Monday, February 28, 2005
WFEX 1
Four days in the field, not a bad break from the monotony of the classroom and garrison life. I would be thrilled if we weren't facing snow, ice, sleet and winds. Oh well, suck it up and drive on.
We'll be out in the field for the next four days, so I'll be out of touch until this weekend. We get back on Friday morning, but we've got to clean weapons all day after we get back so I'll likely accomplish that and pass out.
We'll be out in the field for the next four days, so I'll be out of touch until this weekend. We get back on Friday morning, but we've got to clean weapons all day after we get back so I'll likely accomplish that and pass out.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
A nice walk in the woods.
After a loooong day yesterday blowing stuff up, we had land nav IV today. It was a beautiful day, a little chilly in the morning then warming up to a nice sunny day.
Yesterday we:
- fired the AT4 rocket launcher
- fired the M203 grenade launcher
- threw hand grenades
- fired the M249 SAW (squad automatic weapon)
- viewed the TOW and Javelin missile systems
- fired the M16 with night vision goggles
- and moved through the woods as a fire team with night vision goggles
All of that took us sixteen hours. Hell of a long day. It was, however the second most enjoyable day we've had here, second only to engineering day when we got to play with C4 and TNT.
The AT4 was not nearly as cool as you would hope. Due to the fact that the Army and the Air Force use up all our damn money, the Marine Corps can't spring the $1,400 each for us to fire a real AT4. So we fired a 9mm bullet out of a trainer tube which is set up exactly the same as a live AT4 and is weighted to feel the same. Kinda cool, but not nearly as cool as it would have been to fire a real rocket.
The M203 grenade launcher is a 40mm tube attached to the bottom of an M16 rifle. You can launch all kinds of nasty things from this little weapon; CS gas, smoke, flares, star cluster signals, and of course; high explosive rounds. It is not nearly as easy as you might think. It is a very low velocity round, so the recoil can send your round off target if you don't hold on tight. We fired five paint rounds, which send up a cloud of orange powder on impact, then one HEDP (high explosive dual purpose) round. It still amazes me every time a high explosive round goes off. They were impacting 150 meters away and you could still feel every round go off. Cool shit.
Then we moved on to the hand grenade range. I remember the first time I threw one, that little green orb was terrifying. That 14oz baseball sized hunk of metal has some major destructive power. You know that all you have to do is fumble once and you are in a world of hurt. This time, I was a lot more relaxed. Maybe too much, but I got through it with all of my extremities intact. We threw them from a concrete bunker, so you toss it, crouch down behind the wall, and wait for the boom. It is a very impressive boom, it shakes you. I wish we could throw more than one.
The afternoon started off with classes on the SAW, the smaller of the two machine guns you will find in an infantry platoon. Lots of firepower in a small package. Then we fired a belt of 50 rounds. Ho hum. I hate the way the Marine Corps does that. Fifty rounds is not enough to really get a feel for a weapon, it's just enough time to say you've done it. It also seems that every time I fire a machine gun I get yelled at for firing a longer burst than I'm supposed to. What the hell, it's a machine gun, let 'er rip! At least this time they can't really yell at me, I outrank the range personnel.
Then we got some classes on the Javelin and TOW anti-armor missile systems. The TOW is the most widely used anti-armor missile we use, it is a wire guided vehicle mounted system. It has two variants, a direct attack munition, which slams into the side of the armor; and a top attack variant, which flies over the target and detonates downward. The weakest armor on a tanks is the top, so this variant produces a real mess when used properly. The problem is that guys in Iraq are using this to attack buildings and it either doesn't go off or the blast is sent into the floor. We, of course, did not get to fire a live missile, we only got to look through the sights. The thermal sight on the TOW is not like you see in the movies, there is not a rainbow colored image on the screen which shows distinct color lines. It is actually a mostly red display with white showing hot items and black showing cool items. It is not very sharp either, but I'm sure it is very effective in locating tanks and other huge masses of heat.
The Javelin is an awesome weapon. It is a fire and forget system, which is incredible for something ground based. Once you pull the trigger and fire this thing, you get the hell out of there, no need to stay on target and guide it in like the TOW. Once it finds its target, it pops up and drops down on it. A two stage warhead delivers an incredible punch. They told us that it is capable of penetrating 36 inches of armor, but its actual capabilities are classified. That is three feet of steel. There is no tank in the world which can stop this round. On Monday we saw video of a Javelin launched at a T-72, a very substantial Soviet tank, and it ripped it to shreds. I'm not one to exaggerate, this tank was gone. There was nothing but parts left. It sends a chill down your spine to see so much destructive force. I'm glad we are the only ones with this thing.
