Is it gross? Yeah, that was kind of the point. He was in the middle of the desert with no water. That's a pretty bad situation to be in, and they were emphasizing that fact by showing him resorting to some pretty nasty things to get through it.

 

Bear Grylls nonsense aside - you cannot and should not EVER drink urine in a desert survival situation. It is full of waste products that your body does not need, and drinking it will speed, not relieve your dehydration. The more dehydrated you are, the more concentrated it is, and the worse it is for you to drink. The proper uses for urine in a survival situation would be to either pee on your clothes and wrap it around your head and core for evaporative cooling, distill it in a solar still so you can get the water without the salts or nitrates, or in a long term situation like Alexandria pee in the same place all the time so you can get the nitrates to make gunpowder.

It bears mention that Bear Grylls was not "IN" the Special Air Service, he was "with" the 21 Territorial Army SAS. In reality - this was a reserve unit of the British Army, and his job within it was as a secretary / clerk not as an SAS Operator. To put it in American terms - he was a national guard secretary who filed paperwork for a Special Forces unit one weekend a month and two weeks a year. Thats why one should be careful following anything on those TV shows - the one "Airborne Ranger Sniper" on the other survival show was an MP stationed in Germany during peace time. Not even a "real MP" but a correctional officer in the stockade. Then in Korea he was an ID badge clerk.

 

Oh Jay...how I've missed your posts.