Alone in the Wilderness: Survival Techniques | Survival Science | FD Survive

Come on, man. Teach us how to kill something. Next, on a special episode of Survival Science. That's what you want. It's idiot proof. There's no way to fail. Perfect, Laura. Nick and Laura are deep in the wilderness. At Survival School, they'll master critical strategies every outdoorsman should know. Yeah! Fire-breathing treasure! Whether you're lost, injured, starving or worse, I'll give you the beaver fever if you're not careful. This training can mean the difference between life. Seriously, it's like phenomenal. And death. That's amazing! Hey, everybody, welcome back to Survival Science. You know, Nick and I are all about breaking down life and death situations when it comes to spending time in the backcountry. And today we're pulling out all the stops. That's right. We're going into survival mode. And we're going to see what happens when you get lost in the wilderness and what you can do to survive. So we're up here in the mountains at the Survival Training School of California, and we're going out into the wilderness with nothing, not even your mascara. I'll leave it at home. But we will have an instructor. He's going to teach us how to do things like purify water, find food, build a shelter and maybe a little orienteering. So if we do get caught in the wilderness, we'll know exactly how to survive. You don't think we're going to have to eat any bugs today, do you? I hope so. Of course you would say that. Let's go. Thomas Coyne of the Survival Training School of California trains everyone from civilian outdoorsmen to elite military units. He's going to get Nick and Laura up to speed on his unique survival techniques. Thomas, you're going to kind of walk us through survival training, teach us what to do, how to survive. What are some of the things that we're going to do in your course? Well, right now, we're going to get you ready for the most common survival situation, because that's what you're most likely to face in the outdoors. The most common killer in the outdoors is exposure. Each year, over 1300 people die from exposure in the wilderness. The colder it gets, the harder it becomes for the body to maintain a consistent internal temperature. Lessons Nick and Laura learned the hard way. Oh, my gosh. So first things first in cold weather and high altitude like this is we're going to need to create a microclimate. And a great way to do that is with a shelter. Building a simple shelter that protects you from the elements is the first step of survival training. Let's get building. Awesome. With that, Thomas demos the basics of building a lifesaving shelter. What about hip height? Hip height, Laura. Hip height? Her height? Thank you for having that. The thing is, it's built to the person making it so sized for you. The basic tripod frame provides a sturdy foundation. Walls sloping 45 degrees make the structure more stable in windy conditions. A few large sticks are leaned against the tripod for additional support. Medium sized sticks are woven in between. Pine needles are gathered from the forest floor and piled onto the frame until there is no light leaking to the inside. They keep the heat in and cold out. A final layer of sticks holds the pine needle insulation in place. In just 30 minutes, it's almost complete. The last touch is a row of rocks to reflect heat from the campfire back towards the shelter. Lift with the back, not with the legs, right? Right. I'm bringing over baby rocks, but they'll go somewhere. We're not here to judge. Thank you. Teamwork makes the dream work, my friends. With the rocks in place, the shelter is ready. Doesn't look like much, but on closer examination, it could mean the difference between life and death in the biting cold. All right. So now that you have the system down and you see how to do it, let's see how you do without a survival instructor. We're going to give you about 30 minutes because in an emergency, time is not a luxury you're likely to have. So let's see who can make the better tripod shelter of the two. Wait, wait, wait. So you just said teamwork makes the dream work. Yeah, you're going to team up with Mother Earth here and the nature. So it's you against me. Yeah, there's no pink out here, so get to work. Yeah, I like this right around here. It's got a little bit of cover up above, right? It looks good. So why don't you put yours kind of over there on that nice little flat spot and I'll get kind of this little spot here. I like your zoning rules. Yeah. All right. Let the games begin. All right. The competition starts with a quintessential outdoor activity. Gathering wood. Hey, leave some for the rest of us. Hey, you snooze, you lose. This stick not going to work. I don't know. You take the