Weather Watchers

I bet that it’s because that’s what they’ve always done.

Just paid for air conditioning unit to be delivered Monday, fingers crossed it does the job!

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And its in ACTO120

Only 24C today, but feels as hot as the 32C we had a couple of weeks ago, as there is absolutely no wind at all!

How many heatwaves do we need before we become acclimatised?

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More like when is the CoC going trust the volunteer’s experience and realise that they know what they are doing :rage:

Another way of undermining the confidence of the volunteer and take them nearer the age of pulling the handle.

Niji will be Cx’d for RAFAC participants if WBGT hits 32°

Luckily the forecast has started to come down

Army HQ (via RAFAC) has made us all do Heat Module 3 - acclimatisation for deployment.

Half the links in the DLE package are outdated, and one of the slides advises commanders to contact a Navy email address if the deployment activity will start prior to having acclimatised. Im not sure if im meant to email or not :zipper_mouth_face:

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What’s even the point of training if the cadets and staff involved, who get to know how each other work, aren’t allowed to make decisions on the ground. Instead, being treated as though it’s just another event.

HQAC really need to come up with a better strategy on heat.

I’ll repeat what I’ve said before:

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They really are starting to take the piss with this sort of thing.

If they are that worried about our cadets health, they’d be getting in some youth sports coaches or similar. Qualified people who work with young people in strenuous environments. A day with someone like that would actually be quite useful. I really can’t see how HIP Mod 3 would be useful!

Don’t get me started on HQAC and Nijmegen. They don’t have a clue what happens, even CFAVs at HQAC and Regions don’t want to assist. They send a RC out when it gets hot, someone who has probably never been out there before and make decisions that impacts everyone.

Again, they forget about those who have been out there numerous times, understand the issues with heat and, more importantly, understand that the walkers set off at 0300-0500 each day with recognised rest stops, ample water and food stops, and spectators who are there to assist when the going gets tough.

TBF i quite like SWs approach. Its been pragmatic this summer.

Was that vertically or assisted out horizontally??

It only takes three days above the local threshold to be categorised as a heatwave, but it takes two weeks to acclimatise: so you could have any number of heatwaves without officially becoming acclimatised, if none of them last for two weeks. Of course, once that two-week heatwave is over you are no longer considered acclimatised.

With extremes of temperature, you come back to the RIAT report about the charts etc are not valid for children.

Which is a strange decision considering everything we do in RAFAC in the UK or Northern Europe is considered un-acclimatised.

To be fair, the RC who is attending this year has previously been to Nijmegen twice before and is the OF5 lead for Road Marching.

The corps is treading on a difficult tightrope. The HSE is taking a long hard look look at the MoD regarding Heat Illness. Everything we do is optional and we need to bring everyone home in one piece. Better to make a difficult decision this year and go next year, than make the wrong decision and never go again.

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Running… :wink:

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well in your own post you indicate “advises commanders” so isn’t a “must”

I am not convinced it is supposed to be helpful to you as decision makes, but it is useful to them as where the “buck stops” responsible people.
they can indicate “we provided X, Y and Z” to our personnel so they were aware of expectations. Any deviation from the learning and the fault is on you not them.

But the event will cancel itself before it gets that bad. They’ve done it before, they’ll do it again.

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The organisers of the event learned a lot in 2006. Before then there were not any free water stops on the route. The only place to get water way from householders on the side of the road.

Since covid the committee have been much more proactive in ensuring the event is safe and able to carry on. They lost a huge amount of money during covid, they cannot afford to cancel again financially or reputationally. 2022 they cancelled day 1 to ensure there was three more days of marching (unlike 2006) and last year they took 10km or 10kg off all of the marchers. They also took the unprecedented decision to shorten the route for cadet military marchers down to 30km. This decision was also applied to military individual marchers who did not carry the 10km ballast or teams where the majority were not weight carriers. The KNBLO and the Marches organising committee are now much more flexible when it comes to heat stress and applying the contingency measures. This is all good news for the RAFAC cadets who will be marching next week.

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