RAFINO

RAFINO Report
ISSUE 22 - Summer 1999
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ARMY "COOL SCHOOL"
By Carl Rotz


(This concerns my activities over another long holiday weekend (Veterans' Day) leaving my ever-loving wife home to keep the fires burning.  Speaking of fires, I sure learned to appreciate them when I was at the Northern Warfare Training Center, Arctic Operations School - more affectionately called "K-K-KOOL SCH-SCHULE" by the students.  I know you'll all be envious of my experiences there.)

I started out Friday morning, the 15th of November, from Elmendorf and flew north to Fort Greely where the school was located. In the afternoon I found myself in the classrooms in company with about 130 other officers ranging in grade from 2nd Lts. up to Brigadier Generals.  Not too bad a start.  The lecture hall was warm and cozy, but when we got back to our Quonset Hut quarters we found some ominous looking equipment stashed beside our bunks: sleeping bags, rucksacks, etc.  Oh well, our bunks had sheets, blankets and pillows on them and after a couple hours of bridge, I turned in.

Saturday all day was like Friday afternoon:  lectures, films and more lectures about living out in all that white stuff at 30-40 degrees below and belower.  Got back to our quarters about 5 p.m. (sun had already gone down at 2:30 p.m. and it was dark by 3:45 pm) -- found skis and poles .  Oh boy - now the sport was coming, but first, we spent Sat. night waxing the skis and fixing the bindings to fit our boots.  A word about the boots -- big, white Arctic boots with rubber outside and inside, with the in-between area filled with insulation material.  We called them "Mickey Mouse" boots but they were surprisingly comfortable and kept the feet warm-warm, but not dry, as the feet sweat and make the socks wet.

Sunday morning it was back to the classroom again for more instruction allowing 1 hour off for church (accommodated by starting classes at 7 a.m. instead of 8 a.m.)  That afternoon we finally started off with our skis.  I had visions of a glorious afternoon of shussing down the slopes.  But no such luck.  Most of the class had never been on the "slats" before, so the whole afternoon was spent on level ground learning to ski and doing some cross-country skiing - and that's work.  Oh, well the next day was a holiday, so surely I'd get in some good skiing then.  Of course there were some nasty words on the schedule about moving out on an overnight bivouac, but surely that had to be a misprint on the schedule as Monday, after all, was a holiday.  Again, no such luck.  Posted was a notice to fall out with full mountain gear.  Soon we were off on our cross-country skis a-huffing and a-puffing through the vast Alaskan woods and fields.

We arrived at the bivouac site before nightfall (about 4 p.m.) and were put to work collecting wood for the camp fire.  We were cooling down from ski exertion and beginning to realize how cold it was -- some 45° below zero, so I didn't need urging to get a big fire going.

The evening was filled with more lectures and about no one venturing far from the camp fire.  Then we drew lots to see what time each of us would stand fire watch.  I drew 4 a.m. 

I had two mountain sleeping bags with one stuffed inside the other.  I stripped down to skivvies and quickly slipped in.  I wondered at the tight fit after zippering up.  I was warm but could barely move.  After a wide awake hour of that I had had enough and crawled out and volunteered for fire watch the rest of the night.  At dawn I examined the sleeping bags.  Each was marked "bag, mountain, sleeping, SMALL".  Lesson #1 in cold weather indoctrination is: examine your cold weather gear before venturing out in the cold.  One of my classmates forgot another lesson - don't touch exposed skin to exposed metal in sub-zero temperatures.  The result is very painful.

I now am a "Cool School" Veteran."