lessons this way. OK, that's feeling pretty good. Nick, your fort fell. Nick, your fort fell down. Broke my stick. First things first. What happened? I'm getting warm. You're going to collect all my pine needles for me, right? I'm going to help you. Yeah. Pine needles aren't just for insulation. They also make for a dry and comfortable mattress. We're going to build some leaf number beds. What number do you like your bed set at? Twenty three and a half. All right. With a little assist from Nick, both shelters are complete with time to spare. Now they're ready for inspection. Look at this. The king needs a little ornament right over his door, right? Well, you'd be surprised how many people choose to decorate their shelter. Well, this is great, guys. It looks like you really stick to the principles I gave you. And that's what counts. They're steeper than forty five. They're blocking all the light from the inside. So I know they're going to stop water. We have some really good reflector walls built up appropriately spaced and we stop the wind from blowing our cover off. So this is more than survivable throughout a night of cold. I've got one last question. As far as decorating, who won the decorating contest? I'm a pine cone guy. Thank you. It's a little ornamental. You can have it. Go with the goat. You know what I mean? Yeah. I put a doorbell on mine too, just in case we get visitors. Laura and Nick have aced their first test of survival school. Next up, a quest for fire. Nick and Laura are at Thomas Coyne's survival training school deep in the mountains near Big Bear, California. Their next challenge can be difficult for even the most experienced outdoorsman making fire without a lighter or matches. What we're going to do now is get a nice straight branch like this and we're going to spin it just as fast as we can to a much softer piece. And the friction that occurs there is going to ignite the dust that it makes as it drills through. And we'll use that to get our fire started. Nick and Laura will be constructing a bow drill. The design is simple. Tie a string to opposite ends of the bow. Wind the drill stick in the middle of the string. When the drill stick is fixed in place over a piece of wood, the bow can be drawn back and forth. The friction creates heated dust that ignites into an ember. We said about a little more than a hand length. That's right. So I'm going to carve a little V in this thing. Shape one end of the stick into a point. This is secured in a rivet hole of Nick's knife to keep the stick from wobbling as it spins. The other end is flattened and will spin against another piece of wood. The drill plate. Carve a notch in the drill plate to collect the heated dust. Why is that important again? To have that V. Once that notch is full, all the heat on the tip of that drill is going to be trapped in that notch and that's going to light that up. Now, Nick channels his inner caveman. There you go. Very good. A little bit more speed. Now add a little bit more pressure, just a little. Pressure is last. Perfect. Full stroke. Full stroke. Breathe. The friction drill creates temperatures of over 300 degrees at the tip. Plenty of heat to turn wood dust into an ember. A little faster. I'm going to give you a countdown. Ten. All you got, man. Nine, eight, seven, six. Stop, stop, stop, stop. Blow on that gently. Blow on that gently. You already got it. You got it. Nick delicately transfers the heated dust to a bed of wispy kindling dried pine needles help stoke the embers into a larger flame. Yes. Watch your clothes. Look at that, Nick. Yeah. Yes. Use your convection. Don't let it go apart yet. Don't let it fall apart. We're not out of the danger zone yet. Finally, Nick carefully transfers the kindling to the campfire itself. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Fire breathing dragon. Who's got the hot dogs? Yeah. Bring out the marshmallows. That was almost too easy. No. I can't believe. That's a delicate process. That's incredible. Nick Munt has created fire. All right, Thomas, well, we've got a good fire. So now what? All right. Well, the next most critical skill after shelter and fire in this cold weather, we're getting some water. All right. Let's do it. I'm thirsty. As any experienced outdoorsman knows, water can be plentiful, but if it hasn't been purified, it can be poisonous. The best way to purify water is to heat it. Then you're sure you've killed everything. We're going to show you how to boil water in anything that holds water. Maybe you have a Ziploc bag, empty sandwich bagging or pocket. You got a hole in the ground, whatever. The first step is to heat up several small rocks in a campfire. Next, Thomas splits the end of a tree branch to fashion a simple pair of tongs. He uses these to retrieve