Chemical Agents

Thursday was the big day of Chemical Agents. I was exposed to CS Gas (a.k.a "Cough and Spit)  and OC (a.k.a "old chilly"). The day started at 7:40 am. My first exposer to OC was at 8:30 am. All the cadets lined up outside, we stuck out our right indexed finger, got a little spray to the finger and placed our finger to our cheek. I felt nothing... about 10 minutes went by and my check was on fire. The burning sensation stopped around 10 am. You can see below my red cheek. 

After the first exposure the cadets had a two hour lecture about different types of gases. 

We tried on gas masks for our afternoon outing to to the gas house. 

The gas house was at Point Sur. We all partnered up and stood in a circle in a medium sized room. In the middle of the room, was a small coffee like can, where the instructors dispersed the CS gas. Arm and arm with our partner we watched the instructor throw a small canister into the empty can on the floor. Smoke lifted, quickly filling up the ceiling and then the gas slowly floated back down. Once the whole room was darken by the CS gas we had to face our partner, take off our mask, say our name, agency and roster number.  When it was my turn I took my mask off and very quickly said, "Officer Bray, State Parks, 3307,"  cleared the gas out of my mask and walked out with my partner. The room below is the gas house before the CS was let out. 

Being in the gas house with the mask wasn't bad. The moment I took off my mask I felt my nose and lungs tingled only a little. The worst was walking through without the gas mask. My partner and I walked in, stood in front of an instructor and said aloud our name, agency and roster number. The moment my partner and I walked out of the gas house we started coughing. My lungs and eyes were on fire. I felt a little delusional and weak. It felt like someone reached down into my lungs and ripped the inside of them. My eyes watered up and I could hardly keep them open. It was awful, but lasted only for a short amount of time. All the cadets at the end stood in an empty field letting the wind blow away the CS gas. Below is my partner and I after being exposed without a mask.  

After walking through the gas house the instructors let us have some fun. They demonstrated a bunch of other forms of gas or "less-lethal" options we might see other agencies use. State Parks doesn't carry a lot of what they showed us. It was all shown to educate us . It was a lot of fun!

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The worst part of the day was the OC. All I have to say is it hurt. It hurt bad. I don't think I can even explain what it felt like. It was like someone cut up the hottest pepper and sprayed it in your eye, times 10. Or like a thousand pin needles puncturing your eye. It was a painful experience that gave me a sense of accomplishment when it was over. I wish I had some video footage for you all. This is how it all went down, briefly:

I stood with one hand over an eye, the instructor yelled out "gas, gas, gas" and sprayed me across the forehead. I grabbed my baton, hit a suit-patted guy three times yelling, "get on the ground, get on the ground." Ohhhhh, my whole face and eye burned and I had to keep going. I had to arrest someone. Barely being able to see, I ordered someone to the ground, and cuffed them. It felt like an eternity. As soon as I got him cuffed I went to decontaminate. During decontamination I was in my own world. Nothing around me matter, only the pain, I continued to breath and tell myself "it's not that bad," "there are worse things that could happen," "it's okay." I kept telling myself these things but the pain of the OC kept overruling my positive thoughts. My eyeball was swollen and I felt completely helpless. I could do nothing but wait out the pain. There were hoses set up and fans. I rinsed my face and eye and let the fan blow into my eye. The harsh burning sensation lasted for about 30 minutes. The first 30 minutes was the worst. Slowly it got better. Throughout the evening my face tingled and by the time I went to bed the pain was gone. I survived.