Silly Military Tricks.

Yeah, that was a pretty poor description of simunitions... They are a special round that can be fired through a real weapon. Simunitions hurt when they hit you, but aren't designed to penetrate. Of course you do need face and throat protection. That being said, there have been some horrible accidents when simunitions and live ammo weren't controlled well enough on the range. I don't know about the military, but law enforcement have had some fatalities when people loaded live ammo instead of simunitions during training exercises.

They'd hate me if I were the Safety Officer. *pan in* *scroll: immediately following orientation and safety briefings...* 1. "Everyone in the firing order--secure a zip-lock bag, print your name on the label and empty your pockets. Everything goes into the bag. No exceptions. None." 2. "Everyone in the firing order--weapons safe, bolts/slides locked to the rear, weapons up and downrange. Proceed to the ammo point, place the plastic bags in the box in front of the NCOIC, secure and inspect ten loose rounds, then form a line right here, in front of me. Do not load your mags until I have inspected each round." 3. *ring* "Range, Tuttle. No, the first rounds haven't been fired yet. I haven't opened the range. When will firing commence? I'll call and let you know. Yessir, I realize that it's a tight schedule. But it's my range and my trainees and everyone leaves here in the same condition he arrived in. Out." Heh. They'd ab-so-tivly hate me...

I remember being tapped as a safety officer on the front 3"50 mounts of an LPD once. Never again. It was gunnery practice on a towed aerial target. The Italians were flyin the tow plane. I had binos. The gun crews were firing on radar control. When they thought they were ready to fire, the gun chief tuned and hollerd "Check sight"? I was to confirm that the guns were oriented on the towed targed not the tow plane. Guess what? Yes it was a timed (read some felt pressure) exercise. Yes radar can see farther than me and binos. I refused to give the response that would let them fire which was "Check sight safe". The gun captain repeated his question. I scanned down the barrels with binos. Again no response, I saw nothing. Then suddenly the gun captain talked into his mike, and flipped the switch on his auto control thingie ... the guns snapped about 5 degrees to the left. I began to see a plane come into view towing a target. The guns were oriented closer to the target as they tracked. Again the question "Check Sight" I responded "Check Sight Safe" Yanno Naval guns have a much nastier "crack" than arty. And with the auto loaders and double guns they shoot like ... really quick. We finished the exercise. I walked to the gun captain and asked. .... you were trackin the plane at frist weren't you? He said yup, then went back to whathehelleveritwaz he was doing on his gun thingie. He wasn't worried, I was the one that would have gone to jail. All together now .... In the Navy, you can catch a strange disease.. In the Navy, you can go down on your knees ... In the Navy, you can swim the 7 seas ... In the Navy ... In the Navy...

When I was in the 25th Inf in Hawaii (75-76), we used to run a pretty tough obstacle course (lots of stuff I've never seen anywhere else). Sometimes we'd don these heavy-duty rubberized hoods that had a screen for a face plate (like the screen in the window of a microwave oven), and under the armpit straps that secured the hood. As we ran the obstacles, the NCOs running the place would shoot at us with bb or pellet guns. No kidding. You'd be up on some 2x4 about 8 feet off the ground, running just to keep your balance, and you'd get whacked in the knee or the leg or whatever, and if you were not focused, off you'd go. I tumbled a couple of times, and was shot off a rope once. That was NOT fun. And talk about getting you angry enough to try really dumb stuff! Aaaarrrrrmmmmyyyyyyy Trrrrraining Suuuuurrrr! Feh!

Simunition: from the Great White North- http://www.simunition.com/ Cheers JMH