Army training STILL failing 3 years after soldier’s death
ARMY instructors have had no further training on using a key temperature gauge despite a Scots soldier’s fatal collapse on a hot day, an inquest heard.
Corporal Joshua Hoole died within an hour of collapsing during an annual fitness test (AFT) march in Wales in July 2016.
The inquest into his death has heard that soldiers knew it was to be ‘the hottest day of the year’ and the exercise start time had been brought forward because of this.
Cpl Hoole, 26, of Ecclefechan, Dumfriesshire, collapsed around 400 yards from the end of the eight-mile march. Two other soldiers had earlier suffered suspected heat injuries.
The inquest has been told a temperature gauge used to determine if it was safe to start AFTs had been ‘erroneously’ located in the shade of the gym at Dering Lines in the Brecon Beacons. This meant it gave low readings in the morning. The error was only rectified at the start of this year.
Army policy states that AFTs must not go ahead if the temperature on the gauge reached 20C. The base’s physical training instructors (PTIs) had an informal policy where the Wet Bulb Globe Thermometer (WBGT) was moved outside the gym, so it stayed in direct sunlight in the morning.
But Corporal Owain Morris and fellow PTI Cpl Anand Gurung said they had not had any training on using the gauge after 2007 and 2005 respectively. Cpl Gurung, of 1 Royal Gurkha Rifles, said he knew a march was planned but not the start time He recorded the gauge reading 17C at 7.10am, and 17.3C at 8am. But the next reading at 10am, more than an hour after Cpl Hoole collapsed, was recorded by another PTI at 25.5C.
Barrister Richard Tutt, representing Cpl Gurung, asked him: ‘We may in due course hear the direction by the then Secretary of State [for Defence] has been given that a
‘Should be in any direct sunlight’
sticker should be put on all WBGTs? It reads: “Attention, when using this WBGT to take daytime outdoor readings, make sure it is not shaded in any way from sunlight – it should be in any direct sunlight”.
‘Is there a sticker to that effect on WBGT you use now?’ Cpl Gurung, now based at Shorncliffe barracks in Kent, replied: ‘No, sir.’
Cpl Morris, who is still at Dering Lines, also confirmed there was no ‘attention’ sticker on the WBGT. He added he had advised The Rifles’ training team to bring forward the march start, as the previous day it had read 24C on the WBGT at 9am.
A nurse later told the inquest how another soldier’s heat injury was ‘very obvious’. Claire Bailey, who treated Corporal Anasa Matau at the base’s medical centre, said his temperature was high, at 38.5C (101.3F).
Cpl Matau has told the inquest he was taken to hospital where medics told him he ‘would have died’ if he had not pulled out of the march.
The inquest continues.