Comments on: SERE School

By: helohellion

helohellion — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 19:18:01 +0000

Speaking of boots boots boots, does anyone know what song it was that sounded like russian jazz (Scat). Just a woman make noises really but after little sleep I swear there were hidden messages!!

By: Mags

Mags — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 12:59:55 +0000

Brunswick, March 1983. My biggest mistake was taking offense at being called “enswine”, and after ‘correcting’ my captor received a great reward of using my body to try to break down a wall. Loved the ‘box’ though… I still get cramps in my calves just at the thought. Firehosed while naked standing in the snow – loved that too… not. And like everyone, made several copies of the graduation certificate and hoped to never, ever have to do it again, or for real. It was by far the best school the Navy ever ‘offered’ me, and I will never forget the experience. I made me a better man. Today, I think of those that go through it and only hope the training is as realistic as it was for me, and appropriate to today’s enemy – My son is there in Warner Springs right now as we speak – a new fledgling SeaHawk pilot enroute to his first fleet squadron, carrying on the tradition. I look at the calendar and the clock and know what he must be experiencing at day 11, right now, and am praying for him. Of course I know it’s training – but for me it at one point it became real, and I know he must be hurting, starving, and … resisting. God Bless our fighting men and women.

By: John Walsh

John Walsh — Wed, 12 May 2010 06:01:30 +0000

Was this in Warner Springs? We made the students work for the sandwiches. We could usually see the students trying to get out of the compound, but we had discretion on whether to let them get away with the escape. If they showed some creativity, we let them proceed. Otherwise,back to pounding the ground with rocks or moving dirt from one hole to another.

When I was a student, I managed to burrow under a wood pile next to the fence (how convenient) and sneak out. Damn, that sandwich and the water were awesome after days of starving. When I called down on the intercom from the shack, they came and got me and tossed me into one of the boxes for a while. I fell asleep and didn’t respond to the call for my number. Low and behold, the lid came up and the light did shine on me. A guy the size of Paul Bunyan lifted me straight out the box and tossed me across the room. IN essence, they didn’t want us to fall asleep and develop pneumonia.

That was one crazy damn place to be stationed.

By: John Walsh

John Walsh — Wed, 12 May 2010 05:49:20 +0000

I also vacation at Warner Springs, but in 1968 and I got the dubious distinction of becoming an instructor there as well. Of course I had to go through the school and like a total idiot, I never picked up on the fact that five of us (also assigned) were dressed differently from the rest of the student. I remember the pigeons and the rabbits, and the fact that grown men will run like children when an improperly dispatched rabbit comes back to life and starts crying.

We had an ensign leading our group in the navigation exercise and he managed to get us lost in the deadly heat of summer. If it wasn’t for a couple of us enlisted, we’d have likely had some serious casualties. We found water the old fashioned way, saw some beautiful green trees next to a dry river bed.

At the end of the exercise, they tied my hands behind me (not quite over yet), threaten to shoot me if I didn’t eat everything they fed me and proceeded to drop a raw oyster into my mouth, chases with a raw egg (cracked on my forehead) and finished it off with a bottle of catsup.

I did almost the same thing when we got back to North Island (FAETUPAC DET 6).They took us to the mess hall to get something to eat and I decided to go over to the bowling alley and get some real food. Big mistake. I went through the menu like a man possessed. Big mistake that. I almost ended up in Balboa Naval Hospital for observation due to eating too much.

I don’t remember anything being as tough in life as going through that school. Someone on another board mentioned one person dying up there and I might be the corpsman one who dealt with that death. Sadly, they brought in someone who had been dead for hours and asking the corpsman to do something for him.

By: Kendrick79

Kendrick79 — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 18:56:22 +0000

I was wondering which mountain range we were on during survival school. does anyone know? It was back in 2001.

By: Humble1310

Humble1310 — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:58:05 +0000

Oh c’mon, it was great fun. You got paid to go camping and kill bunnies.

I’d do it again. Esp after having done it all already. . .