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Airmen train high schoolers in winter survival

Specialists with the Air Force’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance Escape training program led high school students through winter survival in Alaska — courses normally taken only by airmen that may be exposed to combat.

According to an Air Force press release, cadets from two junior ROTC programs hiked and slept in the wilderness surrounding Elmendorf Air Force Base near Anchorage from Feb. 29 to Mar. 1.

There, they started fires from natural elements, built snow shelters, learned to signal for help and warded off hypothermia.

“Out of all the information the cadets learned, the snow shelter construction was most important, in that, they spent the night there,” said retired Chief Master Sgt. Bill McNew, the Air Force Junior ROTC Aerospace Science Instructor for Eagle River. “With subzero temperatures, their shelter played a big part in the cadets not becoming injured.”