Update: April 17, 2009 - In order to view these videos you must request me as a friend on youtube. Username - steph*da*kel (take out the *s)

My department alongside with a couple of other departments had us do "officer survival training" this weekend. The training is completely separate from the academy. Officer survival training taught us a lot of tactics we didn't learn in the academy. We shot thousands of rounds in many high stress scenarios, perform various physical exercises (i.e my wrist is swollen and I have a bruise on my chest the size of a baseball), and we even had to get OC Sprayed again. If you're keeping count I've had to get OC Sprayed twice in the past 3 weeks. Most people never feel this type of pain once in their life, and I've had it twice in a 30 day period. Just great!

Pay attention to how I dropped to the ground to do push-ups after being sprayed. I wanted to show off and be macho, but for some reason my superior Officer picked me up immediately. The effects of the OC Spray caused me to go into a slight panic after being hosed with the water (water doesn't necessarily help, in fact it can make things worse if theres too much). I even tried to pour milk into my eyes, unfortunately it didn't do much help at all. The only thing that helps OC Spray is time it self.

Shout out to Angelo, he took the pain like a man and dropped down and did 25+ push ups comfortably.

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The video below is footage shot 45 minutes (can last up to 2 hours) after the initial OC Spray. Pay attention to everyones individual reaction. Some Officers were screaming, some were panicking, some Officers even had a hard time breathing. If you see some Officers in the video walking like they are completely fine, then out of no where break out screaming - it's because the OC Spray is like an on and off switch. For a brief minute you won't feel anything, then out of no where it feels as if someone is throwing acid into your eyes. Every Officer in this video was trained on how to react when put in a high stress environment, which is easier said than done. I can't even imagine a civilian that has never received my same training being OC Sprayed. Talk about mayhem!

I had a lot of fun shooting this video. A lot of Recruits in this video I've got pretty close with on a professional level. This is a memory we will share for the rest of our career. Although the pain was unbearable, if I had to do it all over again - I would.

If you don't understand the effects of OC Spray, then read my last post.

Final Thought: There's a young female recruit (pink jacket) in this video who was sprayed for the first time. She reacted as if nothing happened to her. When I asked her how she felt, she responded in a normal tone and said "I feel like I'm going to die." This is proof that pain can be concealed by emotions.