The CUL is the box which you look through to aim the Javelin and it, like the TOW, contains a thermal imaging as well as daylight sighting system. The thermal has a 4X and a 9X setting which you can toggle between by pressing a button on the left control handle, which contains several other controls. They didn't tell us what those do, it's not like we'll ever fire one. These thermals were more like what you see in the movies. There are only three colors: white hot, green neutral, and black for cold, but it was so sharp it was like a video game. This is the first time in the Marine Corps I have seen a piece of gear that was truly state of the art. It was really cool, but the ugly truth is that I'll never fire one and probably never even see one fired. The CLU (command launch unit) costs somewhere between $400-500,000 and each missile is about $68,000 dollars. The pencil pushers are not eager for us to fire these things off. The two corporals who taught us had been to Iraq with this as their primary duty and neither had actually fired a missile. Their battalion fired two in the entire war.
Then we fired the M16 with night vision and an infrared aiming sight. It was pretty cool, but I didn't hit a thing because my sight wasn't even on the weapon tight. It was angled down, so my barrel was angled up and that meant my rounds were flying somewhere way over the target. Oh well, it was fun anyway.
Then we wandered around in the woods for a little while with NVGs on, which was cool as well. Moving in night vision goggles is still frustrating because of the narrowed field of view and the loss of depth perception, but I'm getting better at it. My fire team likes to put me on point whenever we move in NVGs, but I'm not sure if that is because I'm good at it or because they like to have me in front of them so they can see me trip over the branches. Oh well, I still like to be out front.
This morning reminded me of Parris Island. That sounds strange, being that PI is hell on earth, but I'm referring to the weather. I was there in spring, and the weather is absolutely beautiful in spring. The cool mornings break with a soft beautiful orange light and a light breeze off the water. The trees sway and the cool breeze seems to make everything smell clean and pure. Even when the drill instructors were laying on the stress as hard as they could, I couldn't help but be amazed by the beauty of the morning. I wrote my father one day about the beauty of the sunrise over one of the swamps out there. We were on the first force march, the three miler, and as we passed over the land bridge, I looked out over the golden water and reeds. The birds were active and a breeze swept across the open water. Even though I was in pain and the drill instructors were yelling, I was calmed and comforted by the scene in front of me.
Well we got done early today, so I'm going to take off for the rock climbing gym. Maybe I'll meet someone interesting who's not in the Marine Corps. I have some great friends here, but sometimes you feel like you don't have a life outside the Corps.
Yesterday we:
- fired the AT4 rocket launcher
- fired the M203 grenade launcher
- threw hand grenades
- fired the M249 SAW (squad automatic weapon)
- viewed the TOW and Javelin missile systems
- fired the M16 with night vision goggles
- and moved through the woods as a fire team with night vision goggles
All of that took us sixteen hours. Hell of a long day. It was, however the second most enjoyable day we've had here, second only to engineering day when we got to play with C4 and TNT.
The AT4 was not nearly as cool as you would hope. Due to the fact that the Army and the Air Force use up all our damn money, the Marine Corps can't spring the $1,400 each for us to fire a real AT4. So we fired a 9mm bullet out of a trainer tube which is set up exactly the same as a live AT4 and is weighted to feel the same. Kinda cool, but not nearly as cool as it would have been to fire a real rocket.
The M203 grenade launcher is a 40mm tube attached to the bottom of an M16 rifle. You can launch all kinds of nasty things from this little weapon; CS gas, smoke, flares, star cluster signals, and of course; high explosive rounds. It is not nearly as easy as you might think. It is a very low velocity round, so the recoil can send your round off target if you don't hold on tight. We fired five paint rounds, which send up a cloud of orange powder on impact, then one HEDP (high explosive dual purpose) round. It still amazes me every time a high explosive round goes off. They were impacting 150 meters away and you could still feel every round go off. Cool shit.
Then we moved on to the hand grenade range. I remember the first time I threw one, that little green orb was terrifying. That 14oz baseball sized hunk of metal has some major destructive power. You know that all you have to do is fumble once and you are in a world of hurt. This time, I was a lot more relaxed. Maybe too much, but I got through it with all of my extremities intact. We threw them from a concrete bunker, so you toss it, crouch down behind the wall, and wait for the boom. It is a very impressive boom, it shakes you. I wish we could throw more than one.
