Re: Troops suffer hearing loss in Afghanistan (Edinburgh Evening News)

On Oct 31, 9:50 pm, hummahu...@humma.com wrote:
> On 30 Oct 2008 02:10:13 -0500, ad...@ng2000.com wrote:
>
> >http://www.ng2000.com/fw.php?tp=hearing-loss
>
>   I'm shocked, shocked I tell you that our troops are suffering severe
> hearing losses.  In other news, night follows day and dog bites man.
>   In more disturbing news, the number of military audiologists
> assigned to preventive medicine (hearing conservation) has fallen by
> 50 % since the start of the Gulf Wars.  Nice planning.

I know another member of the group, a career Air Force engineer,
attributes his hearing loss to Service aircraft noise. For all the
good it does me, I have little doubt that my loss (profound high-
frequency) was caused by National Service in the 50's. I had the
misfortune to be part of a group manning 17-pounder anti-tank guns.
These fired a round about 4 foot long, about 9" at the base, tapering
to a 3" round. High velocity. I still remember, as gun-layer, the man
in charge said 'Fire one'. When I pressed the firing pedal the world
more or less ended - I have never experienced concussion/noise like it
(and the only protection we had were crazy little rubber plugs smaller
than an ear-mold). When he said 'Fire two' my foot refused to have
anything to do with the proceedings! Temporary paralysis. (When these
things fired the great blast of flame and the enormous amount of dust
thrown up for about 50 feet around the weapon meant that, during WW2,
used against REAL tanks, they rarely got off more than a shot or two
before they were taken out).

As I say, this was the 50s. It is crazy that the forces are still
failing to equip people with adequate ear protection (and making sure
that they use it).
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