BOLCII Day 18: Shooting house

0550 PT lead by LT Monique Miles. Upper body circuit training in the sawdust pit. We did it in 4-man teams. LT James, LT Grams, LT Boudrou and myself. 15/10 partner resisted P/Us, 10/8/6 pull up bars, 20/15/10 dips. 50 overhead arms claps/50 cherry pickers, 2 min bear crawl, 2 min wheel barrow carry. We completed (2) complete circuits. There was 20’ rope that another cadre said was shut down so we did more P/Us or S/Us. There is a reasonable PT equipment setup for a good work up with a little planning.

Off to showers and uniform for the day then to chow, as we get in line it becomes very apparent that food service ran had out of food, not cool considering there was half of 3rd yet to go through. We made due with some odds and ends.

After loaded 40 rounds blanks it was on the bus at 0820 for Booker range. The army has some very nice shooting houses setup there included live fire with overhead view, a three story sim-munition concrete house complete with plywood door and windows for breaching and trap doors between the floors. There is also a plywood city called “The wild, wild west.” They also have a complex underground tunnel training system that the IOBC guys will get to do.

First off the cadre demonstrated clearing a glass house (just engineer tape on the ground) then SSG Butler and SSG Vega took 3rd and part of 2nd off to the shade while 1st and the rest of 2nd baked in the sun for practice (did I mention our cadre is the best?) with 4-man stacks to clear a corner and middle wall door rooms. It was great training, learning how to “flow” into a situation, never stopping and trust your teammates to do their part and interchanging roles from situation to situation.

It was then time for a tasty MRE and then some time at “the wild, wild west” w/SSG Butler showing how to cross a liner danger area in a Military Operations in Urban Terrain (MOUNT) environment then off to see actual footage or a 4-man Ranger team clearing the same live shooting house we would be working. –It would take months of working together as a team to achieve their level of flow but it was cool to watch. It was then off to the 3-story house for stair clearing and finally we got our turn at the live round shooting house (just dry fire for us today) and we pretty much worked on our own in 4 person teams, that was a lot of fun practicing.

Oh yeah the other highlight of the day was they decided to pump out the latrine at the range today for about 4 hours the whole range was covered in a heavy pungent odor of well… you can guess!

LT Fields has started video taping segments of our training for a class DVD, he interviewed the latrine cleaning crew today… the DVD will probably turn out to be a Michael Moore style documentary of BOLCII -Ha!

Back in the FOB it was rest and refit for tomorrow enjoy another MRE while C Co got hot chow (yeah, they get TWO hot meals a day and D Co only gets one!) and read a few academic papers for an upcoming discussion. http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2007/05/2752865 and http://nationaljournal.com/njcover2.htm

It will be a long couple of days with a night mission so I am going to wrap this up.

Me and BOLCII

BOLCII Day: 17 FOB II

First off, with 240 LTs in one open room how many alarms do you think were set? If you guessed 239 you were correct! And of couse they were all set at different times and would only go after the owner had left to go to the latrine! All 6 PLTs except for 3rd had to get up at 0500 for some reason but we didn’t have to report to PT till 0550. Ah well.

PT was great with a 4-mile run down the road off the FOB (Ok so maybe you wouldn’t do that in Iraq) the pace was pretty high so all of us were sweating buckets by the time we were done there were a few LTs who had trouble hanging. It was then some quick P/Us sets starting at 10 and counting down with a buddy.

It was off to the showers which was an adventure in itself, imagine a large tent with no lights or windows with double rows of plastic shower down the middle and sinks on the outside… All designed perfectly for someone about 4’ 2” At the least the middle tent had hot water, I understand the other male shower tents did not fair so well. And yes, please check the sign in front of the tent BEFORE you go in, no sign = male. Sign = female. My good battle buddy who shall remain nameless to protect his identity apparently went in the femail shower and was fully engaged in his shower before he realized that he was the only male in the tent!