The afternoon started off with classes on the SAW, the smaller of the two machine guns you will find in an infantry platoon. Lots of firepower in a small package. Then we fired a belt of 50 rounds. Ho hum. I hate the way the Marine Corps does that. Fifty rounds is not enough to really get a feel for a weapon, it's just enough time to say you've done it. It also seems that every time I fire a machine gun I get yelled at for firing a longer burst than I'm supposed to. What the hell, it's a machine gun, let 'er rip! At least this time they can't really yell at me, I outrank the range personnel.
Then we got some classes on the Javelin and TOW anti-armor missile systems. The TOW is the most widely used anti-armor missile we use, it is a wire guided vehicle mounted system. It has two variants, a direct attack munition, which slams into the side of the armor; and a top attack variant, which flies over the target and detonates downward. The weakest armor on a tanks is the top, so this variant produces a real mess when used properly. The problem is that guys in Iraq are using this to attack buildings and it either doesn't go off or the blast is sent into the floor. We, of course, did not get to fire a live missile, we only got to look through the sights. The thermal sight on the TOW is not like you see in the movies, there is not a rainbow colored image on the screen which shows distinct color lines. It is actually a mostly red display with white showing hot items and black showing cool items. It is not very sharp either, but I'm sure it is very effective in locating tanks and other huge masses of heat.
The Javelin is an awesome weapon. It is a fire and forget system, which is incredible for something ground based. Once you pull the trigger and fire this thing, you get the hell out of there, no need to stay on target and guide it in like the TOW. Once it finds its target, it pops up and drops down on it. A two stage warhead delivers an incredible punch. They told us that it is capable of penetrating 36 inches of armor, but its actual capabilities are classified. That is three feet of steel. There is no tank in the world which can stop this round. On Monday we saw video of a Javelin launched at a T-72, a very substantial Soviet tank, and it ripped it to shreds. I'm not one to exaggerate, this tank was gone. There was nothing but parts left. It sends a chill down your spine to see so much destructive force. I'm glad we are the only ones with this thing.
The CUL is the box which you look through to aim the Javelin and it, like the TOW, contains a thermal imaging as well as daylight sighting system. The thermal has a 4X and a 9X setting which you can toggle between by pressing a button on the left control handle, which contains several other controls. They didn't tell us what those do, it's not like we'll ever fire one. These thermals were more like what you see in the movies. There are only three colors: white hot, green neutral, and black for cold, but it was so sharp it was like a video game. This is the first time in the Marine Corps I have seen a piece of gear that was truly state of the art. It was really cool, but the ugly truth is that I'll never fire one and probably never even see one fired. The CLU (command launch unit) costs somewhere between $400-500,000 and each missile is about $68,000 dollars. The pencil pushers are not eager for us to fire these things off. The two corporals who taught us had been to Iraq with this as their primary duty and neither had actually fired a missile. Their battalion fired two in the entire war.
Then we fired the M16 with night vision and an infrared aiming sight. It was pretty cool, but I didn't hit a thing because my sight wasn't even on the weapon tight. It was angled down, so my barrel was angled up and that meant my rounds were flying somewhere way over the target. Oh well, it was fun anyway.
Then we wandered around in the woods for a little while with NVGs on, which was cool as well. Moving in night vision goggles is still frustrating because of the narrowed field of view and the loss of depth perception, but I'm getting better at it. My fire team likes to put me on point whenever we move in NVGs, but I'm not sure if that is because I'm good at it or because they like to have me in front of them so they can see me trip over the branches. Oh well, I still like to be out front.
This morning reminded me of Parris Island. That sounds strange, being that PI is hell on earth, but I'm referring to the weather. I was there in spring, and the weather is absolutely beautiful in spring. The cool mornings break with a soft beautiful orange light and a light breeze off the water. The trees sway and the cool breeze seems to make everything smell clean and pure. Even when the drill instructors were laying on the stress as hard as they could, I couldn't help but be amazed by the beauty of the morning. I wrote my father one day about the beauty of the sunrise over one of the swamps out there. We were on the first force march, the three miler, and as we passed over the land bridge, I looked out over the golden water and reeds. The birds were active and a breeze swept across the open water. Even though I was in pain and the drill instructors were yelling, I was calmed and comforted by the scene in front of me.
