A couple from a peace time sapper.

1/ On the Rifle range in recuits, One of my fellow recuits turned around with a loaded L1A1 SLR instead of keeping it pointed down range and said "Sgt my rifle wont fire" The %$#@ thing (rifle) went off and the bullet hit the ground near the Sgt followed by the recuit. (some how the recuit had a large bruze on the side of his face soon after)


2/ I was on a chopper flight taking the Area Range Saftey Officer (ARSO) on a looksee ( I was just along for the ride)
We where flying up a valley when we noticed some Diggers (Soldiers) about to fire live AT rounds across the valley. He (ARSO) had no idea they where there and or that there was a live fire going on

Fred

Hi there some funny stuff happened to me and to others in my time in TA. At least we all laughed after the events anyway!

1. Battle camp TAPOC Training at Barrybudden camp April 1990, me and another started 5 day excercise fully kitted and heavy loaded with blank ammo, etc at the edge of the burn facing a crossing equal to the length of a four tonner. Him a short ass carrying GPMG with a good few belts of ammo, me carrying Clansman radio pack and spare ammo for him in belts plus my own boxed. On start signal he jumped in first and duelly disappeared ww2 style tin hat and all. Fortunately for him I was a few seconds in reacting to the start signal and watched him go under and was able to fish him out. Had we both jumped at same time I don't know if he would have got up from the depth he was in as it took all our strength combined to pull his ass out. We still had to find a shallower bit to cross at anyhow.

Same excercise we were waiting for a night attack on our section location dug in. I still had Clansman pack with aerial bent horizontally forwards with the section leader in a two man trench which became a three man when one of the guys on his own decided he would join us. We had a sack of thunderflashes still to hand out through section but attack came in. All three of us grabbed a thunderflash each. Mine was third out ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, only it didn't.

On the back stroke, thunderflash hit the aerial ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, left my hand,,,,,,,,,, fell into trench at our feet. We were out like a shot. Climbed back in to a lot of cursing and swearing. For some crazy reason I didn't get to Sandhurst??????????????

2. Salisbury Plain Training Area 1991 or 92 now as future drivers with RLC (V) getting familuerisation training on the Leyland DROPS. Pvt Clark driving with another Pvt were being supervised by a L/cpl in his truck with flatrack of concrete blocks for simulated load. After entering a tank trap Clark reversed out turning and put the load to the point of no return. The result: -

L/cpl and other landed on Clark now immersed in chalk white mud half filled cab. Clark was first out. L/cpl was Helo'ed out with suspected spine damage. Two days in hospital and light duties for him rest of exercise. Plenty ribbing and cleaning of kit for Clark. Bent cab sent back for repairs and hose out.

3. Salisbury Plain and now driving DROPS,,,,,,,,,great fun and then lifetime experience getting to fly in Puma Helo to practice emplaining and drop zone defence in skeliton webbing and rifle only. First flight out I get seat facing open starboard door during nap of the earth roller coaster ride. Pilot hovered 6-10 feet over a rise in the earth formed by soft rolling hill port side and 6foot from edge of steep 14 foot stone wall cutting starboard. All jumped off but starboard stick had still to form all round defence out from helo so we jumped the 14ft. One guys SLR hit ground before he did muzzle first with him landing on the butt end between his legs. He was doubled up in agony,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,everyone else was doubled up laughing. More than just his pride hurt!!!!!!!!!!!!

4. Exercise Scottish Rover as a two man team driving a Bedford 4 tonner in a night-time road and x-country navigation/driving skills competition running out of Drip Bridge Camp around an area I should have known very well as I work within the Stirling Council boundaries. Route took us into Queen Elizabeth forest where upon we got totally lost. Coming out from the forest my driver put the nearside (mine) wheels onto the grass verge which dropped away as the road rose up. I could see what was going to happen and was shouting STOP,,,,,STOP,,,,,,,F******* STOP and watching fence posts pass under my door window.

We stopped,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,now perched at 45 degree angle off verge and only supported by two very stout posts with a 3m wide burn in front of the cab. Lucky we had seat belts on. Scared the hell out of a single woman in a remote cottage after midnight who shut the door on me and called the police fearing she would be attacked. She nearly clubbed her brother in law who had a key and arrived to her aid. The recovery truck arrived and it was the Cpl who had trained my driver and I in methods of recovery at Grantham months earlier. He put us in charge of our own recovery using the Foden Wrecker. 30 seconds of terror going off the road,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,5 hours of hard work getting back on.

