Tank Gunnery in Pictures

One of our M1A2 Abrams switching out crews on the firing line.

The reason every shot is 'lost' after firing. This is the smoke and dust the round kicks up.

After hours of sweeping and digging out oil spills, an ironic message from 2LT Adam Bone: "Look at what I learned at ABOLC"

An NCO and 2LT from 4th PLT on the firing line

2LT Adam Bone posing while supervising the cleaning of the M1A2 barrel.

Boxes of spent .50 caliber shells and machine gun belt links. All painstakingly cleaned off the range.

Spent links from the hungry .50 caliber. We'd go through about 100 rounds per engagement.

Just after firing. An excellent photo from 2LT Phil Baki.

The Abrams on the move. Majestic.

ON THE WAY!!

Well, another week done (albeit a tad longer than most weeks) and just that much closer to the end of ABOLC. I have mixed feelings about finishing this course. On the one hand, everything that happens here is generally infuriating. The day to day incompetence and bungling has sent my blood pressure numbers in a direction that couldn’t be called healthy. On the other hand, I love my mates, I love tanks, I (with a few notable exceptions) love my cadre, and honestly, Columbus, GA could be a heck of a lot worse… But I do recognize that all things do come to an end, and it sharpens the mind when you remember that waiting on the other side are 16-40 sons and husbands whose lives will depend on how well I learn my job now. A sobering thought.

Well, this week was a busy one. Our platoon got a lot accomplished, namely tank gunnery, a Blue Force Tracker class, a mental resiliency class, and, most importantly, we adopted a platoon mascot, a one eyed stuffed cat we’ve fondly named “Attack Cat” who accompanies us to our training events.  We also got some good classes on calling for artillery fire and close air support, which featured an awesome video of Kiowa (a small army helicopter) pilots who’d run out of ammunition firing M4s and pistols out of their cockpit doors at targets on the ground. That’s dedication. The air support brief also featured lots of videos of Air Force and Navy jets hitting targets for Army troops. It always strikes me how cool calm and collected pilots sound even as they’re doing a highly dangerous and, I imagine, very difficult job. It’s usually something like this: 

Platoon Leader: “THEY’RE ON TOP OF THE BUILDING!! WE NEED A BOMB THROUGH THAT ROOF!!!”

Pilot: “ahhhhhhhh, roger, we see ‘em………”

PL: “WE’VE MARKED OUR POSITION!! COME ON IN!!!”

Pilot: “yeah, we’re coming in hot……… uhhhhh, bombs on the way…….. got ‘em”

PL: “FANTASTIC!!!! THEY’RE DONE, THANKS FOR THE HELP!!”

Pilot: “annnnd roger, batman 37 out”

Almost makes you want to be a pilot… well, it certainly makes you appreciate them.

Well, the marquis event for the week was definitely the tank gunnery that took place over the weekend last week. We spent three days out in the field, the first doing a dry fire run through with only machine guns, the second a live fire with main gun and machine guns, and the last day cleaning up the range and cleaning the tanks. The dry fire was a Godsend because, even after all the hours in the simulator, it only took about 5 seconds to realize that the real thing in a real tank was so much different. The complexity of the task was certainly daunting, but it was just so darn cool to be controlling a 70 ton monster with three very lethal weapons systems that most people (including me) completely lost their heads during the dry fire. The next day was absolutely amazing. It was pretty awe inspiring to feel the boom of the 120mm main gun going off in your very bones, but nothing really prepares you to be inside the tank controlling that gun and sending the big bullets downrange. One engagement in particular was a lot of fun. From a defensive position (with just the gunner and commander’s sights sticking up over a berm) we engaged two personnel carriers in about 10 seconds. It went a little something like this (bear in mind the tank commander and gunner were students and the loader was the NCO cadre):

(Tank is REDCON 1 [ready condition 1] and targets come up, there is already a HEAT [High explosive, anti-tank] round in the main gun)

Gunner: (looking through his sight and scanning) PC IDENTIFIED!

Tank Commander: (gives a fire command to the gunner and loader with the type of round to be loaded and the target) Gunner, HEAT, PC!

Gunner: (Uses the laser range finder to get a range) Identified! Range 1750 meters!

Tank Commander: Driver move up! (brings the tank so it’s gun is over the berm)

Loader: UP! (The gun is loaded, armed, and the loader is out of the way of the breech, which recoils about 12 inches, crushing everything in its path)

Tank Commander: Fire and adjust!!

