Monday, April 2, 2007
A large rock near Clinton Lake sizzled with blood and smelled of cooking meat. Hungry ROTC cadets with government-issued mess kits in hand surrounded it, waiting for the superheated rock to charbroil their dinner. That night they slept in tents they had constructed from two parkas and a rope.
Daniel Rogers, Hutchinson freshman, chops wood Saturday for a fire during ROTC Air Force survival training. ROTC Air Force members spent the weekend learning survival tips near Clinton Lake.
About 20 Air Force ROTC cadets, most from the University of Kansas and a few from Washburn University, underwent survival, evasion, resistance and escape training this Saturday and Sunday at Clinton Lake. Air Force instructors from Missouri’s Whiteman Air Force Base administered the training and taught the cadets skills they could use if they found themselves in enemy territory and in need of rescue.
Thomas Gray, a training specialist from Whiteman, said that knowing basic survival skills, such as how to find food in nature and perform first aid, would help keep downed pilots alive and make their rescue easier.
One of the skills Gray taught cadets was how to use emergency communication equipment, such as a PRC-112B1, a $9,000 radio a downed pilot could use to send and receive text messages from rescuers.
“It lets us know where they’re at so we can send in our rescue forces and pick them up,” Gray said.
Stephanie Koenig, St. Louis freshman, said she attended the training because she had never been camping before and thought it would be useful experience.
”I didn’t know you could get water from vines, and I didn’t know you could cook steak on a rock,” Koenig said.
The cadets cooked their steak dinner on a large, flat rock they had positioned near their campfire. They spent nearly an hour stoking the rock with burning sticks, placing them above and below the rock until it became searing hot.
Shana Beach, Lawrence graduate student, said it was like cooking with a grill.
pullquote
I didn’t know you could get water from vines, and I didn’t know you could cook steak on a rock.
-Stephanie Koenig, St. Louis freshman
KU ROTC Capt. Dan Hatchel, who organized the training, said cadets learned a lot of textbook knowledge through the University’s ROTC program, but the training was an opportunity to get hands-on experience with practical survival skills.
“Things you might never use,” Hatchel said of the training. “But you might.”
Kansan staff writer Nathan Gill can be contacted at ngill@kansan.com.
— Edited by Ashley Thompson
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