Heatstroke protection

[Joey12thga]

WATER! :laugh1:

That's cause you weren't in my pioneer detachment. Drinking is what we do so the stuff we build makes sense.

 

[Nathanb1]

Nope not boys Soldiers. It was under the fuel can becasue that was a centralized point for each gun crew, the Fire Direction Center, and Battery Ops Center. Each section monitored there own people, and the medics would check them when they made rounds. There were no dangers... everything was by long established 6th Inf Div (Light)(Arctic) SOP. It was because of my time in Alaska and in Iraq that my guys in my reeanctment unit know me for such a bear on hydration.. in the 4 years of our existance, NO ONE has gone down from heat or dehydration..

Speaking strictly from a female point of view, you understand......

 

[M E Wolf]

In the Official Medical Records, they refer to heatstroke as "overheat."

Lots of hits using 'overheat' as a term and another term usually affixed near it is sun-stroke.

M. E. Wolf

 

[B Peach]

In the museum at the Gettysburg VC, there is something that looks like the top part of a kepi that Confederate soldiers would wet down and wear under their caps to protect them from collapsing from the heat. Do reenactors use the same thing today?

Never heard of that.

I have seen on fil and re enacting, the use of the Percy Havelock, which was his invention in India to prevent heat stroke of the English, and is the white attatchment that clips onto your cover at the back and ides to prevent the neck from getting exposed to heat.

Shendoah has Rosco p coltrane, from Dukes of Hazard wearing one iirc, when he is shot down.

 

[Republican Blues]

The havelock really didnt last long in the field...They actually didnt last past Manassas. Soldiers found they restricted air flow, and actually made them hotter.

 

[IronEagle]

the only heatstroke prevention I saw while at the Gettysburg Reenactment and others was to take off one's jacket and down massive amounts of water.

 

[B Peach]

The havelock really didnt last long in the field...They actually didnt last past Manassas. Soldiers found they restricted air flow, and actually made them hotter.

Very intresting, ive trawled the net and its clear it had universal dislike in the WBTS, what ive yet to grasp is why the thing stayed in use till ww2 in the Uk, also Japanese for instance haveing it as standard kit.

 

[Republican Blues]

The WBTS pattern came all the way around past the ears., and was a cap cover. The Japanese Version was a three piece affair that allowed for air circulation, and only covered the back of the neck. Brits (and Aussies) would sometimes make thier own, and they did were lighter and again only covered the back of the neck. Be advised, movies and reenactments are not the best source of material culture research.

 

[sargebill]

I know what your referring to,i used to have one,it did work quite nicely though in the Florida heat it didn't stay cool for too awful long...lol

 

[1SGDan]

Several things from my experience in hot weather

In most latrines there is a urine color gauge so you can evaluate your hydration level (exactly how this works for females I'm not sure)

If you drink plenty of water there is less chance of problems

I have thrown a wet towel over my head to reap the benefits of evaporational cooling. Of course once this is dry the value is diminished and becomes a heat retainer.

 

[sargebill]

i used to own one it worked ok for a short period of time,had to constantly keep rewetting it though

 

[1SGDan]

thereby revealing the benefit of evaporational cooling

 

[coltshooter1]

A friend of mine is an ex-Special Forces Sgt. and always said that if you did not feel like urinating you were getting dehydrated (at least that's the clean version of his statement). He said that is one of the first lessons taught by the instructors during hot and humid weather.

 

[ole]

Have read a bit on that, coltshooter. One of the first indicators of dehydration is that you become not thirsty. If you don't want to drink your water, you're on the slippery slope.

Having grown up on a farm, the older folks always had water handy. Never did understand why they did that, but it is clearer now. The men always wore long-sleeves and hats and drank copious amounts of water. I'll suspect that the same rules apply in the sand box.

 

[dvrmte]

Up until a few years ago I ran year around. Not just for exercise, I trained for racing. I guess I have a competitive streak.

I've ran in temperatures from +12 to +100 degrees. Be warned, you can overhydrate. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5630821

When I ran more than six miles in hot weather, I would get in my truck and drop off gatorade bottles at intervals along the route before I ran.

Before a race I would start drinking water a few hours before a race and stop when my pee was clear. It takes a while to figure out how much water you need to stay properly hydrated. Ideal for me was finishing the run weighing about a pound less than when I started. Any more water and I'd have to stop on the roadside to relieve myself, a sign of too much water.

