Survival
Survival Skills
On the school site the Project introduces the pupils to the full range of wilderness and survival skills:
SHELTER
WATER
FIRE
FOOD
MEDICAL [FIRST AID]
NAVIGATION
The programme for each pupil runs for approximately 35 - 40 hours of practical instruction, with classroom follow up and optional personal study and possibly [a] day visit [s] to an outdoor centre. The skills will be taught at the pupils' own level but will not be diluted in any way. An understanding of risk, hazard, and personal awareness will also be introduced.
Survival and wilderness skills need to be taught - and learnt - with experienced instructors who have themselves learnt the correct ways to manage not just school based teaching, but the real world 'wilderness' work, taking days or weeks, not just a few minutes. Those who want to learn - whether adult or youth - will need to start learning in a new and different way, as many of the skills are practical - not learning out of books. You can't (at least there and then) write down notes as you go along - you have to remember what is taught to you as it's taught to you. It's this which makes the work so important - learn it first time if you can - how to build your shelter, how to treat a bleeding wound, how to light fire without matches or lighter. Remember - if you are in wilderness or an emergency and need these skills you cannot take your textbook out of your pocket and read up on it!
A school expedition to wilderness: Iceland. Here we are 29 kilometres from a road, and nearly 600 metres above sea level.
Safety comes first. In everything you do - moving around with timber, or leaving rucsacs on the ground, handling tools, or lighting fires, eating wild food - everything must be thought through. The wilderness is a wonderful environment but it's no good going half way around the world to get to it only to be sent off to a distant hospital because you have not listened to your guide or instructor!
Year 8's on their own in the forests of western Norway, orienteering across a course of 3 kilometres. To get to the point where you can confidently leave the Instructors for a couple of hours, you must have listened to instructions, and be confident of what to do in an emergency....and of course be prepared with some good survival knowledge.
Just a few of Mr Howard's Wilderness Experiences:
[worth finding in an atlas!]
Northern Finland
Extreme North-West Iceland
Greenland
Romania : Carpathian Mountains
A 3 month, solo, 6,000 mile overland, and trekking expedition through Norway and Sweden. This photo: in bear country on the Norwegian Swedish border
SHELTER
Shelter is one of the key skills that you need to have in survival situations and when trekking through wilderness. Some important points:
-
A shelter usually has to be built to protect from rain or sun or wind.
-
Very rarely can the 'perfect' shelter be found ready-made in the wild.
-
Do not build your shelter on a hilltop, or on a flat valley floor by a river. It's a good idea not to build it underneath a solitary tree.
-
Try to practice before you go on an expedition.
-
Try to build the shelter in the right place - first time; and not too late in the day.
-
Building a shelter too late in the day means you will probably be too tired, and you will make mistakes.
-
If someone in your group is injured you might need to make, fast, a temporary shelter until a weather-proof one is finally finished.
Winter shelter building with a basha over a snow pit. Northern Sweden
Survival Training Exercise
WATER
Humans cannot live for more than three days at the very most without water. The body is made up of 75% water - this water must be replaced when we lose it throughout the day.
-
Humans can survive without food for 50-60 days
-
Water is lost through breathing, through evaporation from skin, from loss of body fluids, also from heat exposure, exercise, cold, and burns.
-
Lack of water called 'dehydration' is life threatening.
-
90% of the population do not drink enough.
-
When there is not enough water, do not eat very much.
-
Wear lightweight and light coloured clothing if possible.
-
Do not talk...breathe through your nose only.
-
Boil water if possible.
FIRE
Fire is a 'multi-purpose' tool for us if we have to survive or when we are in a wilderness environment. It is, with water, the most important of our skills.
-
You must know what to collect, to light your fire with.
-
Fire building ....you must know this.
-
Fire lighting...how?...Flint & Steel? Friction (rubbing two sticks together!), chemicals?
-
Remember the Fire Triangle: you need air / ignition (heat) / and fuel to light the fire.
-
Spend time preparing the correct fuel - eg don't collect wet wood, don't collect wood that is too thick.
-
Collect: TINDER: fine, dry, snappy sticks KINDLING: finger- thickness twigs - but enough to light from the flaring of the tinder; and FUEL: heavy, thick, and slow burning wood.
Fire: School Pupils on a Military Skills Course
Scenario
Five of you are sailing north in a yacht off the west coast of Scotland.
It is Autumn, and you are one day out of port and not expected in the next port (which is home) for another five days. It is very stormy. You run aground on submerged rocks and the yacht smashes to pieces. You all make it to shore by swimming and/or wading, although two are injured: one has a suspected broken leg; the other badly injured ribs.
Before jumping into the water you all managed to save some things that you thought might be useful. When put together this is what you all saved:
One set of wet weather clothing
Two working cigarette lighters
30 metres of rope
A folding pocket knife with a sharp 5 cm blade
Two sails
Three tins of baked beans
A waterproofed first aid kit
As you scramble ashore it starts to rain; you noticed just before you left the wreckage of the yacht that on the chart (map) of the coast the nearest settlement/town/village was 50 miles (80 kms) to the east on the other side of a 4,000 ft (1300m) mountain range. You can now see this range of mountains. It has snow on it.
You (as you are not one of the injured) look around the area to see what your new 'home' is like: some areas of (conifer) forest, a stream tumbling down from steep rocky hills, and what looks like some old forgotten rubbish tip where someone has thought about farming the area but had given up. You notice that there is virtually no flat land.
It is 2pm. It gets dark in less than two hours.
What do you do..........?