Well we got done early today, so I'm going to take off for the rock climbing gym. Maybe I'll meet someone interesting who's not in the Marine Corps. I have some great friends here, but sometimes you feel like you don't have a life outside the Corps.
Monday, February 14, 2005
NVGs
So I'm sure everyone has seen those CNN images of fighting in the Persian Gulf; grainy green images with tracers streaking into the sky and ghostly figures running across the desert. This is night vision. It seems pretty damn cool until you actually try to use it to maneuver.
The first difficulty with american night vision goggles is the fact that you are looking through a single lens of moderately small diameter. This causes two problems; tunnel vision and a total loss of depth perception. Your field of view goes from about 180 degrees down to 40 and you are left groping around for objects which you can't really tell how far away they are. They are really damn cool, but they have their limitations.
With this in mind, the Marine Corps built a night laboratory here at Camp Barrett, designed to show us that while it is difficult to maneuver in the NVGs (night vision goggles), it is not impossible. A twenty foot tall steel building, approximately 75 feet by 75 feet square, houses an obstacle course which contains numerous rooms which you must crawl, climb, run, and at one point, slide through. It was definitely one of the more fun things we've done here.
The goggles are designed to be clipped onto our helmets, and they do that well, but they are not the most comfortable things to wear. They cause your helmet to become unbalanced forward and add weight. Once I got them adjusted and fitted to me I felt a little better, but the feeling of tunnel vision is a little disconcerting.
The course starts in a room with some simple obstacles for you to get used to the goggles. The feeling of tunnel vision is immediately bothersome because you don't know what is in the room with you. Turning your head from side to side to check out your surroundings doesn't really ease your concerns, you still feel like you have blinders on. You want to take these blinders off your eyes, but doing so would only make you more blind. I flipped up my goggles at one point and no shit, it really was pitch black in there. I imagine the feeling of being blind would be worse if there was really someone out there who wanted to shoot me.
After a couple of minutes with the goggles on, I felt a lot better with them on. My fire team mates, Olson, Kelly, and Smith, did not feel so good. They were struggling with the goggles a little more. The goggles must be manually focused by turning the front lens of them right or left, but I found that by leaving them focused about twenty feet in front of me, I could see obstacles in my path and I could still maintain awareness of what was further in front of me. I really started to have some fun in there, it was like a big jungle gym. We climbed up rock walls, down ropes, up chain ladders, across narrow high walls, through several rooms, tunnels, a school bus, and a drug lab. I wanted to go back and do it again, but they wouldn't let me do it. Darn.
One of my team members, Lt. Olson, didn't have such a good experience. After clearing the school bus, we were out in the open and were attacked by a simulated machine gun position. We were told to take off running for cover when we heard the machine gun; a little joke from the instructors. I saw the wire, but Olson did not. Across what looked like a break in a fence was a steel cable about 1/4" in diameter. Hard to see in NVGs when you are on the run. He hit it full speed right across his middle and damn near flipped over the wire. I didn't get to see it, but the rest of the platoon was watching on TV monitors in the waiting area and they told me all about it. Oh well, guess we all get to do something stupid here.
Tomorrow is an early day, we're firing the M203 grenade launcher, the AT4 and SMAW anti tank rockets, and some other surprises I'm not fully aware yet. We're also firing something at night but I don't know what that will be either. Guess I'll find out when I get there.
The first difficulty with american night vision goggles is the fact that you are looking through a single lens of moderately small diameter. This causes two problems; tunnel vision and a total loss of depth perception. Your field of view goes from about 180 degrees down to 40 and you are left groping around for objects which you can't really tell how far away they are. They are really damn cool, but they have their limitations.
With this in mind, the Marine Corps built a night laboratory here at Camp Barrett, designed to show us that while it is difficult to maneuver in the NVGs (night vision goggles), it is not impossible. A twenty foot tall steel building, approximately 75 feet by 75 feet square, houses an obstacle course which contains numerous rooms which you must crawl, climb, run, and at one point, slide through. It was definitely one of the more fun things we've done here.
The goggles are designed to be clipped onto our helmets, and they do that well, but they are not the most comfortable things to wear. They cause your helmet to become unbalanced forward and add weight. Once I got them adjusted and fitted to me I felt a little better, but the feeling of tunnel vision is a little disconcerting.
