Field Training

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

We're waiting to go in this building to do the shooting video game again. We are working on Short Range Marksmanship (SRM). SRM is targets between 5-100m. We quickly acquire and engage the target. Should be pretty cool. I'm really tired, though, because we had a late night last night. We did what they call "Nick-At-Nite". It is pretty crazy. It's at night obviously, and we have to high-crawl and low-crawl across a sand pit that's probably 200m long. Hard work! We do that while there is 3 machine gun towers firing live rounds over our head! We also crawl past bunkers that have C-4 explosives in them that blow up. Also, flares went up every so often that light up the sky. While all this is happening, there are speakers blaring withe gun fire, screams, and Muslim worship music. It was pretty crazy, but fun. What was really cool is that the machine guns are loaded with a 4:1 ratio of normal ammo to tracer rounds. They burn orange through the air so you can see where you're shooting at night. It's pretty crazy to see bullets flying over your head. They're probably about 15' high, so it's safe. The C-4 bunkers are loud! They shake the ground. I was really close to one when it went off and it blasted dirt all over me. The flare was really bright. And it burned for like 30 seconds. You're supposed to freeze and close your aiming eye (my right eye), so your eye doesn't have to adjust back to the dark. You also look forward to see where you are going.

Anyway...it was definitely an experience. What sucked is we had to do it at night so we didn't get back to the barracks til 00:00. We had to shower, so I didn't get to bed til 00:40. We still had to wake up at 05:00. I'm sleepy. It sucks; I just want to take a shower and get in bed. My bunk is comfortable but only because I'm so freakin tired when I get in it.

What really sucks is that we don't have any chairs. If we want to sit down we have to sit on the floor. We can't sit on our bunk until personal time @ 2100... then it's light out @ 2200. I have like a sore spot on my ass up near my tailbone form sitting on the floor, so I just stand a lot! It's little things like that that you take for granted - a comfortable chair. If we're in a classroom or something we sit on those folding metal chairs; those get old real fast.

Well, we were fitted for our Class A uniforms yesterday also (called Army Dress Greens). We got belt, tie, socks, undershirt, 2 short sleeve dress shirts, one normal dress shirt, shiny shoes, jacket, fitted slacks, and 2 berets. We don't ever wear them though. We graduate in ACU's and black beret. That's fine because it will be really hot. ACU's aren't cool, but they won't be as hot as the Class A's. They are pretty sharp looking especially after we get all out patches and pins on there.

Once we got back to the barracks, we did weapons maintenance because our rifles were filthy from the FTX (field training) we did last night. We leave in the morning to do an FTX. We'll be gone til Saturday @ 1700. We're doing Short Range Marksmanship (SRM). I think I said that already, and we also get to shoot... M249 SAW (5.56mm Machine Gun), M240B (7.62mm Machine Gun), M2 (.50cal Machine Gun - it weighs 80 lbs), M203 (Grenade Launcher), AT-4 (Anti-Tank Rocket Launcher), & M4's (Carbine version of M16). It should be pretty cool, so we'll see.

Only 21 days left!!!