Oh how we laughed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nige

Not mine:

My dad and I were watching the History Channel at the local pub after work one afternoon and someone was on tv talking about how big a hard @ss Curt LeMay was. Dad said "I can vouch for that." Dad was a fireman in the Air Force stationed at Offutt in the mid 50s. LeMay's private plane was in a hangar and dad and his crew had the fire watch. One of the guys on the crew promptly back a crash truck into LeMay's plane. My dad and about 40 officer's and enlisted men had to stand tall before the man and get their hides royally chewed by "Iron Ass" LeMay himself.

I was talking to my room mate at Purdue. He mentioned that his uncle was a waist gunner on a B17. I said "Wow, I bet he told you some stories." He said, "He might have but his body washed up on the shore of France in the spring of 1945."

My brother was in the 3/2 ACR in the 80's at Amberg. They got blown out on an alert and were on the Czechoslovakian border so he was driving an "up loaded" M60A3. Their platoon was driving to their preprepared positions and a guy in a Mercedes drove into the side of my brother's tank. Guy was drunk and got out the car with a gun, which as I understand it is unheard of in Germany. Everyone in the tank got out with their side arms and had a stand off until the police arrived. The guy had a trunk full of license plates, beer, and stuffed deer head.

Shaun

Not military, but went on an airsoft meet over the past weekend. One guy brought a couple airsoft grenades and we wanted to test them. Normal external operation (pin and spoon) with an internal clock that is set for 3 seconds and then it pops open and a spring fires about 40-60 bbs outward. That said, the timer's accuracy is dependent on weather. It was about 25 degrees out.

The first grenade I threw had a half second fuze, exploding just over my head and spreading bb's over everyone but the parade of players who lined up to get hit. If we thought that was funny, the second grenade didn't even go off. After about 10 seconds (remember 3 second fuze), the line dropped their guard and 3 guys went for the grenade despite my yelling. It exploded under their hands and despite the intense pain, no one was injured. However there wasn't a dry tear anywhere on that field from all the guys laughing their @#%es off.

Jeff

here's a funny one:
in a hot summer day, me and my tank crew were cleaning the tank and doing some maintenance work on it. I figured I'd better push through, so we could go and relax in the shade, o i assembled the shaft and shot it inside the cannon. I enter the tank i assemble what i thought is the right brush. I hoped outside and started pulling the shaft. But it didn't move. I called for help, but that only caused some broken shaft parts.
i quickly replace the broken shafts and started over. Still, no good.
I try and I try, but the thing wouldn't move! And in the meantime, i broke at least 2-3 shaft parts. At this point I figured something is wrong. I enter the tank, open the breech and see to my amazement that I used the breech brush instead of the bore brush... so i pop 'round to our Sargent and cool as a cucumber i say to him: " ah. sir, we got defective shaft... some of it's parts are broken". he looks at me with a crooked eye and say :"well, go and replace it then"

After 23 years in the Navy and about 15 of that on flight decks of carriers I,ve had a few close calls but one that sticks in my mind is getting aboard an overloaded R4D in Yuma Arizona for our trip back to NAS Miramar. An old Chief enlisted pilot was flying the old bird. We took up all the runway at Yuma to get off the ground,climbing out at about 500 feet all the windows on the port side turned black as an oil line broke. He banked into the dead engine, we bounced down the runway,went to a hanger, changed the oil line and went to San Diego. The old Chief laughed and said s##t happens.

Not Me personally but my late father.
He was stationed at RAF Horsham St. Faith,now Norwich Airport,in the fities maintaining the GCA (ground control approach) equipment.
One day he and his superior officer were doing some routine maintainance on the caravan that contained the contollers equipment (my dad had been on the roof fixing something on the ariels)when if he shouted into the van through the blackout curtain if he could throw the mains switch to test the rig - what he did`nt know was that senior officer had all the cabinets open,the safety bypasses all in place and was reaching into a cabinet to replace some of the valves - to which he got the reply " go on,f&*king electrocute me " SO HE DID !!
Apperently the scream was heard across the airfield - S.O. could`nt press charges because the base commander told him he`d given permission to his junior to throw the switch.
The last time my dad met him he still had the scars were he`d welded himself to the two valve terminals !!!

