Fatigue Management

experiencing severe sleep loss effects. The most important thing to look for is
an ability to do repeated additions without any long pauses. A substantial
decrease in the total number of additions completed in a given time frame, as
well as long pauses and errors, indicates deterioration. Obviously, numerous
variations to this task are possible. The goal is to get soldiers to demonstrate
working memory. More difficult tasks can be used for brighter or mentally
quicker soldiers, such as continuous subtraction (start with a three digit
number above 300 and choose a single digit number between five and nine to
be subtracted). Alternatively, more militarily relevant tasks can be used such
as encoding, decoding or map plotting. Whatever the task, it is useful to
establish baseline performance scores for each soldier prior to the
commencement of SusOps in order to take account of individual differences in
the abilities involved.
Because of the strain, they [the 8th Army field engineers]
worked in half-hour shifts: ‘any longer than that and we
lost our concentration and became careless.' Montgomery's
assumption that the Engineers would be able to clear a
narrow corridor of eight feet through the minefield at a
rate of 100 yards per three minutes proved completely
unrealistic: ‘for hour after hour the work went on. The
teams were relieved at half-hourly intervals and many of
the mentally exhausted Engineers lay where they were and
fell instantly asleep, oblivious to the gunfire, the bombs
and the bullets.'
Ben Sheppard
regarding the Battle of Alamein
A War of Nerves, 2000
Improving Wakefulness
In order to improve wakefulness:
a. Allow frequent breaks to alleviate strain, boredom and
complacency.
b. Increase social support; ensure soldiers are paired up to provide
companionship, support and checks/double-checks for one
another. Use teams rather than individuals to do tasks whenever
possible.
c. When fatigue is due to sleep loss (rather than physical effort), use
periods of mild exercise or short bursts of strenuous activity.
d. Identify the purpose of tasks to increase incentive.
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