I cannot tell you the distance because I am not sure of where I crashed the plane, but it was 6 days walking with an AK bullet in my leg.
I cannot tell you the distance because I am not sure of where I crashed the plane, but it was 6 days walking with an AK bullet in my leg.
Good one Fatty! How close to Zero-Ass thirty is O-Dark thirty?
About 15 minutes in between for a quick jerkoff in the bush.
I would assume there is some sort of backstory to this? Please...do tell.Originally Posted by RedJohn
If you think that come SHTF you are gonna jock up in all your kit and be a death-dealing one man army, you're an idiot - izzyscout
I'm interested in the back story as well...
It is, of course, obvious that speed, or height of fall, is not in itself injurious ... but a high rate of change of velocity, such as occurs after a 10 story fall onto concrete, is another matter.
About 10 miles. I guess I'm a slacker.....mind you that was when I was 16. Shortly after.....I got a car.
Not the longest, which was 20 miles, but the roughest was the trail to Havasupai Falls in the Grand Canyon. 5200" of elevation change, 25 F temperature change. Going down was much easier than coming back up. I was 25 when I did that. Cured me of wanting to hike I'll tell you. As a young exploration geologist I did about 10 miles daily, usually ending the day with about 50 lbs of samples. That came back to haunt me in my 40s when I had a hemilaminectomy and discectomy. I ride horses now instead of hiking.
Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me Liberty or give me death." Patrick Henry, Virginia House of Burgesses, March 23, 1775
Quo Vadis?
Luke 22:36, And he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.
emergencyfoodssupplies.com
Yes there is one. There won't be any "details", not for another year. When I was young, I was working Navy Intelligence. I was deployed in Africa. Outside of the information gathering, there were some other special missions. For this particular mission, there was nothing extraordinary to it. Steal a plane, fly to a neighbor unfriendly country, land on a dirt road, get the package that special forces were to deliver to me, bring the package to the original location. Mission's over. I am at this time a cocky bastard. Some say that I am still to a certain point. I am James Bond meets Superman. I'd accept anything as long as adrenaline is flowing.
Borrowing the plane was easy to me. I choose a Cessna 210 that should do the job. This choice would save my life later because of its construction. As I reach the country's border, I drop below radar (these Russians radars were no that good at that time) and get to my destination fairly easily. I land on time and within an hour the package arrives. The problem is that the package was to be bailed out of a local jail and that not everything went according to plan. They were closely followed by a party whose intention were definitely unfriendly. I have to attend to the package because he had been mistreated in the jail and I would not be able to do it while flying low out.
As I start the engine, the search party is making its way in the area. I have only one way to take-off and it is going toward them. The Cessna can take-off fairly rapidly and climb very high fast but the speed isn't there anymore. I decide to use that method and offer an angle on the plane that is showing a lot of it. As I climb they start firing at the plane. lucky for me they're not too good shots. I manage to get hit by a few bullets while taking off. I guess (I can only guess because I never got to inspect the plane later) that they hit the battery and/or the generator because I loose electricity almost immediately thus losing any instrumentation that is not vacuum powered. I believe they also hit the engine as I will lose it later and a couple rounds go thru the cabin floor. Where I got lucky is that the floor of that pressurized plane was stronger built than other models. One of the bullets that made it thru the floor ended up in my leg but had lost enough velocity that it stayed in the muscle and did not went up and explode my knee. That would have been bad.
As I am flying away, the engine start giving me troubles, I am above water. My HF is down, my navigation system is down, so I cannot call for help and tell them where I would crash. I am basically on my own, I am wounded, and my package is not in a very good shape. I can see the coast when the engine starts to crap up on me. I am over an hour out so I am safe as far as the enemy is concerned, I decide to make it to the coast line. I'd rather crash on land than at sea. We have life jackets but no raft.
Well, faith decided that we needed to swim a little. At less than a click off-shore I have to put the plane down. The engine has quit running and I am not high enough to reach land. All in all the water landing went smooth and because of the pressurized cabin (it only has a couple small holes) the plane stay afloat. I have time to put my life jacket, strap the package into his, open the door and as the water rush in the cabin, I have time to pull the both of us out. It is swimming time now. The salt water on my wound is not helping and I am afraid that our blood would bring sharks. Strangely enough I did not bleed much.
After the swimming part, that seemed to take forever, we got on the beach. I took care of both our wound with what was left of the kit that was in my side pocket. After resting a little, we left in search of civilization. That was not going to be easy. I have a gun, 2 spare mags and a knife. I have cash too and this would be very helpful later on.
To make it short, after roaming in the African bush for 6 days eating whatever we could find or kill (none of us can run and my leg is taking a color I do not like). We reach a village where my cash made a beat up truck magically appear, we're brought to a hospital where we both recovered pretty nicely. The doctor told me that I was about a day away from loosing my leg.
So what was the distance walked? I cannot even guess. I don't know exactly where I crashed, I don't know where is the village that had the truck. To me, it looked like a thousand kilometers. It may have been a hundred. I have no clue, but we were not walking fast, either of us. One of the days, we did not walk at all. I had killed a fairly big animal at a water point. We ate, drank and rested that day. I think that it did us a lot of good.
That was a eye opener to me. I was only carrying what was on my person. the gun, the knife, the cash and the life vest. The mirror from the vest was a life saver. I had no food, no water, NOTHING! At that time, I also had not completed a decent survival training yet. It ended being a freaking fucked up mission. I never went anywhere without a backpack after that. Also remember that this was in the early 80's and we did not have the equipment that we have now.
RedJohn says, "John Miller is a wimp"
Wow. That is some intense stuff.
If you think that come SHTF you are gonna jock up in all your kit and be a death-dealing one man army, you're an idiot - izzyscout
Hats off to RedJohn... that is an amazing story!
It is, of course, obvious that speed, or height of fall, is not in itself injurious ... but a high rate of change of velocity, such as occurs after a 10 story fall onto concrete, is another matter.
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