RIGGER'S BELTS MIGHT HAVE SAVED RANGERS' LIVES
Wednesday,
July 19, 1995
THE FORT BRAGG POST
Four Rangers dead in the
flooded swamps of Florida after a training screw-up in 1995. They were cold,
wet, hungry, exhausted and trying to tie life-support Swiss seats using 13-foot
rope sections to hold snaplinks to slide across a rope bridge (see photo above)
with numb fingers as the wind chilled their weakened bodies into hypothermia
and death. This is not the first time starved Ranger school students have died
in the Florida swamps when the line from "hard-ass" to
"dumb-ass" was crossed as retired CSM Eric Haney describes in his
superb book, Inside
Delta Force. On page 23 he describes how in 1977 twenty-three men had gone
into hypothermia during a night crossing of the Yellow River with 4 men dying.
I guess in our eagerness to play feel-good ego games we never learn to act like adults.
They needed the
life-support belt at their waists to hold a carabiner/snaplink to hold them up
on the rope so they could cross the neck-deep water using the rope bridge.
However, this is totally
unnecessary! Individual tasks that theoretically should take a few minutes
result in half-hours and hours for large groups. The larger the group, the more
time needed. Every Ranger and Soldier can and should
have a life-support "Rigger's belt" at their BDU trouser waist so all
that needs to be done is to clip a snaplink (carabiner) on, connect to the
river crossing rope, and CROSS.
A "Rigger's
belt" of black type XIII nylon parachute webbing and friction-lock buckle
available for $3.75 at some Fort Bragg shoppettes (and off-post surplus stores
for different prices) can be on the waists of every Paratrooper's BDU trousers.
Ask your local parachute Rigger to make some for you and your men. Tuck in your
BDU shirt and clip on a snap-link and you're ready to cross a one-rope bridge
in seconds--not bone-chilling minutes.
Had these belts been
with the Ranger students during the tragedy there might not have been a tragedy
at all. What is needed is for some base leaders to discard their prejudice
against "Rigger's belts" and consider the greater common good and
tactical benefits that these belts can provide.
Uniformity can be
maintained by using a black color. That they are not "Army issue" or
"regulation" is not a valid excuse. [2002 Editor's note: the Natick
belt depicted above is now "issue"] Change the regulation, make them
issue, or at least an authorized option. Rangers and Paratroopers
are not "ordinary Soldiers" (as if there is such a thing); they can
ill afford to carry a flimsy black web belt into the field that cannot support
a useful load with life support reliability.
In fact, even mechanized
infantry Soldiers could use "Rigger's belts." They should be able to
ride on M1A1 Abrams tank turret bustle racks provided they snap-link
(carabiner) themselves in. (Refer to FM 7-8 "Infantry
Platoon and Squad")
A life-support
"Rigger's belt" can be used to pull Soldiers out by rope from the
bottoms of hills, cliffs or up from dense trees by hovering
helicopters unable to land. In the movie, "The Green Berets"
there is a very interesting scene at the end of the movie where John Wayne and
his men rappel off the balcony of a captured NVA General hooked up to Rigger's
belts around their uniform pants.
Certainly if the
time/situation permits, use harnesses and tied Swiss seats specific for the
purpose in mind. But when the time is critical and these things are not
available, then we must be able to turn to something organic to the
Soldier--his uniform's "Rigger's belt."
The Natick Rigger's belt
is made by Blackhawk Industries
and can be ordered from them or U.S.
Cavalry Store by clicking on their hyperlinks.
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