At the CTT the trainees learned that the water is what separates the SEALs from all other special operations forces. For most special operators, the water is an obstacle; for the SEALs, it is their sanctuary. The trainees learned buoyancy control and how to swim more like a fish than a human. They mastered breathing techniques and how to use their arms to make themselves longer in the water, which added balance.
The men in Michael’s class completed their training in very modest surroundings. The classroom was a single large concrete-block room with pale yellow paint, a concrete floor, long, narrow wooden tables with unpadded chairs, and a large retractable projection screen centered on the front wall behind a slightly elevated platform and podium. Many times during classroom instruction, the students were ordered into the surf and sand and then sent back to the classroom for the remainder of the training evolution. Calisthenics and other physical training are conducted on the “grinder,” a thick square area of asphalt just outside the classroom door. On the asphalt about three feet apart the numbers one through fifty were painted in yellow, designating a position for each student. During multiple twenty-repetition calisthenics, the students again were ordered into the surf and sand and then returned to the grinder to complete their evolutions. With PT completed, the class set out on a four-mile conditioning run in the soft sand, during which they were directed back into the surf several times. None of the training evolutions was designed to punish the trainees; instead, each was designed to teach a specific skill that will be needed when the men became Navy SEALs.
During the second week of Indoc, the class began inflatable boat, small (IBS) training. Here they learned to work together as a boat crew. The IBS was a 13-foot, 170-pound inflatable rubber boat. Poorly designed and too bulky for operational use, it was perfect for teaching BUD/S trainees to work together as a team in the surf.
On the final day of Indoc, each trainee’s performance was reviewed by the Academic/Performance Review Board, which decided who would continue on to First Phase. The board could not remove a student from BUD/S, but rather only decided who continued on to the next phase of instruction. In addition, each student had the opportunity to evaluate each of his instructors and the training in writing. The review board determined that Michael Murphy had successfully completed Indoc and was given the rite of passage to the first phase of BUD/S training.
First Phase
Eight weeks long, First Phase was much like Indoc, only the intensity and expectations were elevated several levels. Running, swimming, and physical training grew harder as the weeks passed. Students continued weekly four-mile runs in combat boots and long pants in the soft beach sand, and were expected to decrease their obstacle-course times, swim distances of up to two miles wearing fins, and continue to learn small-boat seamanship and the importance of teamwork.
Drown Proofing
Drown proofing was an important part of basic conditioning. During this training evolution, the students learned to swim with their hands and feet bound, more of a psychological test than a physical one. It originated in the Vietnam era, when an American POW was hog-tied, then tossed into the Mekong River to drown. That POW proved that a man could swim with his hands and feet tied if he put his mind to it.
In order to pass drown proofing, the trainees had to enter a nine-foot-deep pool with their hands and feet tied, and (1) bob from the surface to the base of the pool for five minutes, (2) float on the surface for five minutes, (3) swim one hundred meters, (4) bob for two minutes, (5) complete forward and backward flips, (6) swim to the bottom of the pool and retrieve an object with their teeth, and (7) return to the surface and bob five more times.
Knot Tying
The students learned to tie knots underwater—not an easy task. The knots—bowline, sheet bend, clove hitch, and right angle—are important because they are used to secure underwater demolition charges.
Cold-Water Conditioning—“Surf Torture”
In the waters of the Pacific just off Coronado, the water temperature usually hovers around 65°, in the summer, never going above 68°. In the winter the water temperature never gets above 58°. The students were ordered to wade into the water up to their waists with their arms linked to prevent a student from being swept out to sea, and then sit while being pounded by the cold saltwater waves breaking over their heads. Another variation was to have the trainees lie with their arms linked and their heads toward the water’s edge to allow the crashing surf to wash over them. On the very brink of hypothermia, they were ordered out of the surf and onto the beach for calisthenics to warm up, and then back into the surf in a training evolution that lasted for about one hour.
Unfortunately, cold-water conditioning was not a onetime experience; it was repeated frequently during BUD/S. Its purpose was to teach the prospective SEALs to mentally fend off the effects of hypothermia—which more than likely could save their lives in the future.
Log PT
This relatively simple but brutal training evolution required that a boat team carry an eight-foot, 150-pound log that was twelve inches in diameter over the men’s heads while running in the soft beach sand wearing long pants and combat boots. During these timed beach runs, the trainees did hundreds of gut-busting sit-ups while holding the log on their stomachs; they also performed calisthenics such as jumping jacks and overhead tosses.
Rock Portage
In these evolutions the seven-man boat crew in their unwieldy IBS attempted to navigate the large piles of sharp rocks in the surf in front of the Hotel del Coronado. A five-star luxury hotel, Hotel del Coronado is located on the Silver Strand between Naval Amphibious Base, Coronado and Naval Air Station North Island. Extremely risky, these evolutions were conducted both day and night.
