Reply #20: Really? Is that new? [View All]

[enlightenment]

20 years ago I was AF reserves out of Colorado -- a MAPS unit. They sent us to Tulsa for our 2 weeks -- 12 hour shifts of loading and off-loading C-141's and 130's.

I was in my mid-twenties and very fit, but weighed about 120 soaking wet, which is pretty thin for me (I'm female). The temps were about 110 and the humidity was very high. After about 4 hours of working, I'm taking a short break with my Sgt., sitting on the back bay door of one of the aircraft -- it was about 9 am. We're wearing fatigue pants, steel toes, green t-shirts and our ball caps. I'm chatting about something when he looks over at me and asks if I'm feeling okay.

Sure, I say. Down he jumps, grabs me off the door and throws me over his shoulder (with me thinking he has lost his mind). He sprints to the port office, opens the door and carries me into the air conditioning. That' the last thing I remembered until I woke up in the hospital on a cooling bed. My temperature was 105 and climbing when they got to me.

He had noticed that I had stopped sweating -- my t-shirt and the band of my ball cap were completely dry. I was very lucky.

We shouldn't have been out there, I guess; but they didn't suspend anything because of what happened to me and I was back to work before the two weeks were out.

What happened to this woman was a tragedy, but I doubt they'll be a law suit -- better training would make a lot more sense.