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Aviation History
1950
1950 - 0711.PDF
FLIGHT, 13 April 1950 SURVIVAL SCHOOL Rigorous Arctic Courses for R.C.A.F. Aircrew: Learning How to "Live on the FRANK H.LINGWORTH AT Fort Nelson, B.C., is a school at which the pupilshope never to have to practice what they study.*" Nevertheless, they learn their lessons well, for they realize that the knowledge they assimilate may mean the difference between life and death. These pupils are aircrew who, likely to fly in extreme northern latitudes, undergo a course at the R.C.A.F. School of Survival. The curriculum includes a fortnight spent among the northern tundras and forests, without food other than the barest iron rations and that which a man can find for himself. The course is necessarily rigorous, and since the school began operations about a year ago many R.C.A.F. men have returned from the tundras with uniforms badly sagging at the waistline; th« more well-padded among them have lost as much as 16 lb in the fortnight. The Survival School has two main pur- poses. The first is psychological—to help the pupil lose his fear of being forced down in the Arctic, a fear that has hampered man's efforts in northern exploration for hundreds of years; secondly, the school endeavours to teach a man how he can meet and defeat the hard conditions which he will encounter after a forced landing. The first part of the curriculum is covered by a series of lectures by experts on the Arctic, the second part by four- teen days spent on the open tundras with the Survival School's manual in the pocket. Each man is dressed in suitable northern clothing, and takes with him a sleeping bag and an emergency kit which includes fishing gear (similar to that carried in Service aircraft), while a limited number of firearms is issued to each group of trainees, to be used collectively. The emer- gency rations are sufficient to keep a man alive, and, according to the school's instructors, "they leave an awful empty feeling in your stomach if they're not supplemented by something else." This "something else"—of which more anon—is detailed in the manual. Every aspect of life in the North is covered. The student learns not to eat snow in its natural state, because, instead of relieving thirst, it causes dehydration of the body; it will quench thirst only when it has been melted. Approxi- mately one quart of water a day is necessary to the man leading an active life in the Arctic. Trainees learn, too, that working up a perspiration in the Arctic can be as deadly as falling through ice, because immediately a man rests from work the perspiration on his body freezes. Some of the facts in the manual do not make sense to the uninitiated. For example, the instructors stress that to be warm in a sleeping bag one must sleep completely naked, no matter how low the temperature may be. The manual also covers northern geography, information about emergency navigation for crews forced down on the tundras, about the building of shelters, hunting, travel, native customs, general care of the body, and the mainten- ance of firearms in sub-zero temperatures. It is the aim of the R.C.A.F. to put all aircrew through the survival course twice, once during the summer and again during the winter. The school has thus far been ooerated from Fort Nelson, but later this year it will operate also from Cambridge Bay, which is well within the Arctic Circle. Courses will be extended to three weeks, students going first to Fort Nelson for a series of lectures and then to Cambridge Bay for the survival test. The school's manual—in some ways reminiscent of those issued to the Far East forces in the last war—covers every aspect of " survival in the uninhabited wilderness of the North," and includes a section in which are given details Pupils of the Survival School wearing the new nylon clothing developed for R.C.A.F. and Army personnel. The photograph was taken on one of the 14-day treks forming part of the course. of how to catch and cook a lemming, how to cook louse- wort—" the most tasty plant of the tundras, eight inches tall with pink or purple flowers"—and of which parts of the polar bear are edible and which poisonous. "All animals in the North are safe to eat—bats, lizards, newts, frogs, snakes (which taste like chicken). Grubs found in the ground or in rotten wood make good food. So do grass- hoppers toasted 00 a stick. But don't eat caterpillars— some of the northern ones are poisonous." The poisonous plants have a chapter to themselves. Also included is information about certain anirpalc which are unfit to eat at certain seasons, and parts of otherwise edible animals which are poisonous—for example, not on any account should a man eat the liver of the polar bear, for it is so heavily charged with vitamins that it causes violent vomiting, peeling of the skin and, in extreme cases, death. The R.C.A.F. "Arctic cookbook" stresses the value of seaweeds to the airman who crash-lands on the coast of Northern Canada—for instance, sea lettuce (which resembles crumpled tissue paper) or purple-weed; both should be eaten raw or boiled into a soup. Carrageen moss clings to stones under water. Its flat forked stems are up to 12 inches long, and, boiled, they make a tasty jelly. Lichens are found throughout the Arctic. Black, brown, grey, they are all edible and are best when collected after rain, though some have an acid taste that may cause internal irritation if the acid is not boiled out first. Rein- deer moss, which is plentiful, grows in sandy soil or under the snow, and is not only nutritious but tasty when boiled. Except for the shark, all northern fish are edible, and may be eaten cooked or frozen. But some freshwater fish in the North contain parasites that render one sick, and, says the Survival Manual, don't eat black mussels (two inches long) because in summer they contain a deadly poison, which toxin cannot be "boiled out." The airman who finds himself forced down in the Arctic is told to keep an eye open for lemmings, the stub-tailed rat to be found throughout the North. In winter they nest beneath the snow, and may be found in the summer by overturning flat rocks or by being snared in their tunnels. The R.C.A.F. is not making secret what it is finding about surviving in the Far North. Much of the material in the Survival School manual is contained in the R.C.A.F.'s Directory of Hinterland Aerodromes. Several of the Directory's six volumes have been completed, and are available to civilian pilots. Meanwhile, the Survival School's instructors are going about their job of teaching aircrew that the North can be friendly—provided that they speak its language. .
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