FORT HUNTER LIGGETT, Calif. –
U.S. Army Reserve medical personnel from several commands prepare for casualty scenarios during the Global Medic training event on Fort Hunter Liggett in California, June 13, 2022.
The medics use special effects makeup and role-playing actors to assist in providing realistic training scenarios for the other medical units training at Global Medic.
“We're just going to be acting and doing some gory makeup to make it look realistic,” said U.S. Army Spc. Noely Mendez, a 2nd Medical Brigade medic participating in Global Medic. “The role-playing is going to be a little hectic where we're going to actually have to be acting, probably in a stressful situation when we're out in the field.”
It is the responsibility of medics like Mendez to ensure the injuries on the role-playing casualties provide a realistic training experience for the other support units. That responsibility includes creating and maintaining the makeup, as well as acting the part of an injured soldier.
The 2 MD Bde. and other Reserve combat support units continuously train at Global Medic with stressful and realistic scenarios to improve and maintain combat readiness. The objective in creating realistic-looking injuries with special effects latex makeup and acting is to simulate real casualty care in a wartime environment.
“I appreciate this part of the training because it’s definitely different and allows creativity, and is just a different part that people don’t know that the Army actually does too,” said Mendez.
After four hours of instruction and in many cases, no prior experience, the medics of this exercise have put their creativity to use, creating convincing looking injuries consistent with real-world combat. The medics are set to perform training operations on a 24-hour time table.