I served in the US Army, B Troop, 1st Sqn, 3rd ACR, at Ft.Bliss, Texas, in the late 1970s. In retrospect, I should have been a better Soldier than I was...

I had trained on the M-60A1 at Ft.Knox, but did my time on an M551 Sheridan. I did have a few interesting occurrances in the Sheridan, a couple at Bliss, and one at REFORGER 77.

1) We were out on FTX, doing a simulated night assault, shorthanded so only I was driving, and the PLt Sgt, SFC Emerson, was TC. We were charging across the desert, in the pitch black, SFC Emerson telling me to keep going faster, and me telling him I could'nt see anything, he said GO! So, I did...sand dunes can get pretty big, and arroyos can get pretty deep...and before we went head first into one, I got that "OH $#!*" feeling. I think we went into a 20 ft or so arroyo, but luckily did'nt nose over, when we hit. Then all was silent, it killed the engine, the Emerson says "Brown? You OK?" Collecting myself said yeah, and luckily the track started and we able to move, were able to get out of the arroyo, and rejoin the rest of theTroop.

2) In REFORGER, things moved pretty fast, had a few close calls, got a barb wire fence stuck in my track, ripping about 50M out (which really PO'd the owner/farmer...). But one morning, after our platoon had overslept, we were moving out down a rather rain-slick road. I was driving with white knuckles because I could feel the tracks sliding on the rocky pavement. Our track B29, was tail-end for the platoon, my TC, Sgt Evans was telling me to speed it up. I was trying to catch up w/ the platoon, and we came to a curve in the road, which had a huge railroad bridge over it. I was slowing down, and my TC was yelling at me to go faster...Well, the rubber track pads on our tracks were worn flush to the steel, and there was NO TRACTION! So, I hit the brakes, and gave it a full hard left T Bar, but we slammed into the inside wall of the bridge, breaking off the front right idler wheel, and several track links, and the Surf Board. Our Loader, PFC Mata, was standing in the Loader's hatch, and got a cracked rib, and MEDIVACd. After decompressing we were taken to a breakdown area, and eventually we Short-tracked the Sheridan, and finished REFORGER. It was an experience I'll never forget. I found this forum while doing a search to see if anyone had pics of wrecked vehicles from REFORGER77.

From the last 2 events, though, I did learn that when someone, even someone who outranks you tells you to go faster, exercise some disgression!

I did have some other events occur, and saw some others, but I never saw combat, so my stories pale in comparrison to those who have. I give the most heartfelt salute to all our Veterans, for we owe them for our Freedom!

even though this thread is a little old, ill add my couple stories....
first one is actually pretty common for those that have done mortars. there is nothing more invigorating that getting a misfire that makes it far enough out of the tube and stops halfway out of the muzzle.
i was in turkey doing a joint op (marines and turks), again with the mortars, we had a HMMMV full of different 81mm rounds that we needed to get to the gun positions. my roomate and good friend was driving. the 2nd louie in the passenger seat, me and another guy are sitting on the ammo crates in the back of the highback hmmmv. for those that dont know, its a canvas top. the only thing stopping us from driving over to the gun pos. is a deep, narrow ditch. i hear the lt ask my roomie "you think you can make it?" this trench/ditch is well beyond the recommended traversing slope for HMMMV. all i hear is my buddy say "absolutely sir". hes one crazy SOB. started going in on an angle and once the front driver tire reached the bottom of the ditch, we started tipping over. mind you, im sitting on many boxes of explosives. the back side of the truck hit the ground and immediately, he hits the gas. we came out of it like it was nothing. the turkish mortar guys were laughing at us at first before we started to cross. totally in doubt that we were going to make it. but their jaws were on the floor when we came out of it.