Obstacle Course (O-course)
Not to be confused with a confidence course, this intimidating true obstacle course must be seen to be believed. Requiring a twenty-yard sprint between obstacles, it demanded a combination of balance, coordination, upper-body strength, technique, endurance, and, most of all, a positive mental attitude. All obstacles were designed to teach, develop, and reinforce a specific skill that would be needed when Michael and the other trainees reached the SEAL teams.
• Parallel bars. Using only their arms, the trainees had to either “hop” or “walk” through a set of parallel bars approximately fifty feet in length with an initial 45-degree climbing angle.
• Pilings. This obstacle consisted of eight log pilings of varying heights and distances. The prospective SEALs were required to leap from one piling to the next to access the next obstacle.
• Tires. In a controlled, balanced sprint, the trainees had to pass through six rows of four tires without falling.
• Low wall. To navigate this obstacle, consisting of a wooden wall about fifteen feet high, the trainees took two hops and jumped up, keeping their bodies low while sliding over the top.
• High wall. The students had to grab a rope and “walk” up a wooden wall about thirty feet high. Staying low, they slid over the top and grabbed the rope on the other side, then walked down.
• Barbed wire. Keeping their heads down, the trainees had to crawl through a trench in the sand approximately thirty feet long and covered with logs and barbed wire.
• Cargo net. To pass over a fifty-foot vertical rope cargo net, the trainees had to climb close to the edge, where the net is tighter and easier to negotiate, while keeping three points of contact, with their hands on the vertical ropes and their feet on the horizontal ropes. They had to climb at a steady pace, stay low while going over the top, and come down in a controlled fall.
• Balance logs. The students had to run along the top of a forty-foot log, across a ten-foot section, and straight down another forty-foot section. If anyone fell off, he had to start over.
• Hooyah logs. With their hands clasped over their heads, the trainees ran up one side of six logs stacked in a pyramid and down the other.
• Transfer rope. Two twenty-foot ropes and a st
eel ring suspended from a wooden beam formed this obstacle. The trainees had to climb the rope, reach over and grab the steel ring, transfer to the other rope, and then descend.
• “Dirty name.” To pass over this set of uneven log parallel bars, the trainees first had to climb on the step log, then jump and push themselves up. Maintaining their balance, they stood up and jumped up to the other log, then pushed themselves up and over the top.
• Hooyah logs. With their hands clasped over their heads, the trainees ran up one side and down the other of another pyramid, this one consisting of nine logs.
• Weaver. This low-level, ladder-shaped obstacle constructed of wide logs required the students to pass under the first bar and use their momentum to swing and weave themselves up to the next bar. They had to do this for a total of eight bars up and eight bars down the other side.
• Burma Bridge. This obstacle consisted of an elevated rope bridge accessed by a hanging rope. The trainees had to climb up the rope at one end, cross the bridge, and climb down the end rope.
• Slide for Life. The trainees surmounted a thirty-foot-high, four-level platform tower by jumping up onto the first level, then flipping up the next three levels to the top. There, they laid on top of the rope with one leg on the rope and the other hanging down for balance. Then using their forearms, they pulled themselves across a seventy-five-foot rope and down a 40-degree angle to the other side. They then got off the rope and descended another rope at the other end.
• Rope swing. The trainees had to swing over to a log beam, run down the beam to a set of monkey bars, using their arms to “walk” their way through the ten rungs to the balance beam, and then run the length of another log.
• Tires:. In a controlled balanced sprint, the trainees had to pass through six rows of four tires without falling.
• Incline Wall. To surmount this 45-degree-angle wooden wall, they trainees had to jump over the high end and slide down.
• Spider Wall. This obstacle consisted of a wooden wall with alternating flushmounted two-by-fours. The trainees had to climb to the top on one side and descend the other.
• Vaults. The trainees had to cross over each of an elevated series of five logs using only their hands.
The student with the slowest O-course time had to wear a pink T-shirt that read “Always a Lady” until the next course run.
As if the O-course was not challenging enough, each boat crew was frequently charged with the task of carrying their IBS on their heads as they went through the course as a team.
Physical Testing
Prior to Hell Week, which is the most intense period of training during First Phase, Michael and his classmates faced an extremely challenging physical training evolution. The trainees had to complete a twelve-hundred-meter pool swim with fins in forty-five minutes, a one-mile bay swim with fins in fifty minutes, a one-mile ocean swim with fins in ninety-five minutes, a one-and-a-half-mile ocean swim with fins in seventy minutes, a two-mile ocean swim with fins in ninety-five minutes, the O-course in fifteen minutes, and a four-mile beach run in thirty-two minutes.
Additional Motivation
In the days leading up to Hell Week, the mental strain was apparent on the faces of many in Michael’s class. Most were convinced that they could deal with the physical requirements of the week, but many were worried about the mental toughness they hoped they possessed and would need to muster to survive the upcoming ordeal.
