Badlands 4-28-2022 – Exercise Tiger, How do you react when things go really wrong

Posted on Posted in Backblasts
  • When: 4-28-2022
  • QIC: Rawlings
  • The PAX: Sofa, Saigon Sam, Outhouse, Bada Bing, DDAY

6 PAX met in the gloom we call Badlands. Our topic this morning was about a rehearsal for DDAY that I read about called “Exercise Tiger” I attached a link and encourage you to read about it as I really had no idea. This happened in 1944 on this very day. This was to be a rehearsal for the Utah beach mission complete with tanks, men, gunfire, explosions, everything the men would see on June 6th…..The problem, things went wrong right from the get and an estimated 749 soldiers lost their lives. First one escort was damaged so they were down to only one escort. Next radio troubles cut communication off between the ships. Then Nazi S-boats noticed our ship and torpedoed it. Unable to radio to the other ships as the next ship arrived it also was torpedoed. A lot of these men died just from not knowing how to wear their life vest correctly and getting flipped head down in the water. 10 men involved had the entire playbook for dday and they were MIA. Everything possible that could have went wrong went terribly wrong. What they learned from this was the importance of the air strike to take out the Nazi S boats, the importance of teaching the men better protocol, the importance of the escorts, and the importance for secure radio communications. Through all of this I tasked the PAX with thinking about how we react when things go terribly wrong.

https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/wars-conflicts-and-operations/world-war-ii/1944/exercise-tiger.html

Warmup – SSH, The Reacher, The Hillbilly, 6 second Merkins (one Merkin is a slow Down 2,3,Up,2,3) DD, PP Left, PP Right, Mosey to the turf field stopping for Michael Phelps, and LBC’s.  As we made the corner for the turf field the PAX made out a familiar object near the field….Cindy had come to join the party. We grabbed our coupon and went to the goal line.

With the block… Lunge walk to the 10, 10 Man makers, Side Step Squat Left to the 20, 20 Curlz for the Girlz, Side Step Squat Right to the 30, 30 2-handed bent over rows, Farmer Carry to the 40, 40 Bench Press, Arms out carry to the 50, 50 Kettle Bell Swings, Leave the block, Sprint to the goal line. Sprint back to the 50, 50 shoulder taps on the block, Lunge walk to the 40, 40 1-armed bent over row (20 each arm), Side Step Squat Left to the 30, 30 Goblet Squats, Side Step Right to the 20, 20 Grave Diggers, Farmer Carry to the 10, 10 Ground to Airs, Arms out carry to the goal line. After Bada Bing had a Cindy casualty we were left with one extra block. Fast paced walk back to the COT each PAX carried their own Cindy and alternated carrying the extra coupon.

COR, NOR, Announcments, Prayers.

Great work men.

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