At an altitude of 11,875 feet, the soldiers stationed at the Siachen glacier live and operate in some of the harshest situations.
A recent video posted on Twitter throws light on exactly how difficult it is to complete everyday tasks, especially cooking and eating, when living in temperatures lower than minus 50 degrees Celsius.
Three soldiers can be seen trying to open a pack of juice which has frozen to resemble a solid brick. One of them explains that they have to heat it in a pan to be able to drink it. They also have to use hammers to crack open eggs and cut vegetables. It is not clear when the video was taken.
“Such things make it very difficult for us to live here,” one of the soldiers says. Postings range from three months to a year, depending on the height at which a camp is situated. According to statistics presented by former Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in 2018, 163 Indian Army personnel deployed in Siachen have lost their lives over the past 10 years owing to the extreme weather conditions.
The video comes a few days after recently appointed Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s visit to the Siachen base camp to review the security situation and interact with soldiers.
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