After changing into ACUs in the shower tent (Note:for the FOB bring a large heavy duty zip lock “grab bag” for each day consisting of your uniform, socks tee-shirt, underwear ect. It makes life much eaiser)

We enjoyed our one hot meal of the day and then it was off to a class w/SSG Butler on our upcoming room clearing training. We moved out for the motor pool area for some reflexive dry fire training w/SSG Bulter and SSG Dunfee. After a delicious MRE for lunch (not!) we had a little downtime in our tent then our cadre decided to steal 5th PLTs bus and give us a bonus of a guided “bus tour” of the upcoming land nav test site for next Mon at 0300. We got to see the alligator lake and were told there are no points in it contrary to a number of LTs who seem to think so every year.

Back to the tent then we knock out some our peer lead classes and then got called for our first live fore reflexive fore range. We arrived early and had to wait awhile, did a dry fore run thru and then it decided to thunderstorm just as the last iteration with me in it was preparing to walk on and live fire. Ah well.

Tasty MRE for supper then personal hygine time and figuring out creative way to hang 240 sets of wet uniforms. Our student COC had to do a poggy bait (snack food) check of everyone’s lockers, that stuff is a no-go here because of the ants. The word is Thursday we will day ops then night ops from 1700-0500 that should be interesting.

I am writing this in the dark as everyone got sick of the two large flood lights left on in the tent last night so they killed all the lights, so what happens as soon as they do? Some LT crashes in to a footlocker and falls on the floor! The whole tent cracked up. ‘Just can’t win!

BOLCII Day 16: FOB

Up late last night packing… ‘Should have been a simple exercise but if anything it was to simple, by the time everybody figured out to add things like personal hygiene kit it was pushing 2300. We brought one “A” bag (duffle) full of personal gear plus all the goodies such as IBA, MOLLE, Kevlar

First formation was 0550 with all our gear in the Co area, loaded our rucks and duffles in an LMTV (thankfully 1, per platoon so there will be minimal confusion!) then we were told to report at 0745 for weapons draw.
No one had arranged to have the DEFAC open early for breakfast (not till 0700) so we had to decide to go back to bed and miss out on chow (the line would be to long) or just kill time in front of the line, since most of us would only see a hot meal once a day for awhile we decided to stick it out.

After chow I head back to the barracks for a quick 10 minute combat nap in Grams room (I had sprayed ant killer in my room just prior to leaving, a Ft Benning problem) and them it was time to load the buses for a 15 min ride out to our Forward Operating Base (FOB) destiny… we rolled thru a maze of barred wire barriers and debarked and took our gear to a company size semi-rigid tent, 3rd was first in so we got to chose our corner filled with grey metal bunk beds and one metal foot locker each. We are now officially “FOB-its”


NOTE: Electrical outlets a premium out here and power strips are not allowed so try a score a bunk with electrical.

SFC Kerr gave us an orientation then we had some time to stow our gear, rack out for a few minutes then it was time gear up and to head to US Weapons range. Well sort of that is, we get out that in full battle rattle just in time to see another PLT take our bus! well, a after a healthy MRE, a few more minutes of organizing stuff and it was finally our turn.

We had a brief familiarization with loading and clearing 249 SAW, 240B, M2 (50 cal) Mrk 19 and M203 then it was off to the firing line. For me since I am not an 11B, it was pretty cool to get behind and fire some of these crew served weapon systems that make the ground shake.

One of the LTs didn’t hold the M203 right and took a CCO right in the chin when he fired, so it was of with him and LT Grams for some stitches at the TMC.

It was clean up detail again because the PLT running the range did not properly plan enough help, we even haul their trash back for them in our bus, how pathetic is that!

Back at the FOB, SSG Butler spent some more time with Short Range Marksmanship (SRM) drill for reflexive fire tomorrow, he really is a great trainer! It sound like tomorrow will be a fun filled day.

I have spent the rest of the evening along with most of the PLT re-doing our paperwork for leave request for the upcoming Labor Day holiday. NOTE: If you are in leadership it would be a good thing to have a completed sample DA31 ahead of time for your PLT. Trying to re-do stuff at the FOB is painful at best

I debated weather to bring my laptop out here but at least tonight it has been a life saver as there are only 10 PCs in the DEFAC “tent” for 480 LTs to use after hours. I have full signal strength with Verizon.

