Three-day survival course basic skills and order of Instruction

Scope and Purpose

This course is designed to be an introductory training exercise in how to survive getting lost in the serra of Minas Gerais Brazil. Emphasis will be placed on not getting lost in the first place, planning, and leaving detailed instructions with a responsible person before leaving. It is not intended to be a comprehensive wilderness survival course and it does not include primitive skills, hunting, fishing, or trapping.

Methods and equipment are selected that are available here in Brazil and at a cost accessible to the average middle class high school student. Expensive and imported kit is to be avoided. Everything taught must be reproducible locally within the means of the students.

PICT NOTE: This course syllabus is a constant work in progress and gets modified every time I take a group out. I have done other things with other groups and have added and cut components. My early rips were very informal affairs with groups of friends who wanted to go along with me on my wilderness trips. This course evolved out of those early experiences.

I don't advertise this course and only offer it to people involved in the churches I work with here (I am an Evangelical missionary). I only charge the students the cost of food and gasoline. A large part of the purpose is team building among teen and college age leaders. The state I live in has some world-class wilderness areas but most city kids don't have the basic skills necessary to take advantage of the opportunities around here. Often kids head off into the wilderness unprepared and suffer horribly. The course is designed to give them a feel for what it takes to spend and unplanned night in the bush.

99 44/100 % of the people taking this course have had no previous wilderness experience. Most have never even spent the night in a tent at a campground. The first 24 hours of this trip is usually a very high stress event for most of the kids in the group. A kid once made the comment, "You have to remember, we're all apartment boys!" I rarely if ever get through all of the stuff I have planned to teach on the first day. The learning curve for these kids is nearly vertical.

No matter how hard I stress it there is always someone in the group who thinks he's out there to play in the waterfalls and sunbathe. None of them ever understand that a half hour after sundown it will be pitch black and the streetlights won't be coming on. I'm not kidding, some of these guys have never had to lift a finger to take care of themselves. Brazilian mothers rival even the Italians. Universally their main concern is food, they honestly believe that if they skip a meal they will DIE! None of them ever sleep more than an hour or two on the first night. In rainy season they all get wet and manage to soak all their stuff no matter what you tell them. The first morning is usually a pretty grim scene. By the end of the second day their attitudes have perked up and they are getting into it. Five years later if you get them together again every detail of the trip gets discussed and laughed about. As I tell them "You will forget what you did on many weekends of your life but you will never forget this weekend."

Basic Skills (not listed in order of importance but in the general order they are taught)

Water treatment - Aside from rainy season dehydration is a serious threat to anyone lost in the serra. Most people who get lost in the serra either carry a half liter bottle or no water at all. Carrying at least a one-liter bottle will be stressed. Total water carrying capacity will also be discussed. Students will be able to collect, filter, and treat water from a variety of sources.

Method - Students will be taught the use of 2% Tincture of iodine and ascorbic acid. In addition to a plastic one-liter bottle the students will carry in their basic kit a five-liter Galão de Emergência, and PVC water filter. One of the five-liter water bags will be filled and carried by the group as untreated water.

Timing - At the start of the hike water is collected from a stream or open flowing spring.

Galão de Emergência - Five liter bag sold in gas stations to carry gasoline. They cost about $.50 each. They are a bad idea for carrying fuel but they make great emergency water carriers.

Navigation - The whole point is to never get lost in the first place. Since maps are generally unavailable in Brazil students will be taught to navigate without maps.

Method- Everyone will be taught basic compass navigation, recording routes and distances on paper, reversing the course. Students will be shown the use of a pace counter.

Timing - On the hike in

Signalling - Most people who get lost in the serra have never given thought to emergency signals. Since cell phones are so common they will be given top priority. Cell phones are to be carried OFF to conserve battery life. Students will be allowed to carry cell phones but not allowed to make calls during the exercise.

Method - The group will be divided in two and separated by a distance of .5 km. They will shout a series of phrases and have to record what the other group said. They will then blow their whistles and reflect each other with their mirrors. Cell phone signal checks will be conducted at regular intervals whenever the group stops. Locations of the last known signal locations will be recorded.

Timing - Mid hike in on first day.

Campsite selection -

Method - Students will be taught the features of a good campsite. Upon arrival in the area we plan to camp the students will fan out in pairs and search for an appropriate site. Locations have all been scouted previously so the probability that they will select the pre-determined location is near 100%. It helps if they are allowed to discover the location themselves.

Timing - End of hike on day one.

Shelter construction

Method - The basic day hike kit list includes a poncho or plastic tarp and cordage. The students will be sleeping either in two man tents or hammock shelters depending on time of year and selected terrain. They will learn how to set up a simple tarp shelter and be given the option of spending the night in them if they so desire. Use of natural shelter will be stressed.

Timing - After campsite selection has been made.

Bedding down

Method - Students will prepare a bed from natural materials found in their location. In most places this means making a thick grass mattress.

Timing - This activity will run concurrent with tarp shelter building.

Fire building

Method - Students will cook over a communal cooking/warming fire. Students will collect tinder, kindling, and fuel from the area around camp. They will be taught how to locate seasoned Candeia wood by sight and smell. During dry season, once the materials have been collected the five-liter water bag will be dumped over them. During rainy season this will not be necessary. Students will be shown how to scrape off wet bark, split firewood with a baton, and create fuzz sticks. Students will be shown how to make smoke signals with green leaves and grass.

Candeia - South American hardwood common in the scrub forests. It burns very well and is identified by a pungent, wet-dog smell. Dead Candeia trees are common as fires kill them and they remain as standing deadfall for years.