Gunner: On the way! (He squeezes the trigger and BOOM!! the round flies downrange)

Tank Commander: (gives a sensing of where the round hit in relation to the target. There is so much dust kicked up by the shot, this is always impossible) Lost!

Tank Commander: (in the M1A2 SEP, the TC also has an independent sight. While the gunner is identifying, lasing, and firing, the TC is finding the second target. When he does, he ‘designates’ the gunner which swings the gun tube to where the TC is looking. Two eyes are better than one!) Designate right, PC!

Gunner: Identified, range 2200 meters!

Loader: UP!

Tank Commander: Fire!

Gunner: On the way!! BOOOOM

Tank Commander: Lost! Target, target cease fire. Driver move back. (The driver reverses the tank back into the defilade, hull down position)

This whole dance takes about 10-15 seconds and the tank is hardly exposed at all. We also did multiple engagements with just about every failure imaginable, including the gunner’s controls going down, leaving the TC to engage, identify, and shoot from his position, and a failure of the laser range finder, forcing either the gunner or TC to ‘choke’ the target, using a set of hash marks on an auxiliary sight to estimate the distance. It was a very difficult and long day, but it was a blast and everyone felt accomplished at the end. I even got to watch a herd of deer prance across the range through the thermal sights in the pitch black of night, proving that deer might be the stupidest animals on the planet. It’s a miracle they weren’t turned into hunks of venison by some trigger happy 2LT. It sure was tempting and beats the heck out of laying in a deer blind for 12 hours with a bolt action rifle. 

Anyway, so gunnery was cool! Of course, just when we’re all on a high we revert back to Private mode for the recovery. I spent my Tuesday sweeping dirt off of every cement surface on the range with a push broom. For four hours. Luckily, I was with the lads so we all had a great time and a good laugh, but it is a bit terrible that in these days of budget crisis and defense spending cuts that 33 Lieutenants making Lieutenant pay swept dirt off of pavement for an entire day. On the plus side, we did come up with a new name for sweeping that has caught on in a big way around Hawk Troop. If any of you hear the act of sweeping referred to as ‘push dirting’ any time in the near future, you’re welcome. We ended the day at the 'wash racks' which are essentially car washes for tanks. It consists of six stationary fire hoses that you blast the tank with getting all the dirt and grime off. Of course, when you give 22-30 year old guys giant fire hoses there is inevitably going to be a water cannon fight. But the tanks did get cleaned eventually...

Also, Coach K gave us a motivating speech proving that this man is following me through my career. It's too bad I can't stand Duke basketball...

Also, pictures to follow.

Steel Horses- Learning to Ride the Abrams Tank

Here I am, another Saturday night spent crazy partying with all the other 20 somethings in the city of Columbus, GA. Oh wait. That’s not quite it… Let me rephrase. Here I am, another Saturday night spent packing and getting to bed as early as possible, not quite looking forward to the 0300 wake up for another long Sunday. Oh well, such is life? At least we’ll be doing something that can only be described as truly awesome: Abrams tank live fire. I’ll let you know how it goes afterward, but I can assure you it’ll be pretty darn cool.

As for this past week, we’ve been learning everything there is to know about tanks. We started with the driver’s position, learned the loader’s trade and spent the most time on the two most technical jobs, gunner and tank commander (TC). In the new M1A2 SEP (the Abrams version currently being operated by our Regular Army units) there are all sorts of computers, buttons, knobs, switches, touch screens, and sights that need to be identified and learned. In order to do this, we spent countless hours in and around the Abrams at the motor pool fiddling with the instruments and putting the tanks through their paces in order to prep them to fire. We were tested on loading the 50-70 lb. ammunition into the breech (in less than 7 seconds, no less) and various emergency procedures such as what to do in case of fire (slightly more complicated than simply running away screaming, tempting though that may be). Perhaps the easiest drill we had to learn was the rollover drill, which involved trying to turn the main gun to act as a tripod and, failing that, simply waiting upside down until someone comes and pries you out. Not a whole lot of fun, I imagine, but easy to remember.