the heated rocks from the flames. So just like with the bow and drill, we have to be very careful. You can also get a facial. Look at that. Now I'm going to grab another rock so we can increase that temperature. Three rocks is enough to bring the water to a boil. How long did the rocks sit in the fire before you moved them into the water? About half an hour right in the convective current. And so obviously the bag is tough enough to withstand boiling water. What's strange is these rocks are, you know, they're getting to very high temperatures. But as long as you put them in the water first, it won't melt the bag. Now, if this rock touches the bag anywhere outside the water, it will instantly melt through the bag. Next, treacherous waters. You're going to be shooting it out of both ends and it won't be good. All right, so Nick and I are back at home base and survival school, and now we're going to purify some water, some creek water, as a matter of fact, with nothing but some hot rocks, a couple of sticks and a freezer bag. Here's what we do. We've heated these rocks on here for a long time, so they're good and hot. At sea level, the water needs to boil for a minute. But as you go up every thousand meters, you have to go another minute. So since we're up here around 7000 feet, we're going to go about three minutes, which should be about good, right? Enough to kill all that bacteria. Yes. Delicious. Nick wields the makeshift tongs like a pro. I eat a lot of sushi, so I should be pretty good at this. Come on, come on. Oh, yeah, I got it. All right. Watch this. That is very hot. Bring this over here. Careful. Listen to that sizzle. Perfect. Let's get another. A few more rocks bring the water to a rolling boil. So the most important thing is to get your water and make sure that you boil it for the proper amount of time, because those little protozoas are pretty tough little critters and they can live right through that. I'll give you the beaver fever. Yeah. And if you get that, you're going to be shooting it out of both ends and it won't be good. The water may not look appetizing, but it's clean and ready to drink or use for cooking. In fact, Thomas has an old trail recipe that will make good use of this batch. So what we've got here is our water that we boiled in the baggie here and we're just adding flour to it. So now we're just going to mix this up and make a nice little patty out of it. Right. And slow cook it right on the cold, slow cook. You know what these are called, Nick, don't you? What? Ash cakes. No, I said ash cakes. Oh, OK. The white ash on the campfire coals prevents burning and cooks the cakes evenly. In just a few minutes, they're ready to eat. Prepare to be amazed. That's good. That's amazinger than heck. Yeah. You don't have to fake it, do you? No. Tasty, isn't it? Wow. It's cheating a bit, but ash cakes are great with honey. Seriously, it's like phenomenal. Well, what if you need something a little meatier? Oh, my God. We're like lost in the wilderness. We need food. Come to our rescue. Come on, man. Teach us how to kill something. Well, what I'm going to do is I'm going to show you the most simple, effective, small game trap, which is the easiest to get out here in an emergency. And all you need is a couple of sticks and a piece of string. Use your boot lace, a strip of bark off the willow tree, a strong blade of grass, what have you. OK? OK. Thomas starts with a heavy rock, then trims two sticks and joins them together in a sort of lever. A string is attached and tied to a small stick that acts as the trap's release lever. Thomas shows the precarious process of setting the trap. Go ahead, release. I have to feel the balance point. So it has to be holding it. Right, right. So now you'll see it's like a lever. See that? Sure. So now I wrap this stick around. See how it teed off when I went under my string? I've seen a lot of manuals that will show this over the string and they can catch. Now here, I would recommend if you're doing this at home to have a safety rock because if this falls on my fingers, that sucks. Thomas carefully places a small stick to brace the latch and act as the spring for the trap. A piece of plastic is the bait. Now, which one of you guys said that stick won't hold? Isn't that great? That's a double fifth bump. The trap is ready. Laura will do the honors and spare the life of some hapless Southern California squirrel. Here come two squirrels that are going after the bait at the same time. One for Nick, one for me. Ready? That's amazing. I'm stuck. Oh, oh. Awesome, man. Very cool. All right. Coming up, medical miracles. A survival emergency in the wilderness often begins with an injury. A broken bone is incredibly painful. And if you're stuck in the woods, there's no choice but to