"Happy Camper Survival Training" is officially called "Snow Craft I". Snow Craft II is Crevass training, etc. Our group will not actually be in any snow/ice conditions, so most of the 2 day training will not be applicable. However, everyone going into the field has to go through this training, in case of emergency, etc. I also learned a couple of things we will use, and even learned a trucker hitch knot which will come in handy the next time I am setting up a tent in SD in the rain at midnight with mosquitos and crying kids.
After spending the morning in a classroom going over the schedule, safety, and some demonstrations, the "Delta" arrived to give us a ride out on to the Ross Ice Shelf:
We first went into the Intructor Hut, a glorified tent, to go over the procedures for lighting emergency stoves, and similar things.
We then went to the I-Hut (Instructor Hut) storage shed and put together sleep kits, which constsist of a sleeping bag, a liner, and two insulation pads. This all goes in a bag, which we are required to haul, in addition to our CWG bag. I think it is supposed to be sort of like military boot camp, where they break you down psychologically by have to do extra work. On the other hand, it is an excellent way of forcing you to face all the things you could come up against. There is no other way to do it.
We then hauled all the sleep kits, tents, cooking gear, food, etc., out to our "campsite", about a mile. We first set up 2 Scott Tents. This was useful because we will have one of these in camp for cooking, because it has a vent. We'll put a table and a few chairs in it, but we have other tents for sleeping.
We then constructed a "Quenzie Hut". You pile all your gear up, cover with waterproof floor of Scott tent, and then everyone shovels snow onto it. You let it set up for a couple of hours, come back and dig a "mouse hole" in the side, pull all the gear out, and there is a snow house. We later dug out a proper entrance that tunneled in from underneath, but only about 4 of us were willing to help.
We then mad snow blocks with saws and shovels as a windbreak:
We then set up a few sleeping tents, then a "kitchen":
Some of the guys and 2 girls made personal snow enclosures to sleep in. 1 of the girls didn't make it through the night and headed into a tent. One of the guys' crashed in the night, and we heard him making a second one about midnight:
This was a modern campsite, with full plumbing. The yellow flag is the pee flag, the outhouse is a plywood box surrounding a 30' hole in the ice with a toilet seat on top. When you sit on it, there is a continuous rush of cold air coming up at you....interesting.......This is only allowed because this is not a protected area, but in most areas now you can no longer do this.
It was very clear, and over 40 F. Here is Mt. Erubus with steam venting out. There is a liquid pool of lava at the top, but people are no longer allowed to hike up there.
The next morning, we had to have cooked breakfast (oatmeal and coffee/tea), haul all of the equipment back to the shed, break down the tents, have all the gear packed up and lined up for pickup by 8:30 am to simulate a helo pickup. When the pilots show up in the field, they don't wait for you to be ready, and don't help you pack, so this was a good lesson, it was quite a chore....
We then walked back to the I-Hut, carrying our own CWG, where we went over radio information, and ate yesterday's leftover sandwiches and snacks for lunch.
We then ran through a couple of outdoor scenarios in groups, simulating an emergency. One was "bucket-head, where everyone had to wear a bucket on their head to simulate a white-out, and using only a rope anchored to the tent look for a stranded team member. We failed miserably. We also simulated being stranded out with only 1 survival bag kit, and had to set up the radio above and call for help, set up a tent, tend for a person with a simulated broken arm, and 1 with hypothermia, all things we learned over the course of the 2 days. We did much better on the second scenario. Here we are setting up the radio antennae:
Then we headed back to our pick-up point for a ride back to town. We did some "lessons-learned" discussions, and were briefed on helicopter and environmental safety things, and were done!
After spending the morning in a classroom going over the schedule, safety, and some demonstrations, the "Delta" arrived to give us a ride out on to the Ross Ice Shelf:
We first went into the Intructor Hut, a glorified tent, to go over the procedures for lighting emergency stoves, and similar things.
We then went to the I-Hut (Instructor Hut) storage shed and put together sleep kits, which constsist of a sleeping bag, a liner, and two insulation pads. This all goes in a bag, which we are required to haul, in addition to our CWG bag. I think it is supposed to be sort of like military boot camp, where they break you down psychologically by have to do extra work. On the other hand, it is an excellent way of forcing you to face all the things you could come up against. There is no other way to do it.
We then hauled all the sleep kits, tents, cooking gear, food, etc., out to our "campsite", about a mile. We first set up 2 Scott Tents. This was useful because we will have one of these in camp for cooking, because it has a vent. We'll put a table and a few chairs in it, but we have other tents for sleeping.
We then constructed a "Quenzie Hut". You pile all your gear up, cover with waterproof floor of Scott tent, and then everyone shovels snow onto it. You let it set up for a couple of hours, come back and dig a "mouse hole" in the side, pull all the gear out, and there is a snow house. We later dug out a proper entrance that tunneled in from underneath, but only about 4 of us were willing to help.
We then mad snow blocks with saws and shovels as a windbreak:
We then set up a few sleeping tents, then a "kitchen":
Some of the guys and 2 girls made personal snow enclosures to sleep in. 1 of the girls didn't make it through the night and headed into a tent. One of the guys' crashed in the night, and we heard him making a second one about midnight:
This was a modern campsite, with full plumbing. The yellow flag is the pee flag, the outhouse is a plywood box surrounding a 30' hole in the ice with a toilet seat on top. When you sit on it, there is a continuous rush of cold air coming up at you....interesting.......This is only allowed because this is not a protected area, but in most areas now you can no longer do this.
It was very clear, and over 40 F. Here is Mt. Erubus with steam venting out. There is a liquid pool of lava at the top, but people are no longer allowed to hike up there.
The next morning, we had to have cooked breakfast (oatmeal and coffee/tea), haul all of the equipment back to the shed, break down the tents, have all the gear packed up and lined up for pickup by 8:30 am to simulate a helo pickup. When the pilots show up in the field, they don't wait for you to be ready, and don't help you pack, so this was a good lesson, it was quite a chore....
We then walked back to the I-Hut, carrying our own CWG, where we went over radio information, and ate yesterday's leftover sandwiches and snacks for lunch.
We then ran through a couple of outdoor scenarios in groups, simulating an emergency. One was "bucket-head, where everyone had to wear a bucket on their head to simulate a white-out, and using only a rope anchored to the tent look for a stranded team member. We failed miserably. We also simulated being stranded out with only 1 survival bag kit, and had to set up the radio above and call for help, set up a tent, tend for a person with a simulated broken arm, and 1 with hypothermia, all things we learned over the course of the 2 days. We did much better on the second scenario. Here we are setting up the radio antennae:
Then we headed back to our pick-up point for a ride back to town. We did some "lessons-learned" discussions, and were briefed on helicopter and environmental safety things, and were done!
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