Posted on 02/26/2014 8:55:18 AM PST by C19fan
British soldiers are being banned by health and safety rules from training at a military base in the Arctic circle - because it's too cold. Locals at the Allied Training Centre in Porsanger in Norway said they were stunned that while Norwegian troops were out in -25C weather, the Brits were being kept in the warm because of the army rules. The base commanding officer Lieutenant Colonel Trond Thomassen confirmed: 'British officers are not in a position to train with large divisions at Porsanger, where the temperature drops to 25 degrees below zero.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
The UK Armed Forces will soon only be available 9-5 with weekends off, and don’t expect an answer during lunch or tea time.
We have seen a siege of single digits and teens here since the beginning of January. Working outside at the refinery, I can’t help but sympathize..!
Well, let’s hope that the Russians have the good taste to not start any trouble when the temp drops below -25.
Hmm...Arctic Circle. Cold. There’s probably a connection there, but I’m just not seeing it.
The Swiss air force is a 9-5 M-F gig. There was a recent hijacking of a Florence-bound plane to Switzerland that revealed this.
I was stationed at Grand forks AFB for a few weeks years ago...
It was October but already bitterly cold and we would have gotten an Article 15 for going outside or walking to work or getting frost bite...
someone had to come and pick up anyone without a car for a lift to work..
I doubt if there was much training there either...
> The UK Armed Forces will soon only be available 9-5 with weekends off, and don’t expect an answer during lunch or tea time.
Or they might just unionize like the Dutch armed forces did.
Similar to the Swiss air force response during the recent hijacking. "It was after office hours".
lol
yep
This article does’t provide enough information to know if the restrictions are reasonable.
-25C = -13F. If the soldiers aren’t equipped or trained for survival in these conditions, having them do training anyway would be quite dangerous.
Of course, why are they sending them off for winter training if they aren’t properly equipped?
I’ve spent a good deal of time ski-camping, in temps as low as -33F. If you aren’t equipped and trained for it, you can be in a lot of trouble verrryy quickly.
In 1960 in Grafenwohr {German, NAZI death camp WWII} US Army training base, we stayed there for 30 days and slept out side when we were in the field for training.
During the coldest nights with temps at -22F, we used the tarps off of the guns 155 Howitzers to build shelters.
Never been so cold for so long.
It was too cold to sleep, and shooting the guns during training was at half speed because every one had to wear gloves.
The Soviets used to run incredibly harsh cold weather exercises, teaching their men to survive with only their overcoat.
I remember reading a description of one during the 80s, it was for line troops in someplace like Siberia, and it was very intimidating to read about how much more advanced they were than ourselves, in cold weather training at the individual level.
Grafenwohr was not a Nazi death camp. Before and during WII it was a major training ground for the German Army
You are correct, I got my nazi training/death camps mixed.
I always heard it was Wildflecken or Hoenfels (sp?) that was really cold.
I do remember pulling guard at Graf one night on a temporary ammo dump, three coils of concertina wire stacked to make a perimeter.
There was artillery going over all night too, flashes, boomboomboom, whooshwhooshwhoosh, crumpcrumpcrump.
I’d post the guard, go back to the hex tent we were using for a guard shack and put my sleeping bag around me like a robe while wearing my parka and field pants with liners, long johns, wool shirt, fatigues and trigger mittens and still shivering violently all night, sitting on a folding chair with a PRC (prick) 77 radio next to me, drinking coffee all night.
The first thing a new guy was told was don’t screw with the track or tank heater, people would get very upset with you if they thought you broke it, lol.
Compared to the precision, computer arty fire of today, those guys were shooting like a kentucky rifleman with a muzzle loader.
We had so many over shoots {where the round went all the way over the target, by miles,} and landed among the ranks of other US Army guys, playing war on the other side of the target.
There is no such thing as "friendly fire". If you get kilt by your own guys, you are dead.
I saw and treated way too many GIs killed by "friendly fire".
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