Beyond the practical drills we spent another 20 or so hours in the AGTS (Advanced Gunnery Training System) or, the ultimate computer game. You and your partner (a fellow LT) spend hours in a very detailed M1A2 simulator running engagement after engagement. As both a gunner and TC, you fire multiple engagements in all sorts of scenarios dealing with all sorts of malfunctions, enemies, and munitions. By the last few iterations, the computer generated enemy was almost certainly wishing they’d stayed home. LT Matt Condon (my partner) and I were a lethal team, blasting troops, Soviet personnel carriers, Soviet tanks, and Soviet helicopters out of the sky with frightening regularity (thank goodness for the Cold War- nothing like a standardized enemy). But the Red e-Horde kept coming, thankfully in manageable twos and threes, and we scored an endless series of electronic victories for democracy. The final engagement was against an onrushing group of T-72 tanks, no doubt infuriated by the predictable, yet senseless demise of their digital comrades. Unfortunately, after this engagement both Matt and I realized we have a long way to go to be anywhere near as good as our instructors…

During all of this excitement and excellent training, there was an incident that surprised me to no end, but that very short story will wait until my triumphant (hopefully…) return from gunnery. Goodnight, and have a good weekend! Go Jags…

A Short Week and a Shorter Weekend

Sorry for the long delay!! I keep promising myself that I’ll be better at regular posting, but general exhaustion and procrastination generally combine to thwart even the best of my intentions. So, either way, I’ll spend my last few moments of this wonderful weekend (Jaguars AND Spurs won! Hooray!) going over some of the events of last week, both mundane and humorous. 

First, a humorous little Hawk Troop anecdote: Last Friday, the day before the three day Labor Day weekend, we were cut loose at 3pm at which point everyone scattered to the four winds, intent on enjoying their three days to the fullest after the 12 day week. However, as soon as I arrived home, I got a call from my student Platoon Leader telling me that I needed to be back at the office for a ‘meeting.’ I was literally just about to get into the best shower of my life and the prospect of getting back into my uniform and driving the half hour back to work was daunting to say the least. Luckily, I got another call about 15 minutes later saying I didn’t need to go in. The shower was fantastic. BUT the student PL and Platoon Sergeant did have to go in and they were treated to an absolute corker of a class, one hour on how to read a training schedule. Apparently people have been confused about when and where to be causing lateness and LTs showing up in the improper uniform. Of course, a training schedule, just like any schedule, really, is incredibly easy to read. It has a column for date, time, event description, uniform, location, and who the information pertains to. So, an hour long class on how to read it was a painful and insulting way to deal with a situation that has literally nothing to do with LTs being unable to read the schedule but rather that the schedule is more often than not, dead wrong. 

This point was not lost on one of the LTs who had sacrificed two hours of his weekend to receive instruction on what location means. The very next day of work, Tuesday, he decided to follow the training schedule to the letter. Of course, the very first event on Tuesday, PT, was scheduled for 0630. Now, PT is never at 0630. It’s always at 6am and no matter what the training schedule says, everyone showed up at 6. Except LT Shortt. He bravely took the lessons from Friday on board and strode up confidently at 6:30. Of course, he’s getting in a fair bit of trouble because, “LT Shortt, you know that PT is at 0600 no matter what the training schedule says.” Oh the irony…

Anyway, the other major events of last week were the Land Navigation test and, at long last, our introduction to the M1A2 CEP Abrams tank! The land nav test was pretty rough. We were dropped at 4am in the middle of the woods with a map and a set of points and a red flashlight and given 5 hours to find 6 of 8 points in the woods. Now, I was pretty confident in my land navigation skills after bossing all the land nav West Point could throw at me, but I was in for a pretty rude shock. It turns out that land navigation in the pitch black of a Georgia night in terrain that you’ve never even seen during the day is rather difficult. Despite all that, I managed to cover about 8km and find 5 points before the sun came up. I was sauntering towards a 6^th point when I was dissuaded from that course of action by multiple boar attacks on rather panicked classmates. It doesn’t take very many terrified, sprinting, knife wielding LTs coming bursting from the forest that you’re about to enter to persuade you to find some other point. No one wants a boar tusk in the kidney… to make a long story short, I had two and a half hours to find my last point and get back to the start point. My confidence was very nearly my undoing because it took me roughly 2 hours and 20 minutes to find my last point, leaving a rather ill-tempered Chris to sprint the last kilometer back to the start point just as time expired. I passed, but it was not an enjoyable experience…

Well, sorry for the rather mundane post. I’ll go into the tank stuff at a later date, as we still have nearly two weeks left of Abrams gunnery. This next week is another super week, so goodbye to the weekend for another 12 days!