A note on the FOB, there is a tent for everything, a tent for changing (yes, one for males and one for females!) a tent for showers, a tent to eat in, a tent for thr TOC, a tent for the cadre and a tents for briefing our upcoming missions. Porta-jons are the latrine of choice and there is a buffalo for a water point.

BOLCII Day: 15 Qualify Cont

0550 PT formation, those of us who still needed to qualify were dismissed back to the barracks so PT would not have any potential negative effect on our firing. 0700 we drew weapons, had breakfast. 0800 we marched out to the qualification range, several of us intended to re-zero but the zero range was not open yet so they just put us on the line again. It took me a few frustrating iteration as a no-go then the CPT McGinty stood behind me on the line to observe and noted my shots were going high right, something I should have seen but was to intent on delivering the round and move to the next to realize. I use some “Kentucky windage” and was right on. I so glad to walk off the line for the last time.

Lessons Learned: #1 bring a 3/32 allen wrench with you and tighten down your CCO after zero-ing and tighten every day. #2 My rifle was out of my control while it was used during night fire so my CCO could have gotten knocked. #3 Given that I have always qualified first time with iron sights (not expert by any means!) I should have gone back to the zero range after failing the first time. Although zeroing is not fun it would have eliminated a lot of unnecessary rounds down range and frustration.

NOTE: I receive an email question about if you should bring prescription glasses. All LTs are required to wear eye protection on ranges, and during the use of simmunitions As part of CIF you will be issued a set of ballistic "pro-glasses" with clear and smoke lens to wear at the ranges. They actually look fairly high speed and are very functional. As part of vision processing make sure you ask for a set of glasses inserts and you will be good to go, no need to spend your $$ on this one however our PLT cadre is allowing us to wear Wiley X etc (that have an NSN) so bring them if you have them.

After that it was back to the Co area where we were welcomed like long lost children (ok, maybe not quite!) then cleaned weapons. We moved out for US weapons familiarization at the PT field under the shelter. We got thru the M203 and AK47 but a thunderstorm rolled in so the cadre sent us packing. I did get to see a small black bear running along side the PT field. We had weapons turn in, cleaned up the common areas and our rooms, had our motivation speech from the D Co Cmdr, found out we placed 3 out of 6 for APFT at 273 point average (no one failed from 3rd PLT which is great!) Then our safety speech from the student 1SG and were released about 1800 for the weekend.

At some point I need to elaborative on what you can expect for weekend outings in Columbus.

BOLCII Day 13: Zero cont and night fire

At CQ 0400-0500 this morning Matt and I discovered that none of the prior CQ LT had not logged their shifts, signed for the radio or performed any of the clearing duties! I couldn’t do it all so I attacked the most visible areas, the day room and computer room. I hope the other CQ shifts get there act together or will not be released at a decent time on Friday after the Co 1SG walks thru.

At 0500 it was pointless to go to bed with a 0525 wake up for a 0550 formation so I worked on my blog for a while.

Weapons draw was painful again as we waited for another platoon. Not only did they make us 20 minutes late, we completed our entire draw while the they finished up thir paperwork. A few heated words were exchanged from our leadership to a few a dear-in-the-headlights LTs from the other platoon and we moved on.

It was then marching back to Roosevelt Range for more zeroing. The heat here would prove to be a record breaker with it reaching 115 on the ranges, D Co had two separate incidences requiring an LT ambulance transport to the hospital this afternoon. Keep in mind these are healthy active young officers who have proven there physical stamina going down as heat casualties. -This heat is nothing to mess with, you must drink water!

NOTE: I have been adding packets “Replenish” a Gatorade like powder with electrolytes to my camel-bak and canteens. It has saved me on more then a few occasions!