the last story i have was quite comedic. we were at fort bragg doing a mock war. marines vs army. we are sitting in the woods next to a dirt road with our mortar positions setup. nothing really going on ...just the norm. we have a lookout at the end of the road equiped with a 240G. at the opposite end, there is a porto potty. one guy goes to use the can, in the meantime, we hear the guy with the 240G start opening up(blank rounds of course) on an army convoy that is coming down our road. so, we all get in ambush position waiting for the convoy to come in closer. they get to us, we light em up, but in the meantime, the guy in the can comes out pants around his ankles going to town on the convoy as they get to him.

the last story i have

One quick stateside "training" story. I was a Combat Engineer at Ft. Carson in 1979. While we were doing some training with the Utah National Guard in a National Forest there, My squad and I were assigned as agressors (a normal state of affairs, we had a talent for raising hell). Even though I was the Squad Leader I was carring the M60 and we set up to ambush and capture the Dodge M880 that the Guard was using to transport their food. We set up around a blind corner, and when we heard the truck coming around the corner, I jumped out into the road blazing away with the 60loaded with blanks just for fun. I looked up and realized that the Dodge Pickup was painted red and saw the driver bail out into the ditch as his wife had a panick attack in the passenger seat. It turned out he was a Vietnam Vet and everybody but his wife had a big laugh. We missed the chow truck, but managed to CS their chow line a couple of hours later. During the two weeks we "worked" with them we stole a M60, a couple of 5 Ton trucks and a Jeep. Who woulda thunk training could be so much fun. At least for us.

Thats a really shocking story.

Some stuff is funny only because no one got killed. Like these two events with a 120mm mortar battery (6 tubes, towed). Happened when the Jäger batallion (JgBtl 531) I served with did life fire during a stay in Haltern. I was the driver of the S3 so I "got around a bit"

a) Motorcyle vs mortar

The area is officially closed to civilians but some cross motorcycle riders illegally used the ranges. Mostly during the weekend when the range was normally empty. We where standing at an observation point looking at the target range, radio to the mortar frequency. We had just heard the FO and expected the "whump" when suddenly a motorcyclist in bright yellow sped out of the trees and right into the target range. Before anyone could react the mortars went of. Everyone was frozen, expecting the guy to end up shredded. Luckyly the mortars where off a bit and used base fuzed (digging in before exploding) rounds. The cyclist never realized what happened behind him. Took us an hour to run him down. After that we transported both 50km from the range. Him in one direction, the cycle in the opposite

b) Left, Right, who cares

Well, the floating dredger did. Or at least his owner. This time our mortarmen managed to foul up a bit and fire in the wrong direction. Instead of the target zone the mortar round impacted on a frozen quarry pond. I was "sampling the views" and got to see the whole impact series. One on ice, one on a pipeling, two on the dredge, the last two on ice. Again base fuze, the dredge went down faster like a british BC at Jutland

Here's one about the day we broke our minesweeper.

HMCS Chignecto was southbound in Trincomali Channel (between Vancouver and Galliano Islands south of Naniamo), headed for home. I was standing Lifebuoy Sentry on the quarterdeck (they used the students for this, because the permanent crew was too small) while another of my classmates was driving.

All of a sudden I was launched into the air by a huge WHAMWHAMWHAM which caused the entire stern of the ship to lift a metre or so out of the water. I regained my footing just in time to see a huge log thrust up from our wake with two semi-circles chewed out of it as though it had been bitten by a shark. The entire quarterdeck shook and shuddered for about 30 seconds until the bridge crew rang the engines off. We couldn't keep running like this forever, so we dropped the pick in Chemainus harbour to keep from running aground while we sorted things out.

Our diver was called, and after he came back up he reported that the starboard screw had two bent blades, while the port had one blade which looked as though someone had taken a chisel to it. After a little experimenting we found that we could run the port shaft at slow ahead without shaking the ship to pieces. Of course this cut our speed of advance way down, so kiss goodbye the thought of arriving home that evening : (

After talking everything through, we concluded that the log had been lying just awash and athwartships to our course. We'd hit it dead on and it had rolled right down the keel and up into the screws. If we had been going any faster, we'd have snapped the blades off both screws and ended up dead in the water needing a tow. If we'd hit it at any other angle or anywhere other than right in the middle, it would have bounced off and not done any damage except to the student Officer of the Watch's pride.

Not really a mis-hap, more like entertainment.