Cooking - Food is a non-priority for short term survival. Part of the experience is to suffer the hunger involved in an actual survival situation. Students will each carry a small survival ration consisting of a boil-in-bag rice, 2 bullion cubes, 4 instant oatmeal, and four small bocks of rapadura. These will be carried in an aluminum marmitex. Cooking will consist of boiling rice and bullion in the either the marmitex or canteen cup. Students will not eat any of this food on the first day. They will be allowed to carry a normal sized lunch as if they were going on a normal day hike. They may eat this food or ration it as they please.

Rapadura - Solid block of brown sugar candy made from boiled down sugarcane juice.
Marmitex - Small round aluminum cooking pan with closeable lid commonly used by Brazilian workers. They cost about $1.50

Collecting Charcoal - The lower chamber of the 20mm PVC filter is filled with activated charcoal. This will be repacked on the second morning with charcoal taken from their previous nights fire. Students will be shown how to use charcoal and a bandanna to drip filter water.

Searching for water - The second day will be a long loop hike through the serra on which they will practice the skills learned the first day. This will also be a search for alternative water sources at the bases of cliffs, seeps, and springs. Ideally the second day's water supply should be collected from these sources. If the group is unable to find and collect enough water from these sources they will stop by a flowing water source at the low point in the hike and each will have to fill and carry their five-liter water bag.

Expedient Water collection - Upon waking up they will collect dew if it is available. This water will be filtered and treated. Their tarp shelters will be set up to collect any rainwater that falls during the night. Students will also be taught how to correctly dig for water using their machete and collect water from small seeps and bromeliads with the use of a 60 ml syringe and plastic tube.

Basic Equipment

PICT NOTE: This list is constantly evolving and is not all-inclusive. Small items have been left off.

PACK

Students will carry all their own kit, food, water, and shelter in a suitable pack.

SLEEP SYSTEM

Students will sleep in either a 2-man tent or individual hammock shelters in tropical weight bags.

- Sleeping Bag, tropical weight
- 2 two-man tents or hammocks and tarps

EMERGENCY SHELTER

Students will carry and learn how to construct a simple tarp shelter with natural bedding.

- Tarp
- Long line
- Short cords

WATER TREATMENT AND COLLECTION

Students will collect and treat water from a variety of natural sources

- Plastic canteen and cup - or – one liter bottle and aluminum cup
- Galão de Emergência
- 2% Tincture of iodine & ascorbic acid
- PVC water filter
- Absorbent cotton cloth (pano de chaõ)

Pano de chaõ - White cotton sacking material used as mop heads. These are very clean and white when new.

WILDERNESS CUTLERY

Students will learn the proper use of the machete and small fixed blade

- Tramontina Machete and sheath
- Mora SWAK

FIREMAKING

Students will learn how to collect tinder and construct a fire. They will light their fires first with the firesteel and natural tinder then progress to modern means and prepared tinder. Their basic fire making kit will include a BSA Hotspark and either matches or a bic lighter. A small supply of cotton treated with Vaseline and a citronella candle will also be included.

MISC

Ziplock bag
Marmitex w/ emergency food ration
Whistle
Mirror
Sleeping clothes in waterproof bag
Insect repellent
Sunscreen

I certainly welcome any comments suggestions or criticisms. Mac

Seems well put together from what I read. Its better than some of the courses I have read or attended as a Scout when I was a teenager, (man I feel old saying that).

I would be very interested in this course if I was able to go. Could you tell me more about the PVC filters you are going to use? Are they home made or store bought? Just cuious.

Garrett

Garrett,

The PVC filter I use is my own design and it is very simple. It is made from 20 mm brown PVC water pipe. There are two main sections each about 10 cm long connected with a pipe joint. Between the two sections is a plastic screen. The bottom section has a pipe reducer on the end. This traps another plastic screen sealing off the bottom section. The upper pipe has a wad of synthetic fish filter fluff in the bottom that acts as a pre-filter. The lower section is filled with activated charcoal. In the field I repack this setion with ordinary charcoal from a fire.

To use it you simply pour water into the top and allow it to drain through. It is fairly fast. To aid in getting the filtered water into a canteen I added a short hose of narrow bike innertube to the narrow end of the reducer. This fits inside the neck of the canteen.

The filter is not designed to work on its own but in concert with iodine or other chemical means. It does do a good job clarifying water and making it more palatable. To clean really dirty water you can join several of the lower charcoal filled chambers together to make a long drip filter.

I've used this system for years in both North and South America, filtering the water then treating with Iodine. I have never gotten sick. I have a PUR Explorer but don't often use it as this system is much easier, lighter and costs about $5 to make. It's the kind of low tech option that "sells well" here in Brazil. Mac

Sounds pretty good. I will have to look into trying to build one. DO you break it down when you are not usin it, or are the pieces glued together? I am just curious as I love to build homemade camping gear.

thanks for the explanation.

Garrett

This is so cool. I've never been to Brazil but I can imagine a survival course there to be very exciting. Are you taking Pictlet along? That kid could probably show the students a thing or two!

Christina,

Pictlet and I were out for 48 hours last week. We had planned to climb to the top of a mountain to film, photograph the other side for a planned trip later this year. The top of the mountan was in clouds on the second day so we spent the day on the forward slope practicing survival skills and taking pictures of everythng that was in bloom.

When my survival students complain or whine I tell them "Look you're not doing anything here that my daughter hasen't done twice as fast for twice as long." That always shuts them up. She's a trooper. Mac