A National Guardsman with the 2nd Battalion 19th Special Forces Group shows Boy Scout Troop 289 of Madison how to build a fire with limited materials during the Winter Camporee last weekend.
By Suzanne Stewart
Pocahontas Times
MARLINTON, W.Va. — Nothing tests survival skills better than freezing temperatures, several feet of snow and no cell phone service.
Boy Scout Troop 289 of Madison and Troop 31 of Charleston held the annual Winter Camporee at Cranberry Glades last weekend where scouts learned how to survive in the frigid wilderness.
On Saturday, three members of the 2nd Battalion 19th Special Forces Group of the National Guard spent the day teaching the scouts to build a fire, shelter building and other survival skills.
“We spent an hour on hypothermia and winter-time injuries and then one of the national guardsman built a fire with natural materials, and showed them how to do it,” Troop 289 leader Chip Shaffer, of Madison, said. “Their challenge is to do what he did with the same materials…”