My boxing trainer required us to train in plastic sweatsuits. I was in my early twenties then. I usually weighed 152 lbs. when I started and a couple hours later I weighed 147 lbs., my fighting weight. The training was so intense that I couldn't consume enough water to prevent weight loss. The trainer was an ex-Marine boxer that believed in what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

My dad spent two winters near Fairbanks, Alaska when he was in the Army/Air Force back in 1947-1949. He was involved in the insect study and spent a lot of time going from place to place gathering insect larvae for the scientists during the winter. He spent many a night sleeping on the snow without heat. He said his last worry was getting dehydrated and the thought of it never entered his mind. He said he often held back on water due to the problems of getting all those buttons unfastened and then fastened back to relieve himself. Most of the soldiers in Alaska didn't have to go through what my Dad did. He volunteered for the insect study because he got bored pretty quick with life on the base.

 

[dvrmte]

Wisdom from my Dad:

I've mentioned before that my Dad has traveled most of the world with his job. When he was in Pakistan installing textile machinery he said he came close to dehydration several times until he took the advice of the locals to wear their clothing. So as he put it, he wore a bedsheet with a rag on his head. Those people aren't stupid. Clothing captures the perspiration and shades the skin providing a cooling effect. That works well in a dry, hot environment but can kill you in a hot, humid environment.

I know civil war soldiers didn't like the havelock but I'm sure if used correctly, it would have saved many lives. Union troops would seem to suffer more with the dark uniforms and cap. The British in India wore khaki colored uniforms with white havelock and cap. Dark colors absorb the heat while lighter ones reflects it. The ideal summer hat IMO would be made of straw, my favorite. I often wear a straw hat in the garden and when I'm fishing. They're light colored and allow evaporative cooling of the head. That is the main part of preventing heat stroke, keeping your brain cool. If it is really hot I dunk the straw hat in water and put it back on. It dries to fit your head perfectly then.

 

[tresho]

Lots of good posts on this thread.
I have noticed a great many references to heat-induced illnesses in Union units during the Petersburg campaign from official & pension records. I have also found several references to their relatives dying of 'heat stroke' between 1870 and 1900 back in the Great Lakes region from death causes documented in old death records. It's been a perpetual problem. I suspect that injuries and death from heat-induced illnesses outnumber ailments related to too much fluid intake by about 100,000:1, just my educated guess. I write as a retired emergency physician. The majority of all my patients were at least mildly dehydrated on arrival to the ER for whatever their problems were, from sprained ankles to heart attacks. That's why so many emergency patients have IV's started even though there seems to be no pressing need for it, it's a whole lot easier to start an IV before someone passes out.
The hottest work I myself ever did was laying concrete blocks outdoors in Austin TX on a summer day when the air temp was 100 and the humidity about 30% with a steady wind of 20-30 mph blowing. I was 19 at the time, wore long sleeves and long pants with a broadbrimmed hat, drank copious amounts of water, Mountain Dew and beer, along with Fritos corn chips. I did not have to carry heavy objects long distances, everything we used was stacked up right next to our work site. If I had to carry bags of cement or blocks longer distances, I couldn't have done that job. I was also jogging a mile or two every day, usually in the morning before it got too hot. Outside of being tired at the end of that day's work, I felt just fine. My dad worked side by side with me, he was 55 then, and worked shirtless and hatless. He was rather ill by the end of the day, and the next day had a 2nd degree sunburn. And to think he had served with the US Army in the South Pacific, I don't know how he survived.
Now that I'm 63, there is no way I can repeat that feat of strength & endurance, and live to tell about it. Older people are more prone to heat-induced illnesses. Remember there were 10,000 extra deaths in France during a 2003 (IIRC) heat wave there. Most of those were elderly people. After Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, many of the deaths were not directly related to the storm but to the heat & humidty combined with a lack of water, a very high percentage of deaths there were in the over-70 population. This is important for re-enactors over the age of 50 or so.
The quickest rule of thumb to maintain adequate hydration is the Army way of monitoring for concentrated urine, then drink more water until urine is less concentrated. Severe dehydration medically (without testing or measuring anything, just using your regular senses) would be sunken eyes, dry mouth, decreased skin turgor with 'tenting' - pinch the skin lightly and release, the skin will not rebound as it usually does, a pulse not as strong as usual (takes experience to know what that difference is.). The previous medical signs are consistent with severe dehydration. However, in hot weather many people will get severe heat induced illness long before they are that dehydrated, so you really don't want to wait that long.
And you cannot rely on feelings of thirst to determine whether or not you are dehydrated. Some of the most dehydrated patients I have had were not thirsty in the least. Some of my thirstiest patients just had dry mouths, and needed no extra fluid.
And even if you are perfectly hydrated, you can get heat-induced illness. There is a limit to what the body can stand. Heavy exertion in someone in very good physical condition under hot/humid conditions can bring this on very quickly.

 

[K Hale]

Man, just reading that makes me want to drink some water and stay out of the sun.