The course starts in a room with some simple obstacles for you to get used to the goggles. The feeling of tunnel vision is immediately bothersome because you don't know what is in the room with you. Turning your head from side to side to check out your surroundings doesn't really ease your concerns, you still feel like you have blinders on. You want to take these blinders off your eyes, but doing so would only make you more blind. I flipped up my goggles at one point and no shit, it really was pitch black in there. I imagine the feeling of being blind would be worse if there was really someone out there who wanted to shoot me.
After a couple of minutes with the goggles on, I felt a lot better with them on. My fire team mates, Olson, Kelly, and Smith, did not feel so good. They were struggling with the goggles a little more. The goggles must be manually focused by turning the front lens of them right or left, but I found that by leaving them focused about twenty feet in front of me, I could see obstacles in my path and I could still maintain awareness of what was further in front of me. I really started to have some fun in there, it was like a big jungle gym. We climbed up rock walls, down ropes, up chain ladders, across narrow high walls, through several rooms, tunnels, a school bus, and a drug lab. I wanted to go back and do it again, but they wouldn't let me do it. Darn.
One of my team members, Lt. Olson, didn't have such a good experience. After clearing the school bus, we were out in the open and were attacked by a simulated machine gun position. We were told to take off running for cover when we heard the machine gun; a little joke from the instructors. I saw the wire, but Olson did not. Across what looked like a break in a fence was a steel cable about 1/4" in diameter. Hard to see in NVGs when you are on the run. He hit it full speed right across his middle and damn near flipped over the wire. I didn't get to see it, but the rest of the platoon was watching on TV monitors in the waiting area and they told me all about it. Oh well, guess we all get to do something stupid here.
Tomorrow is an early day, we're firing the M203 grenade launcher, the AT4 and SMAW anti tank rockets, and some other surprises I'm not fully aware yet. We're also firing something at night but I don't know what that will be either. Guess I'll find out when I get there.
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Things that go boom
Engineering may be the coolest job in the Corps that doesn't involve flying. It's perfectly suited for the kid who never grew up. You build things and then blow them up, what could be better than that?
Instead of our normal boring classes, we went out to Murphy Demo(litions) range and watched the engineers blow some stuff up. "This is C4...... BOOM!. This is military dynamite...... BOOM!, this is Det Cord...... BOOM!" One of the demonstrations was the fact that C4 will detonate even under water. I'm not sure how much C4 was in that charge, but it blew water and chunks of ice 100 feet into the air. We could still hear stuff falling fifteen seconds after the blast.
After this, we had a chance to play. We each got our own block of C4, two 1/4lb sticks of TNT, and a bunch of Det cord (explosive in a 1/4" rope form; devastating stuff). Broken up into groups of 20, we tied them into rings of det cord about 12' in diameter. One ring of C4, totaling 10lbs of C4, one ring of TNT, totaling 5lbs of TNT, and one pile of TNT also totaling 5lbs which we set off ourselves via fuse detonaors. Remove the saftey, push in, rotate 1/4 turn right, pull out, look for smoke, and run. We had over seven minutes of fuse, but some of the lieutenants were in no mood to stick around. "Can we start walking now?" was asked no more than five seconds after we pulled the detonators. Jeez, relax man, this stuff was made by the lowest bidder, have you no faith?
We walked back about 200 yards from our C4 rings and 100 yards from our TNT piles and watched them all blow up. I don't think I can put into words how impressive these explosions were. Any explosion which moves clothing at 200 yards is impressive. These are explosions which you feel more than hear. Eighteen times (six groups, three set-ups) we watched dirt fly and smoke rise. Good shit.
Then we set up six claymore mines. Nasty, nasty little thing. Seven hundred steel balls a little bigger than a BB backed by 1.5 lbs of C4 explosive. Due to the massive number of people maimed by discarded mines from past wars, this is the only mine we use anymore because it is command detonated, meaning nobody leaves it behind for some innocent to hit. Everyone who's watched a Vietnam movie has seen this thing. It is directional, so you stand it up facing the bad guys, push the button on your remote (up to 33 meters away) and hasta lasagna, don't get any on ya. I really didn't think they were as nasty as they are. It's only a pound and a half of C4, but the explosion from that thing will rock your world, even behind it.
