It was the day after the 4th of July, and we were training. Some of us were bleary-eyed, some of us were somewhat drained, and some were just tired. Ya, whatever celebratory events we attended for the holiday had taken their toll. Still, what could be a more fitting way to celebrate Independence Day weekend than to come to the range and train with our fellow militia folks?

Yep, it rained, and the road was shot. (Donations for gravel are needed here...) It was hot and muggy, when it wasn't raining, and there was a veritable sea of bugs flitting about in search of militia blood. It was a hoot, AND a holler, I tell ya....

There were a couple of newly installed (affixed? mounted?) sighting systems being sighted in as we arrived. One replaced a difficult-to-use open sight on a Saiga AK. (Refer to last month's Field Report, Operation Overload). Another replaced a bright orange Trijicon. They were both similar zero-magnification Holo-sight type devices. These are splendid for quick target acquisition, and serve well up to at least 100 yards. I have a Tasco Pro-Point that serves a similar function. These are all excellent urban sights.

While the sighting in and zeroing was going on, Lou set up the mobile aid station. This consists of an overhead tarp, a table with a vast (and getting vaster) soiree of medical gear and supplies, a cot, and a stretcher which rested on a pair of sawhorses.

 The area is sufficiently large for two medics to work on two injured or ill persons. The stretcher can be picked up from the sawhorses and used to recover someone from the field. As of right now, the mobile aid station is primarily a first-responder type recovery area, with an ample bandaging unit. This area can also serve to help someone recover from a heat-related injury, as it provides shade and fluids for re hydration. It can also be used by properly trained persons to stabilize someone prior to transport to the nearest hospital (in Owosso), if necessary.

We think that if we work on this, and develop a group of first-responders/paramedics, then maybe this set-up can be used to relieve local EMS in the event of a disaster or attack. The idea is that we could handle the less-than critical victims, leaving the local EMS to deal with the more seriously injured people. Lou even suggested that if nothing else, we could be a rest area and re hydration point for rescue workers. This is something that we should all think about. If you know where we can get a Red Cross First Responder class, please let us know.

Frank, who by default was our designated medic, also has his Explorer set up to transport a person on a stretcher. I know first-hand that this works.

We couldn't just set all this up without trying it, so we had a mucho fun patient evacuation drill. I volunteered to be the patient. Yippee.

It was a simulated gunshot wound to my lower left leg, but I had been bleeding out for a while, having walked a mile or so with the injury before nearing the aid station. The aid and litter team moved into action from the aid station to recover me from the field. The team consisted of a medic, two stretcher-bearers, and two security persons. I was happy to see that security was included in this.

The team bandaged the injury, lifted me onto the stretcher, and used my web gear to support my head. (note: web gear does not make a comfy pillow.) Frank had also secured and cleared my rifle, which was a good move.

The stretcher bearers lifted me up, and carried me to the aid station, only stopping once to rest and readjust their grip. The "ride" was rougher and scarier than it looks. At the station, they checked again for breathing, and determined that the wound needed another bandage. The new bandage was applied OVER the initial one, and this seemed to stop the bleeding. Were I conscious, they could have given me some fluids, but I was out. (An IV would have been nice here I guess, maybe to replace some of the lost blood, but 1. We are not trained to stick someone with an IV, 2. We do not have any, not even home made ones, and 3. They ain't stickin' me as part of a drill.) A simulated IV was used (see picture).

I was then loaded into the Explorer on the stretcher, and off we drove toward the Urgent Care Facility in Perry. It is much rougher riding on an uneven muddy road when you are strapped in to a stretcher (yes, I was strapped in. This are suck.) There was some kind of detour, so we didn't actually find the place for several more minutes, and when we got there, it was closed. At this point, I was pronounced dead. We had not considered that they would be closed at all, and had zero plans for an alternate facility. Dead, dead, dead.

Well, this sucked. To make things more suckier, it rained like hell, too, and even though I was dead, neither our medic nor the driver saw fit to unstrap me so it really sucked more. We do these things to learn, and to make our mistakes in training so we don't make them in real life. We now have a map to the 24 hour Hospital in Owosso, which will be a fifteen to twenty minute drive. Next training weekend, the medic vehicle and maybe another volunteer will drive the route, and maybe even take a picture of the place. We will probably keep a couple of these maps on hand at the range.

This was not the most fun militia exercise, but it was something that we felt was necessary.

Upon our return, we had a little after-action review of what worked and what did not. When we do this again, it will run more smoothly.

One of our hard core members had some old gun powder that was decomposing into a weird purple mist. Never heard of this before. It was cool.

There was a bit more zeroing and sighting in (it was a fairly laid back post holiday training day), and I am confident that more rifles with better scopes will shoot more accurately. (Especially that big CETME.) The guys who were running the spotting scopes (mostly LR, from what I saw) really were a big help in getting the rounds into the center of the targets.

That wasn't all, noooooo....We had to do a bread-and-butter drill, which is what we now call squad and team drills. We took a squad of six out for a recon, set up a temporary halt position where we covered sectors of fire and security at the halt.

The team leaders then checked on their teams, and made sure everyone drank some water and was otherwise okay. This is where hands-free water sources really come in handy. The teams then switched places, and moved back toward the range area. Camo sucked, because most of us were in T-shirts, but the noise discipline was excellent, and eye contact was more or less maintained between team leaders and their teams.

It was not a super mega high speed training day, but we did pick up a lot with the medical evacuation drill, and several new scopes were sighted in, and the bread and butter drill was a good idea.

See you next time.

-Lee