The Infamous Gas Chamber

05 July 2011

Today was Gas Chamber day! Wake up was at 0400 and PT around 0545. I really like doing PT that early because it gets me going for the day. Chow was @ 0800 and we were forced to drink 2 glasses of milk. I didn't mind because I like milk, but others were doing everything they could to get it down (like holding their nose). We arrived at the gas chamber "range" around 0900. We immediately had a briefing by the instructors and were lined up to enter the chamber. We had to stay in there 10 minutes and it basically went as such: 30 of us entered the room wearing our protective masks and holding our ACH (Army Combat Helmet) and our M16. We stood there for 3-5 minutes letting the CS gas circulate the room. CS gas is a gas they use in riots. The instructor then came around the room and we had to pull our masks away 3" from our face, state our name, and last 4 digits of our social security number. Then we had to put our masks back on and clear it. No problem! All went well there. The next thing we had to do was to take off our mask, hold it under our left arm, and put on/fasten our ACH, all while holding our M16. I had it all planned out: I loosened all the buckles on my ACH and put the strap on my M16 through my leg. By the way, if anything hit the floor then we had to do the whole thing again. All of my gear worked like I wanted it to, but the catch was that we couldn't leave the room until everyone had completed the instructions. So, I was standing there around 4 minutes inhaling this gas, and trying not to vomit. One guy passed out and they just drug him out by the shirt collar. We finally got out and I had never been so glad to breathe fresh air. It took me about 10 minutes to get back to normal. Overall, it will be an experience I will never forget!

The platoon had classroom time after the gas chamber. The topic covered chemical, biological, and nuclear attacks. Really interesting, but scary! There are some really bad weapons out there they contain these "killers." Very eye-opening.

We ate MREs for lunch today and were back at the barracks around 1400 for cleaning and more class. We went to chow around 1800 and boy did I eat well. I had lasagna with salad, bread, macaroni salad, and jello. For some reason, that hit the spot tonight!

I had the opportunity to witness/experience one of the most courageous events in my life tonight. This 20 yr old, we call him Private Black, has been at Basic Training for 7 months (29 weeks). He is a "hold over" in our platoon, so we see him on a daily basis. He has been through Basic Training already; his only problem was that he could not pass the running portion of the APFT (Army Physical Fitness Test). We were in the classroom doing land navigation training and the Senior Drill Sergeant walks in and says "Chancey get up here." He told me the situation and asked me to pick someone to come with me. We were going to run with Pvt. Black on his evening attempt to pass the run portion of the APFT. He needed to make it in 16 mins 30 secs. This morning his time was 18:15. The first thing I thought was there is no way in you know what this kid had a prayer. Me and this other guy, Bryson, who is a pretty strong runner, ran with Pvt. Black the entire way. Long story short, the kid ran it in 16 min 13 secs and busted out crying! I was so happy for him! He was so appreciative and humble! I hope he goes a long way! Moments like this put a lot of things into prospective for me and I hope it does for you too!

Matthew