grit your teeth and bear it, right? Not so fast. For those in the know, the backcountry even has your pain relief needs covered. So here we have a willow tree. Now, what's great about the willow, it just has so many wonderful uses. It's easily identifiable. And I want you to take a small strip of that. A serving of this bark would be the size of your pinky. And I want you to chew it. It's for body weight, right? So if it's your pinky, it'll be for your body weight. How is it? It's a little bitter. Bitter. You know what you're tasting? The salicylic acid. That is really bitter. Are you kidding? Yeah. You're tasting salicylic acid, which is the chemical compound we make aspirin from. Thomas just poisoned us. Oh, OK. If I don't give you the antidote, you're dead. Yeah, so that's very bitter. It's just like chewing on an aspirin. A broken limb can make a hike back to safety all but impossible. Emergency care can be the key to survival. So one thing you may not be aware of is a little device called the SamSplint, which is just a little portable, flexible splint. A SamSplint and a bandage are essential survival kit items. Add a fleece jacket and you have an effective, improvised splint. Nice and comfy. How's it feeling? Really comfortable. You going to be OK? I think I'm going to be all right. Now, Nick learns to splint his own leg. So let's say I broke my tib fib down here below my knee, right? So I'm going to wrap this thing up, but I'm going to keep kind of clumping in here so that fills the void by the knee. Yeah, it's important to pad splints, not just for patient comfort, which is important. Right. But to make sure that the pressure from a splint is evenly applied along the leg for good support. He uses the fleece as padding and a self-adhesive bandage to wrap it all together. This makeshift splint is enough to get Nick up on his feet. And if he's on his feet, he can start making his way to safety. We've got our arm splint and we've got our leg splint. But now how are we going to get out of here? We'll go over some improvised navigation. Navigation is good. Losing your sense of direction in the backcountry can be a fatal mistake. Thomas has perfected techniques to find the cardinal directions even without a compass. OK, so now we're going to cover a really quick and simple way to get unlost. Well, there's plenty of ways to do it with the stars. But during the daytime, we're going to use a stick and shadow method. It's a simple idea. Find east and west by tracing the movement of a shadow as the sun moves across the sky. All you need is a stick and a couple of rocks. We're going to mark the tip of the shadow of that stick. OK, and now we'll just have to wait a few minutes. And when the shadow moves, you'll put another mark and you draw a line between those two marks and you'll have your east and west. As the sun traverses the sky, the shadow moves along the east west axis. Once you know east west, you know north south. So this is a really good way to find the direction. You get out into the wilderness. You need to know that south is the town, north is the road, east is the river. Just pick an escape azimuth. And as soon as you step on that trail, you know that escape azimuth and you only have to remember one direction and you don't have to know which way it is, just know, just know, OK, it's west, know it's east. And now if you lose your sense of direction, you can find it again with this. And if you can't find a stick in the woods, I can't help you. That's right. Now, one last tip, the essential items for your survival kit, a water purifier, first aid supplies, a multi-tool, an emergency light and storm proof matches. There's no way to put this out once it gets going. OK, and that's what you want. It's idiot proof, right? Yeah, there's no way to fail with it. Now we combine that. Keep these in your pack and you'll be ready for anything. How do you think Nick and I did today in school? What what grade would you give us? I got to give you an A. And you know why? You guys dominated the bow drill and the shelter. Well, I think it's safe to say we learned a lot here at survival school. We learned how to make a fire with no tools. Yeah, build a really cool shelter. The king needs a little ornament right over his door, right? We also had a chance to purify water and taste some delicious ash cakes. No, I said ash. Oh, OK. So when you go out into the wilderness, make sure you pack your survival kit because you just never know when you're going to get stranded. Always be prepared. Number one thing. Well, that wraps it up for this episode. So join us next time as we put nature to the test on survival science. Nighty night, Nick. Good night, Laura. Hope you don't snore. If I do, just put some pine cones in your ears, you'll be fine.