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Army Urban Myths...

The pikey/chav/yob/Turk revenge raid goes back to WW1 (at least).

Most recently in Cambridge with the RHF and gypos

RHF Cambridge.jpg
 
When my Dad did his national service in 48/50 he was an RP (He always was a bit of an officious bastard - probably why he spent his life in the Army. Oddly enough that part of his character contrasted with a very strong streak of anti-authoritarianism.)

He told me that in the event of being called to a pub brawl the SOP for RPs and MPs was to surround the pub and let the fight come to a natural end. When all the combatants were unconscious, incapacitated or dead they would then wade in and cosh the survivors with pickaxe handles.

This had multiple benefits. It avoided paperwork. It meant no drunks puked up or bled all over the guardroom floor. It prevented any potentially stellar military careers from being nipped in the bud. It allowed you to lamp some squaddies with no comeback (they were hardly likely to admit being in a brawl).

Best of all it kept you safe because if they waded in then both sides in the brawl would forget their differences and unite to thrash them. They were not keen on a small scale re-enactment of Rourkes Drift.

You would think that the fairground Pikeys in that Sun reprint would perhaps have learned their lesson over the previous century.
 
If you strip out the supernatural ones (like picking up a hitchhiker who died ten years earlier) I reckon about 95% of urban myths are based on an original truism or actual event.

Even where something seems too stupid or ridiculous there is probably some truth in it. You only have to look at the Darwin Awards to realise that the ocean of human stupidity is pretty deep indeed.

My dad told me nearly every myth on here (or the pre-1987 ones at least) as if it was gospel and either actually happened to him or was witnessed by him. As I grew up the pinches of salt got bigger and bigger.

One that really bugs me comes from the Septics and their ten year excursion to S.E. Asia. I have read six or seven times about a round entering a helmet, travelling around the lining and exiting the other side leaving said grunt/chopper pilot/jammy sod alive and kicking rather than having the contents of his skull all over the floor.

I suppose it could have happened maybe once but books on Vietnam make it sound like an everyday event.

Still, why waste a good story.
 
Myth story from early 1970's Royal Anglian in Ireland got sniped at and the round bounced orff his tiny cap badge .
He is so full of chuff that this beret and cap badge take on totemic properties so he sends it home for his mum to look after.

Then the mod turns up with an order that said beret and badge be handed over to boffins who investigate ballistics, he is not going to hand over his lucky kit so passes on a spare beret and badge . Apparently that's why Royal Anglian cap badges are not bullet proof.

I dare say you can substitute any unit for this pukka gen story.
 
One that really bugs me comes from the Septics and their ten year excursion to S.E. Asia. I have read six or seven times about a round entering a helmet, travelling around the lining and exiting the other side leaving said grunt/chopper pilot/jammy sod alive and kicking rather than having the contents of his skull all over the floor.

.

Didn't this actually happen to one of the PARA's during the Falklands conflict
 
If you strip out the supernatural ones (like picking up a hitchhiker who died ten years earlier) I reckon about 95% of urban myths are based on an original truism or actual event.

Even where something seems too stupid or ridiculous there is probably some truth in it. You only have to look at the Darwin Awards to realise that the ocean of human stupidity is pretty deep indeed.

My dad told me nearly every myth on here (or the pre-1987 ones at least) as if it was gospel and either actually happened to him or was witnessed by him. As I grew up the pinches of salt got bigger and bigger.

One that really bugs me comes from the Septics and their ten year excursion to S.E. Asia. I have read six or seven times about a round entering a helmet, travelling around the lining and exiting the other side leaving said grunt/chopper pilot/jammy sod alive and kicking rather than having the contents of his skull all over the floor.

I suppose it could have happened maybe once but books on Vietnam make it sound like an everyday event.

Still, why waste a good story.

UK have their own real version- Helmet used to be on display in LI museum in Winchester.

Wikipedia - South Armagh Sniper (1990-97) said:
On 16 March 1990, the Barret M82 was used for first time by the IRA. The target was a checkpoint manned by soldiers of the Light Infantry regiment on Сastleblaney Road. A single .50 round pierced the helmet and skimmed the skull of Lance Corporal H**********, who survived with minor head injuries.[32][33]
 
I have read six or seven times about a round entering a helmet, travelling around the lining and exiting the other side leaving said grunt/chopper pilot/jammy sod alive and kicking rather than having the contents of his skull all over the floor.