In the next two weeks we get to see close air support and live artillery. A 155mm howitzer shell contains about 25lbs of explosive in a 75lb steel case. For the close air support demonstration, apparently a jet is going to drop a 500 pound bomb for us out in one of the impact areas. This means about 200 pounds of C4. Now that should be one hell of an explosion.
Instead of our normal boring classes, we went out to Murphy Demo(litions) range and watched the engineers blow some stuff up. "This is C4...... BOOM!. This is military dynamite...... BOOM!, this is Det Cord...... BOOM!" One of the demonstrations was the fact that C4 will detonate even under water. I'm not sure how much C4 was in that charge, but it blew water and chunks of ice 100 feet into the air. We could still hear stuff falling fifteen seconds after the blast.
After this, we had a chance to play. We each got our own block of C4, two 1/4lb sticks of TNT, and a bunch of Det cord (explosive in a 1/4" rope form; devastating stuff). Broken up into groups of 20, we tied them into rings of det cord about 12' in diameter. One ring of C4, totaling 10lbs of C4, one ring of TNT, totaling 5lbs of TNT, and one pile of TNT also totaling 5lbs which we set off ourselves via fuse detonaors. Remove the saftey, push in, rotate 1/4 turn right, pull out, look for smoke, and run. We had over seven minutes of fuse, but some of the lieutenants were in no mood to stick around. "Can we start walking now?" was asked no more than five seconds after we pulled the detonators. Jeez, relax man, this stuff was made by the lowest bidder, have you no faith?
We walked back about 200 yards from our C4 rings and 100 yards from our TNT piles and watched them all blow up. I don't think I can put into words how impressive these explosions were. Any explosion which moves clothing at 200 yards is impressive. These are explosions which you feel more than hear. Eighteen times (six groups, three set-ups) we watched dirt fly and smoke rise. Good shit.
Then we set up six claymore mines. Nasty, nasty little thing. Seven hundred steel balls a little bigger than a BB backed by 1.5 lbs of C4 explosive. Due to the massive number of people maimed by discarded mines from past wars, this is the only mine we use anymore because it is command detonated, meaning nobody leaves it behind for some innocent to hit. Everyone who's watched a Vietnam movie has seen this thing. It is directional, so you stand it up facing the bad guys, push the button on your remote (up to 33 meters away) and hasta lasagna, don't get any on ya. I really didn't think they were as nasty as they are. It's only a pound and a half of C4, but the explosion from that thing will rock your world, even behind it.
In the next two weeks we get to see close air support and live artillery. A 155mm howitzer shell contains about 25lbs of explosive in a 75lb steel case. For the close air support demonstration, apparently a jet is going to drop a 500 pound bomb for us out in one of the impact areas. This means about 200 pounds of C4. Now that should be one hell of an explosion.
Land Nav with the Flu
Alpha company has recently entered battle with the Flu. Despite the Navy's valiant efforts to protect us with their wonderful flu mist, the flu has breached the perimeter and is picking us off one by one.
Like any thinking enemy, it got our student company commander first on Monday night. A friend of mine, he was not well. Throwing up and diarrhea all night long, it was not pretty. I actually woke up Tuesday not feeling 100%, but nothing like him. I learned I was one of three in our platoon not feeling well that day.
As the day progressed, the symptoms got worse. This wouldn't be so bad if we weren't doing land nav that day (Tuesday). Land nav at TBS is almost a PT event. They space your points so far apart that you have to run from one point to the next to get all of them. I was in no shape to do that. As I was trying to orient myself at a stream intersection which I would use to find my second of six boxes, the day got worse. My headache was roring full strength, my whole body hurt, and I was getting chills from the fever. That lovely flu delirium had set in as well. Orienting my map, which should take ten seconds, took me ten minutes. I was just about to give up, but I have developed a reputation as a good land nav guy and I didn't want to fail this event.
I decided that I would shorten my day by going box to box instead of running to attack points (road intersections and stream intersections that are easily identified on the map which are used to make sure you are where you think you are before attempting to navigate to your point). This can be dangerous because if you get one box wrong, all of the rest will be wrong if you find anything at all. I took the chance, I didn't have the energy to go any further.
I actually did find all six points I was assigned, which was better than 14 of my platoon mates who didn't find the minimum four. Unfortunately, that meant I had to go to remedial land nav on Saturday to help one of those 14. It's like being punished for doing well. I love the chance to help someone with something they are having difficulty with, but the weekend is a big deal here. Cutting into my Saturday takes a huge chunk out of my weekend. We have to be in the classroom by 0630, so I can't do much Friday night and then we don't get released until about 1130. By the time you clean up and get ready to go, it's afternoon.
