After firing about 10,000 mortar rounds during four years of training, one soldier who joined the Army with near-perfect scores on the military aptitude test was struggling to read or do basic math. Another soldier started having unexplained fits in which his internal sense of time would suddenly come unmoored, sending everything around him whirling in fast-forward. “Guys are getting destroyed,” said Sergeant Devaul, who has fired mortars in the Missouri National Guard for more than 10 years. “Heads pounding, not being able to think straight or walk straight. They say you are just dehydrated, drink water.”

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Persons: Michael Devaul, ’, ”, Sergeant Devaul Organizations: Army, Missouri National Guard