I suppose it could have happened maybe once but books on Vietnam make it sound like an everyday event.

Still, why waste a good story.

It's happened in every conflict/war in the last century. Ones that spring to mind are Dominic Grey, Para Reg Falklands, the guy that wrote Chickenhawk about huey pilots, and more recently one of our lads in Afghanistan.
 
It's happened in every conflict/war in the last century. Ones that spring to mind are Dominic Grey, Para Reg Falklands, the guy that wrote Chickenhawk about huey pilots, and more recently one of our lads in Afghanistan.

A fairly common occurance if a round hits a helmet at the right angle.

If only we could generate some statistics using a few of the helmets on this site...

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Not forgetting the booties on telic and the rocks in Bastion, oh wait they were all self inflicted weren't they?
 
A very enjoyable romp through ninety six pages (or twelve without the repetition!).

If you walked from Cove to Blackbushe airport you could get a ride in a Spitfire, Hurricane or Lightning. There were apparently a lot of Spitfires in the RAF then and obviously Blackbushe was more than capable of dealing with Lightnings. If you pretended to be lost/ill/dying you could get a lift back to Cove in a helicopter. The alternative version was: as the Vulcans from Farnborough took off over our school they made a Godalmighty racket. If you showed up at the airfield you could get a ride in a Vulcan as the RAF atonement for deafening us. My mother encouraged me to try these out. Years later I realised she just wanted to get rid of me for a few hours.

Hmm... I recall a story from my youth of one of these charity "prison escapes" where two people handcuffed together and to get as far away from their start point as possible in 24 hours. Starting in Swindon, these two made their way to raf lyneham and blasted a flight to the Falklands, comfortably beating the second pair who got to somewhere like Glasgow.


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A fairly common occurance if a round hits a helmet at the right angle.

If only we could generate some statistics using a few of the helmets on this site...

Posted from the ARRSE Mobile app (iOS or Android)


Ah, but first you need to filter out all the helmets that have never worn a helmet (myself especially included)
 
There would appear to be a recent and documented case from Afghan. It's not quite in/around/out but it's close:


Miracle helmet saves Lewis-McChord soldier's life - but how?



By Theron ZahnAug 3, 2013
JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. - A JBLM soldier's recent brush with death could save the lives of more soldiers in the future.

When Sgt. Roger Daniels was shot in the head by a large caliber machine gun during a firefight in Afghanistan, his helmet protected him in a way no one expected. And now the Army is studying Daniels' helmet to understand how it protected him and to use that in new helmet designs.

Daniels' close call came when he and his fellow soldiers were ambushed last summer.

"Turned my head to look south, and when I turned it back I got hit," he says. "I knew right away I'd been hit in the head."

He says the only reason he's still alive, is because his helmet went beyond the call of duty.

"From what I know, they're supposed to be for smaller caliber or shrapnel, but I mean, I guess I just got lucky," says Daniels.

Instead of going through the helmet, the bullet actually went around his head and rattled around a bit.

For the past year the Army has been studying the one-in-a-million shot, to make future helmets protect soldiers in the same way.

"It defeated a threat that is was not supposed to defeat, and we wanted to see how this round actually came through, came around the back side and came out," says Master Sgt. Benjamin Owens.

In a ceremony on Friday, Sgt. Daniels was reunited with the equipment that saved his life.

After the attack Daniels suffered a concussion and a needed a few stitches, but it wasn't too long after that, he was back in action.

"I never thought it would save my life - and then it did," he says.

And maybe the lives of future soldiers as well.

The helmet has now been returned to Sgt. Daniels. He says he will keep the helmet that saved his life where he can see it every day.

(URL: http://www.komonews.com/news/local/...ldiers-life---but-how-218241151.html?mobile=y )
 
Hmm... I recall a story from my youth of one of these charity "prison escapes" where two people handcuffed together and to get as far away from their start point as possible in 24 hours. Starting in Swindon, these two made their way to raf lyneham and blasted a flight to the Falklands, comfortably beating the second pair who got to somewhere like Glasgow.


Posted from the ARRSE Mobile app (iOS or Android)

Variation from RMAS in the late 50s was of an officer cadet on an initiative exercise taking a train to the French embassy in London, joining the foreign legion and then having to have his return from Algeria being negotiated at quite a high level.
 

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