That's a very good point, John.

A bunch of submicroscopic bugs (viruses) can take us down in a short period of time...strange ain't it?

I wonder if post-traumatic stress disorder (since he was in Iraq) could have played a role in causing panic and confusion...sad

I spent alot of time out in the woods at Fort Hood from 90 to 93. All over the whole post. One thing that I would suspect is Snake bite. I've run into alot of rattlers out there and others that I had no idea what they were.

Spider bites and those big orange centipedes are a possibility too.

Nighthiker is right about the suppliments too. Way too many people trying to "bulk up" in the army.

Even in the hottest of summers there is plenty of water to be found anywhere on Fort Hood if you look for it.

The typical land nav course in the army starts with classroom refresher on map and compass reading and then goes out to the bush. The course for WLC would be a commonly used course that isn't out of the way and they would be given a "panic azimuth" to have on them in case of emergency that would take them to a road that they could follow back to civilization. Overall, land nav training in the army is terrible. They dont teach what people really need to learn, terrain association. How to read the land is very important. That is hard to teach. The proliferation of GPS's hasn't helped things much either. I know people that cant even follow a GPS to get where they need to go. Would go right off a cliff or through a building if they could.

Jimtanker,

Could you please explain more about what you mean by terrain association and reading the land?

Thanks!

-Blast

Terrain association is basically reading a map and not using a compass. If I am standing on this hilltop and there is a stream over here and a saddle to my right I am right here and I need to go this way. Its hard for me to explain. Being a tanker I have almost never used a compass when navigating. Being in a big steel box it isn't very easy to get a good reading with one. LOL. Also I'm normally traveling faster than 25MPH. I have learned the ability to glance at a map and be able to travel extended distances by just reading the different types of terreain that is around me. Following depressions or ridgelines. I guess that after years of coordinating crew duties, navigating my tank, and communicating on the radio, all at the same time, it is just a natural thing to me.

There is a pretty good explanation of terrain association at: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/3-25-26/ch11.htm

(sorry, don't know how to post a link here.)

Global security is a great resourse to find information on the military. Check out all of the nice unclassified FMs available to you there.

Cool, I just realized that 90% of my nav in the woods is done by terrain association. The compass is really used just to orient the map, and myself.

Although I've practiced it quite a bit, I've hardly ever actually used classic straight-line travel along a compass heading to get from point A to point B.

I have used resection/triangulation more often, but usually using one landmark in combination with the terrain feature that I was standing on (ie bearing to landmark intersecting with a ridgeline).

Ah, so it is the ability to look at a topo map and match the features on the map to what you see, correct? That would be a very useful skill and one that would take a while to acquire.

Thanks for explaining!

-Blast

This is off-topic, but this is not really that strange. When you remove predators of equal size from an ecosystem, the dominant predator takes over. Then that predator is 'preyed' upon by something much smaller or itself becomes weaker because it isn't constantly challenged by another predator.

Since humans are not really predated upon by anything of equal size, at least not in civilized areas, the main cause of our demise is micropredation by bugs i.e. viruses, drug resistant bacteria etc. And/or our own weakening, viz the recent obesity epidemic, do you think any of these people could outrun or fight a large predator?

Interestingly, this also occurs for other systems. USA doesn't have a large enemy like the USSR anymore, now we get attacked by small terrorist groups, or our own internal problems. Same thing is occurring to Microsoft, it has no equal competitor in the software field, it's therefore attacked by software viruses and anarchic computer nerds that write GNU/Linux.

It does take a lot of practice. I used to be pretty good at it (like many skills, you lose it if you don't use it, and I haven't used it in a while). If you get a topo map of the area you play in, and get out into that area often, using first the map, compass, and your eyes, then just the map and eyes, you will be surprised how you will become able to look at the terrain, then at your map (or the other way around), and know where you are. I hope that sentence makes sense, I'm pooped from a long hard day...