Exercise Display Determination, 1979 I think, 6th Field Force and others took the train from Dunkirk to Northern Italy...ironic, as it was the biggest mass movement of the British Army since ...well, Dunkirk. That was a big train

We were bivvied in the Italian army barracks next door to Aviano AFB.

The weather was bad, heavy thunders storms, torrential rain...one of the most useless ruperts ignored advice and went on a jolly in a 1/4 ton air-portable Rover...he needed to find some terracotta pots for his garden back home. He got hit by a flash flood, the Rover was trashed, he and the vehicle were carried a few clicks downstream.

Did we laugh? Yes we did..unfortunately the rupert survived..

Well, this didn't quite happen to me, but I did have to participate in trying to find him. I was on the Kittyhawk, and we were cruising over the Marianis. It was right after Flight Quarters had been secured(we had a 36 hour Flight Quarters), and the duty chief did a head count. I was on the Line Crew for VA195. One of the other plane captains(line crew are called plane captains, even though we were considered the lowest of the low, the squadron pukes) had turned up missing. All of a sudden, someone declared "man overboard", and the signal flare was shot out. We just about turned the entire carrier upside down. To make an even longer story short, my shipmate, Pearson, turned up sleeping in an A7 intake, up against the compressor face. Not only did the chief ream him out, but he had to stand Captain's Mast.

During an excersise deployed w/ 2nd Bgd 1ST CAV over in Korea..we were pulling guard duty on a dirt parking lot they called our TOC. Well, the whole time, we watch ROK troops march by, waving, and just being friendly. Night falls..its cold as hell, and here comes a couple kids walking up to the wire. Our translator was on a mission, so my battle buddy and I are scratching our heads while they try and talk to us. suddenly one of them stuffs a hand in the satchel he was carrying..and I drew my unloaded M-16 . The barrel was about 2 ft from this kids face..bad . We instruct him to remove his hand, and he showed us little bottle of booze..oops! He was trying to trade for our MRE. Never saw him again the whole deployment!

Really scary moment- I working in the motor pool for HHC 1 ST Cav Div. We had to replace a leaf spring on a deuce shop van. I jacked up the axle, pulled the duels, and started to unbolt the spring. I never looked at the TM about doing this..well, I'm using a BFH to remove the stuck leaf, when it finally came loose. The truck was supposed to be supported on the middle axle...not the rear one I had on stands!! Well, the whole truck starts to lean over in the shop, and my sgt. is standing right by me. Luckily it didn't roll over ..3 people were working nearby. I read the book EVERY time after that one..

In Graf 1989 with 1/16th Inf 1st IDF mortar platoon during around 18hrs into 24hr ARTAP we were firing a platoon fire mission It was pouring down rain and cold. My TC/squad leader/Sgt was helping on the ammo pad ( If any one been to graf the ranges are rocks) well me and him were running rounds back and forth when thier was a large flash of light about 10 feet. The round he was caring had slipped and landed and set off the cheesecharges on the ground all I remeber was seeing the flash and one of the observers chasing me down with a humvee. Both me and SQ went in different directions and He made a mile down the road.

In 1990 Desert Storm while moving across the desert in an M60A1 I happened to look down in the turret and saw a flickering glow. About that time the driver gave a loud G damit. He reported we had a fire burning in the hull ammo storage. We grabbed the fire extinguishers and got it put out before we made it to the news. The heater is located to the right of the driver between the front slope and the ammo storage racks. The fuel line ruptured and the fuel caught fire. There were 2 foot flames burning in a rack full of 105 mm heat rounds. Needless to say the heater was dumped in the desert and the driver gained some additional storage space.

After Desert Storm we were bring the tanks back to Saudi Arabia by ferry. When unloading the ramp would go down onto the concrete pier, the helmsman would give it the throttle to hold it in place and the tank would drive off the ferry ont the pier. One tank had a problem. As the tank started forward the ramp slipped off the Pier, The driver couldn't see the pier edge because it was below his vision and gave it the gas. The front of the tank hit the pier and the tracks just pushed the ferry backwards away from the pier and the tank dropped off the front of the ramp into 50 feet of water. Everyone got out OK but it made for some odd photos to see a giant crane on a barge lifting a tank out of the water.