30 MINUTES | 49 MILES
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Counting the cost of holding on to Siachen
Published on Sat, Jul 28, 2007 at 22:53, Updated on Mon, Aug 13, 2007 at 14:48 in India section
Tags: Siachen, Indian Army
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Siachen is an ironic name. The world’s highest battlefield, where soldiers battle bone-chilling cold, avalanches and biting wind, is named after the Sia rose. Siachen means a Valley of flowers.
Sepoy Gopal Das, 20, is new to Siachen. After a strenuous three-week training, Gopal would be certified fit and assigned to a post anywhere between 18,000-feet to 22,000-feet high. His duty would be to monitor over 49 miles of an inhospitable icy frontier.
“When I came here initially, I had headaches because oxygen levels are low. The training was bit difficult and I was scared initially,” says Das.
Every year over 7,000 soldiers are trained at the Siachen Battle School in high altitude warfare skills to fight the many dangers of Siachen. “There are soldiers who have never seen anything like this. That is why he have special training for them, so that they are psychologically ready to deal with it,” says Major R K Sharma.
Once a soldier adjusts to the terrain, it is time for a trek: 25-28 days of treacherous walk to glacier posts. The temperature at these posts dips below minus 45 degrees, and the wind chill may bring down the mercury by another 15 degrees.
“The first challenge of high altitude is hypoxia, or in lay man terms low oxygen. The second challenge is cold,” says Lt Col Anuj Chawla, Officer in charge, High Altitude Research and Medical Centre, Leh.
There are lots of things which can harm or kill you in Siachen: ice crevasses where temperatures slip to minus 200 degrees, avalanches and ice storms, exposure to ultra-violet radiation, frost bytes, dehydration, extreme weight loss or even a rare case of snow blindness.
High altitude pulmonary oedma, a condition in which the lungs fill up with fluids, was a major cause of death once and still constitutes around 60 per cent of hospital admissions. “Despite the best of training you still cannot be sure who will succumb to what. Even the best of the fit men will come across a problem they are not trained to deal with,” says Major Sharma.
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