Military members or veterans how was your boot camp?

[[R-DEV]Ninja2dan]

Originally Posted by philnopatience

have you seen someone fall off it

I have seen several recruits killed during training events. The truth is that the military actually has a calculated formula of "acceptable death to trainee ratio". Meaning that so many deaths during an exercise are perfectly OK. Three soldiers died on the COC course during my year as a Training NCO, one got ran over after he jumped out the back of a moving 2-1/2 ton, and various sucides or suicide attempts. I have also seen dozens of soldiers fall from the tower or COC/CCC obstacles that didn't die, many had serious injuries though.

I never had a fear of heights...it was the fall to my crunching death that I feared. I never feared water, but drowning in it while being weighted down by 100+lbs of gear scared the shit out of me. Most phobias are there because of your lack of confidence, and once you overcome that you'll be fine. The best way to get rid of your fear of heights? Skydiving, no shit. Jumping out of the plane with no apparent support or ropes or netting will be scary to most. You hardly feel the chute on your back, and it's not until after you have made a few jumps that you are confident your chute will protect you. After about 5-6 jumps, your fear of heights will be nearly gone and you'll be drooling for the chance to jump out of another plane. Skydiving is more addicting than crack and meth combined, but it can also be more expensive as well. If you have a few years, and are looking for something cool to save up some cash for, I'd recommend it.

[[uBp]Irish]

I just did Free-fall at the USAF Academy this past June for AFROTC. Skydiving, except your first jump and all jumps after that, are all solo.


I developed and conquered a new fear too... Standing outside a plane, 4500 feet above the ground and getting blasted by the Wind and Prop-Wash at the same time. You'll get over it quick as soon as you feel the rush of adrenaline as you let go and start doing your procedures for pulling your shoot. Once your canopy is open, craziest feeling you'll ever have.