We called it the white tornado. And shark attacks were most likely to fall on a trainee at the chow hall. 1970s so a far different time. Our TI came into the dayroom our first night and asked who could kick everyone else’s ass. One gnarled hand went up in the back. “What makes you so tough?” “I’m a 5th Dan black belt in karate.” He’d also been a gang member in Dallas and was given the choice of military or jail. Anyway the TI said “fine, you’re the dorm chief.” The dorm chief of our sister flight was chosen because he’d been hitchhiking and the driver took him to a deserted area and shot him through the neck and left him for dead, so he was a survivor. And then our asst TI showed up one Monday morning with a shiner because he’d been in a bar fight over the weekend. Our TI got us out for a little PT on a Sunday afternoon. Back then PT was in either combat boots or chukka boots. He put us in formation and told us as soon as we did a full lap around the 1/4 mile track doing the airborne shuffle in perfect step he’d knock us off for the day. 35 laps later two guys fell out saying they couldn’t go any farther. He immediately halted the flight and those guys got to do 5 more all by themselves.
We called it the white tornado. And shark attacks were most likely to fall on a trainee at the chow hall. 1970s so a far different time. Our TI came into the dayroom our first night and asked who could kick everyone else’s ass. One gnarled hand went up in the back. “What makes you so tough?” “I’m a 5th Dan black belt in karate.” He’d also been a gang member in Dallas and was given the choice of military or jail. Anyway the TI said “fine, you’re the dorm chief.” The dorm chief of our sister flight was chosen because he’d been hitchhiking and the driver took him to a deserted area and shot him through the neck and left him for dead, so he was a survivor. And then our asst TI showed up one Monday morning with a shiner because he’d been in a bar fight over the weekend. Our TI got us out for a little PT on a Sunday afternoon. Back then PT was in either combat boots or chukka boots. He put us in formation and told us as soon as we did a full lap around the 1/4 mile track doing the airborne shuffle in perfect step he’d knock us off for the day. 35 laps later two guys fell out saying they couldn’t go any farther. He immediately halted the flight and those guys got to do 5 more all by themselves.