The flu has continued to ravage the platoon as the week has gone on, my room mate is the latest victim. I'm hoping this is the last round of this crap, it's not fun.
Like any thinking enemy, it got our student company commander first on Monday night. A friend of mine, he was not well. Throwing up and diarrhea all night long, it was not pretty. I actually woke up Tuesday not feeling 100%, but nothing like him. I learned I was one of three in our platoon not feeling well that day.
As the day progressed, the symptoms got worse. This wouldn't be so bad if we weren't doing land nav that day (Tuesday). Land nav at TBS is almost a PT event. They space your points so far apart that you have to run from one point to the next to get all of them. I was in no shape to do that. As I was trying to orient myself at a stream intersection which I would use to find my second of six boxes, the day got worse. My headache was roring full strength, my whole body hurt, and I was getting chills from the fever. That lovely flu delirium had set in as well. Orienting my map, which should take ten seconds, took me ten minutes. I was just about to give up, but I have developed a reputation as a good land nav guy and I didn't want to fail this event.
I decided that I would shorten my day by going box to box instead of running to attack points (road intersections and stream intersections that are easily identified on the map which are used to make sure you are where you think you are before attempting to navigate to your point). This can be dangerous because if you get one box wrong, all of the rest will be wrong if you find anything at all. I took the chance, I didn't have the energy to go any further.
I actually did find all six points I was assigned, which was better than 14 of my platoon mates who didn't find the minimum four. Unfortunately, that meant I had to go to remedial land nav on Saturday to help one of those 14. It's like being punished for doing well. I love the chance to help someone with something they are having difficulty with, but the weekend is a big deal here. Cutting into my Saturday takes a huge chunk out of my weekend. We have to be in the classroom by 0630, so I can't do much Friday night and then we don't get released until about 1130. By the time you clean up and get ready to go, it's afternoon.
The flu has continued to ravage the platoon as the week has gone on, my room mate is the latest victim. I'm hoping this is the last round of this crap, it's not fun.
Saturday, February 05, 2005
A nice walk in the woods
So today, thanks to the idiocy of Fox and Bravo companies we were treated to two hours of lectures on the evils of drunk driving and what will happen to us if we do. First the Colonel came out and told us what dirtbags we are. Then we saw a couple of "blood on the highway" kind of pictures and oddly enough it all ended with a thirty minute lecture on car insurance, which only mentioned the effects of a DUI on your rates for about three minutes. Wierd.
Then all of the people who failed land navigation on Friday, who didn't find at least four of the six boxes, headed out for a mandatory "practice session." Since I scored 100%, I was also obligated to go out there and help someone. We all went back into TA-5 in search of five boxes in two man teams, one lieutenant with a passing score and one with a not passing score. I had Lt. Olson, a pretty nice guy who lives next door to me in the barracks. He didn't really need a lot of help, but I was able to give him some good tips and send him in the right direction. It really is fun to help someone, to take your own knowledge and relate it to them. To see them getting it and to see their confidence building is really rewarding. That is one of the reasons I chose to become a marine officer, to educate and mentor young marines.
The weather, for once, was really nice today. The sun was shining and the temp was probably in the middle 50s. As I was following Olson around, I was thinking about the weekends that dad would take me and my sister into the woods to go exploring. Some of my fondest childhood memories were from us wandering around the woods for hours, seeing things and exploring. I haven't really had a chance to just be in the woods for a long time. Most of the time I am in the woods now I am either loaded down with gear and weapons or searching for little red boxes with a map and a compass. The woods here are really nice too.
Then all of the people who failed land navigation on Friday, who didn't find at least four of the six boxes, headed out for a mandatory "practice session." Since I scored 100%, I was also obligated to go out there and help someone. We all went back into TA-5 in search of five boxes in two man teams, one lieutenant with a passing score and one with a not passing score. I had Lt. Olson, a pretty nice guy who lives next door to me in the barracks. He didn't really need a lot of help, but I was able to give him some good tips and send him in the right direction. It really is fun to help someone, to take your own knowledge and relate it to them. To see them getting it and to see their confidence building is really rewarding. That is one of the reasons I chose to become a marine officer, to educate and mentor young marines.