We had a jimmy-dean for breakfast with a self-heating can of beef chicken stew. It was actually pretty good for a jimmy-dean, the key point is you have to open the top before starting the heater. LT Kwia (one of our international LTs from Liberia) accidentally ripped the tab off his stew can after starting the heater, it became very evident from the loud noises of distress coming from the can that in a few minutes it was going to explode covering 40 LTs with beef stew, LT Seitz, saved the day and took one for the team by using my gerber tool to stab a hole in the top of the can, thereby releasing the pressure and scalding his hand in the process with stew.

NOTE: Cell phone service/. In many parts of the country, cellular service providers have competition, at Ft Benning that is definitely not the case! If you want to be able to make receive calls, you need to have Verizon. If you are assigned to A or B Co’s your experience may be different as their barracks are ½ mi from C and D Co’s but I can tell you there are a lot of frustrated LTs who have Sprint or AT&T etc. They have no coverage inside the barrack and low to no signal on the ranges.

I have Verizon and I have had very good coverage. In fact I would go so far as to suggest going the thru the pain filled act of changing service providers if you want to have good coverage while you are here for BOLCII/IOBC. Walking out to the parking lot to make or receives call is not fun in this heat!

I also have the wireless data card from Verizon that I purchased at the Peach Tree mall (I-185 exit 7A) at 59.99 month unlimited is it pricy for me but so far I have been happy with the speed and the fact I can expect coverage in most parts of the country. I enable ICS on my laptop and share the connection with my room mate with a old linksys hub I brought fir just such an opportunity.

Ft Benning has allowed a private company to provide WiFi base wide, it is $45.00 a month. I have heard mixed reviews from the LTs who have purchased it.

We setup the range, including stapling target to the slithouses and placing them, putting up engineer tape to control traffic and manning the ammo point. It was nice to be doing this in the cool of the day and watch the sun come up.

LT Meredith Walton and I drew gate guard. We had the best job of all sitting under a shade tree directing foot traffic to the range and watching for VIPs. Soon enough we rotating unto the range supervising the other LTs still zeroing and making everybody obeyed the tower and nobody did anything stupid.

You could tell the difference today with our PLT running the show, iterations were much more concise and we kept things moving right along (Hint, for zero alibi shooters, just them finish THEN go onto the next iterations.)

We then bused over the “known distance qualification range” For those of you that went to basic it is the highly computerized range that records where your rounds went for each target to assist you with where to aim mass.

It proved to be so hot ad taking the PLTs in front us so long because of the water/rest breaks that the Co Cmdr called an “adjust-ex” and had us get back on the bus to the zero range which was just finishing up and to an alternate qualification event with paper target at the 25 m distance but small enough to simulate the normal distances. Our PLT came together quickly and made the new mission happen with very little guidance form the cadre, this is what I like to see and be a part of!

We got back about 1700 and had till 1950 to rest up for the night. For night fire (familiarization only, non-qualifying event) we were issued of PVS-14s (night vision monocles) for our Kevlars and PEQs (Laser designators for our M4s) and

NOTE: If you are the only person in the PLT to have an ACH helmet like I do, just use your gerber tool to bend the tabs on the mounting strap of the PVS-14 to go over the front edge of the helmet. It works just fine. Also make sure you install the strap PRIOR to formation to go to the night range even if they don’t tell you to. It will save you many frantic minutes.

The range was actually pretty cool, the 50, 75, and 100 m target were used with IR light in the 50s. You don’t look thru the CCO, just shot from the kneeling position and walk the laser right into the center mass while looking thru the PVS-14 and fire a 20-round clip.

After we got back we had to wait like an hour outside because some PLT in the D Co had an accountability issue with some gear. We all just wanted to shower and go to bed. It would be close to midnight before that happened. We are all exhausted.

NOTE: When you are marching somewhere in the middle of the night DO NOT call cadence, the D Co PLT in front of insisted on being all hooah and singing at the top of there lung as we passed barracks of sleeping Soldiers. Remember that were share a CO are with the 75th Rangers… I thought for sure they would come piling out the doors to pummel us for interrupting their sleep!

BOLCII zero range day 2