Michael remembered his father telling him about the extensive leg injuries he suffered in Vietnam after being hit by an exploding grenade, and the weeks of agonizing surgeries and treatment he endured during his several months of hospitalization. He also remembered his father showing him a picture of him lying in a hospital bed in Vietnam receiving a Purple Heart from his commanding officer. He telephoned his father and asked him for a copy of the picture so he could look at it when he needed to reinforce his mental toughness the following week. Dan sent the picture out the following day. It arrived on Friday, and Michael looked at it frequently over the weekend. He believed that if his dad could endure being wounded by a grenade, multiple surgeries, weeks of hospitalization, and months of physical therapy to learn how to walk again, he could certainly handle whatever Hell Week dished out.
Hell Week
The first four weeks of First Phase were designed to prepare Michael and his classmates for the fifth week, known as Hell Week, the most notorious part of BUD/S. By this time approximately 30 percent of the class had quit. Hell Week was the real gut check of First Phase and would be the defining moment in both the lives and careers of most of those who would go on to become SEALs.
During Hell Week, the students participated in five and a half days of continuous physical training, with a maximum of four hours’ sleep for the entire week, with never more than two hours at one time. Deliberately designed as the ultimate test of physical and mental motivation, Hell Week proved to those who succeeded that the human body can do ten times the amount of work and exercise than they previously thought possible. The Academic/Performance Review Board reviewed each student’s academic and physical training scores and decided who would go through Hell Week. Michael was cleared to proceed.
Anticipation
On Sunday, just after their noon meal, Michael’s entire class was sequestered in the classroom. Along the back wall were brown paper bags, labeled with their last names, that contained a change of socks and underwear. Some of the men tried to sleep, some read, and some even halfheartedly attempted to watch a video on the screen.
Meanwhile, the instructors put the final touches on the initial “breakout” experience, which was set to start at a predesignated time. Inside the classroom, all knew it was coming; they just didn’t know when or how. They had heard stories about Hell Week from the previous class, but no two Hell Weeks begin the same. Several of the boat crews met to encourage each other, and some even engaged in bravado about being able to take “whatever they decide to put us through.” As an officer, Michael personally talked with each member of his boat crew and offered words of encouragement. He knew that the six men he began Hell Week with might not be the same ones he would finish with. Despite his words, the looks on their faces and in their eyes revealed their real feelings. As they looked around the room, they were aware of the 30 percent that had already dropped out and that the statistics said they would lose another 20 percent in the next twenty-four hours and an additional 20 percent before the end of the week. They couldn’t help wondering if they had what it takes. Yes, they all knew it was coming, but they just didn’t know when or how.
As the minutes and hours passed, the anxiety reached heightened levels, and many of the trainees began expressing their desire to “get this thing going.” By midafternoon their frustration was becoming obvious. Some wondered aloud if the wait and anticipation was just as bad as what they were about to experience. Several students acted as lookouts, sitting next to the doors and watching for approaching instructors, and some sat alone with their thoughts. At 5:00 PM the movies were being repeated for the third time, but no one was really paying attention. The students, visibly apprehensive, began to walk around the room, and conversations among teammates were hushed and infrequent. While a few had relaxed and began playing games of cards, others sat quietly staring blankly into the distance. Certainly, something had to happen soon.
When All Hell Broke Loose
At 5:45 PM an instructor quietly crawled to the door near the front of the classroom and secured the lock. A few seconds later, several instructors flanked the rear door on each side. Armed with smoke grenades, Simunitions (simulated ballistic charges designed to provide realistic training) canisters, and semiautomatic weapons loaded with blank rounds, they moved into position. Outside, on the grinder, several more instructors armed with high-pressure fire hoses took up positions on both sides of the door. Numerous obstacles and barricades had been erected, as well as empty fifty-five-gallon barrels loaded with low-intensity percussion grenades.<
br />
Quietly and slowly an instructor turned the doorknob and opened the door just enough to get his hand in and shut off the lights. As the lights went off the instructors, rushed in, screaming through bullhorns, firing their semiautomatic weapons over the heads of the students, who had hit the floor and covered their heads and ears. As the instructors ran through the room trying not to step on anyone, hot spent shell casings hit the floor. Students started yelling, coughing, and hacking. After several minutes of total chaos and confusion, the instructors ordered the students outside, yelling through their amplified bullhorns. Several ran for the front door, but finding it locked, they immediately turned and ran for the back door. The doorway backed up with students, who fell over each other in total confusion. As a group of students cleared the doorway and reached the grinder, they tripped over several of the obstacles that were not there when they entered the classroom several hours earlier. High-pressure fire hoses knocked several to the ground, blinded by smoke and water.
Totally disoriented, some students crawled in every direction trying to escape, while others ran into one obstacle after another as well as into each other. The noise produced by the amplified music, bullhorns, gunfire, and fire hoses was deafening. Some students, totally confused and disorientated, resorted to crawling on the asphalt with their ears covered. Some tried to escape to the beach but were blocked and knocked backward by more instructors with fire hoses. The breakout had been designed to create chaos and confusion. It worked.
SEAL of Honor Page 11