircrew, captured convoy). Leading to your question about long marches in issued boots... Issued gear is never the same as the best gear you could buy for yourself, but it's rarely bad either. Many people, believe it or not, even in the services (any more that is) do not know how to break boots in properly, or how to march or hike (two different things), or how to take care of their feet. They'll learn these things throughout the course (instructors inspect feet on a regular basis), but some learn harder lessons than others. For example, "city kids" are often initially afraid to take their boots off in the woods (ever). You see, the spiders (brown recluse and others they hear about) might get them. Not airing feet out is an easy way to get in trouble when you're talking days and weeks. For a "country boy" the course is often just a really fun camping trip. Our element had to keep two rabbits alive for several days (added challenge), and then kill and eat them (no guarantee the squirrel pole snares, etc would catch anything, so this ensured people learned how to field dress and help overcome food aversions). It turned out on our rotation "killing day" fell on Easter. In our element I was the only country boy, and the others couldn't bear to kill the Easter bunny (twice). In this case the instructors were both amazed and amused, but asked if I wouldn't mind. Two whacks later, followed by field dressing sans knife (even though I had a Buck 110 on me), we were ready to start cooking. Later on we entered the Evasion phase. Sixty two people (split in several elements) went through my rotation. Only two of us were never caught. The other was a PJ, and a country boy. As the course expands (in numbers of students and instructors) and continually adapts to the current environment, I hope the professionalism is able to match the rate of expansion. Thanks for letting me ramble, and relive good memories.

schlots
 
just watched the latest episode on hulu, episode 8 is missing? :confused:

i thought it was interesting to see a Gransfors Bruks axe poking out of the pack of one of the supervising instructors in the field with one of the groups...i guess the issue axe doesn't cut it for him ;)
 
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