The weather, for once, was really nice today. The sun was shining and the temp was probably in the middle 50s. As I was following Olson around, I was thinking about the weekends that dad would take me and my sister into the woods to go exploring. Some of my fondest childhood memories were from us wandering around the woods for hours, seeing things and exploring. I haven't really had a chance to just be in the woods for a long time. Most of the time I am in the woods now I am either loaded down with gear and weapons or searching for little red boxes with a map and a compass. The woods here are really nice too.
Land Navigation
Ever heard the phrase "The most dangerous thing in the world is a second lieutenant with a map and a compass"? The enlisted love to repeat it, but the truth is that many know little to nothing about land navigation themselves. Land navigation is not easy, especially for someone coming from the city, having never really set foot in the woods.
We has classes all week on land nav and then they threw us into the woods on Thursday. That is the TBS preferred method of instruction; cram your brain with info for a few days and then throw you to the wolves. Didn't quite get it? Too bad, time to go lieutenant!
Thursday was our first practical application of our skills, we headed out into TA-5, a training area a little more than one grid square in size. ( A grid square is marked on the map, it indicates a square 1000 meters by 1000 meters.) We were given five grid coordinates to find in two and a half hours. If you reach the coordiate, you will find a box with a numbe or letter on it, that is how we are scored. Most of the lieutenants at least found four.
Friday, we moved onto TA-8, an area more than seven grid squares in size. Now we have six points to find in four hours. The increased time is due to the immense size of the training area. After I was done, I retraced my steps on the map and found I had traveled a little more than 8 miles. This does not, however take into account all of the backtracking and searching for those damn boxes. I actually fell into the river on my first box, only half an hour into the four hours. A log I was using to cross broke as I was crossing and I fell in up to my knees. Not a great way to spend the day; soaked and cold.
As I was nearing drop dead time on Friday (a previously established time which all of us must be done by in order to get a score) I was still short two boxes of my six and was more than two kilometers from the command post. I had to haul ass or I wouldn't get in by drop dead time. In 40 minutes, I found two boxes and made the haul all the way back to the CP. I was either running or walking fast the entire time. After I found the last box, I checked my map for the dirction to the CP, whipped out my compass, and took off running. I just did make it.
The difficulty with land navigation is that you have to take a flat map with a bunch of lines on it and translate that into what you see on the ground. Then you throw in the inherent inaccuracies of a man made map and you have an adventure. I lost twenty minutes looking for a road intersection that was not really there. On the map, there were two roads intersecting another. In reality there was only one. Oh well, I made it anyway.
We has classes all week on land nav and then they threw us into the woods on Thursday. That is the TBS preferred method of instruction; cram your brain with info for a few days and then throw you to the wolves. Didn't quite get it? Too bad, time to go lieutenant!
Thursday was our first practical application of our skills, we headed out into TA-5, a training area a little more than one grid square in size. ( A grid square is marked on the map, it indicates a square 1000 meters by 1000 meters.) We were given five grid coordinates to find in two and a half hours. If you reach the coordiate, you will find a box with a numbe or letter on it, that is how we are scored. Most of the lieutenants at least found four.
Friday, we moved onto TA-8, an area more than seven grid squares in size. Now we have six points to find in four hours. The increased time is due to the immense size of the training area. After I was done, I retraced my steps on the map and found I had traveled a little more than 8 miles. This does not, however take into account all of the backtracking and searching for those damn boxes. I actually fell into the river on my first box, only half an hour into the four hours. A log I was using to cross broke as I was crossing and I fell in up to my knees. Not a great way to spend the day; soaked and cold.
As I was nearing drop dead time on Friday (a previously established time which all of us must be done by in order to get a score) I was still short two boxes of my six and was more than two kilometers from the command post. I had to haul ass or I wouldn't get in by drop dead time. In 40 minutes, I found two boxes and made the haul all the way back to the CP. I was either running or walking fast the entire time. After I found the last box, I checked my map for the dirction to the CP, whipped out my compass, and took off running. I just did make it.
The difficulty with land navigation is that you have to take a flat map with a bunch of lines on it and translate that into what you see on the ground. Then you throw in the inherent inaccuracies of a man made map and you have an adventure. I lost twenty minutes looking for a road intersection that was not really there. On the map, there were two roads intersecting another. In reality there was only one. Oh well, I made it anyway.
