Notice how huge the flag was by looking at the person standing in
front of it. There was music playing and everyone had a great
sense of accomplishment.
These
entries are from the letters that Brandon has mailed to me. His writing
at times can be a bit difficult to determine his words... bare with me,
I do my best, especially with army terms.
Today
is the Raider Challenge. This event is supposed to be the culmination
of everything we have learned in basic training. Each platoon competes
against each other to earn points for Honor Platoon. After it’s all over
we have a 15k ruck march back starting at 22:00. The DS thought our
packing list was too light, so we have to wear our body armor.
I’m
finding it hard to get motivated. Maybe it’s because we haven’t done
anything the last two days. Maybe it’s because we’re getting closer to
the end and I just want it to be over. I want to be able to talk to my
friends and family. As strange as it sounds, I want to know the news. I
want to know what’s going on with my state, the nation, the world.
Being cut off from everything takes it toll. I want to see my wife, my
kids, my family. 12 days until graduation.
We
took the cattle car to one of the ranges and arrived about 13:00, right
at what seemed like the hottest part of the day. We did all the events
as squads and then they added up all the scores in each squad for a
platoon total. Some events were scored by each individual and some were
just squad events.
The
first event was the machine gun, scored on each individual. We had to
load it and fire it. There was a dummy round that would come up and make
the weapon jam. We had to unjam it and finish shooting. It was a timed
event. Our squad did good for the most part on that. Next was the AT-4
(Anit Tank Rocket launcher). We used a dummy one and hat to be prepared to
“fire” in a certain amount of time. We them had to simulate a misfire –
also timed. Our squad did well on this event too.
We
then moved o the LAND-NAV event. This was map reading. Two were chosen
from our squad to find two different coordinates. The rest of us hat to
go up one by one and say whatever the geographic feature he pointed to. I
had a saddle…pretty easy. The rest of the squad didn’t fair so well. We
did below average on this event… well below average.
Next
event, hand grenades. There was a silhouette with a ring around it and
then another larger ring around that. We would get five points for the
outer ring and 10 points for the inner ring. Unfortunately there were a
number of tree branches that a lot of us hit and the sand didn’t let the
grenades roll very well. I was able to score 5, but there were a number
of guys in our squad that scored zero. A funny moment happened when PFC
Metal squatted to throw… a fart squeaked out. LOL. So below average on
this event.
Next event, loading, clearing a malfunction “SPORTS” and unloading our M16 rifles. We did decent on this event.
Next
event, battle drill. Our squad went into the woods and after making
contact with an “enemy” we had to use a basic battle drill we have
practiced to eliminate them. I would say we did average on this event.
Maybe a tiny bit above average. There was a lot of room for
improvement.
We
then had to do first aid. There were two people laying down and as a
squad were broke into to two teams to care for them. My team found a guy
with an open chest wound. We got him all fixed up and “called” in a
medivac. Then we had to move him on a portable stretcher. My team was a
little shaky and the other team was a lot shaky. I think we did OK on
this event.
Soon
dark clouds rolled in and the thunder started rumbling. Everyone had to
get in the bleachers and wait it out. It blew over after about 20
minutes, and then we were back on.
Next
event, we had to carry two stretchers about 200 meters as fast as
possible. Each stretcher had about 200 lbs on it. We did well on it
despite a guy on my team dropping it about 4 or 5 times. Right after
that event we had to run out to the range and shoot a number of targets.
Pretty tough, when you’re breathing hard. We did a little below average
on this. We then had another physical event. We had to pull 6 sand
bags, a stretcher, a big ass monster truck tire down 50 meters and back…
a timed event. It was up to us how we wanted to get it there and back.
The only rule was that we couldn’t roll the tire. We ended up putting
all the sandbags on the stretcher and secured the tire to the stretcher
then pulled them all. Very tiring! We did average.
Once
we were finished we waited for all the other squads to finish on the
bleachers PVT Diesel wasn’t looking too good. He looked very hot and
was complaining of a headache. Luckily we had a lot of rest time before
our 15k ruck march back.
They
announced the results once everyone finished. We found out our squad
did the best in our platoon, but our platoon ended up coming in third
out of four platoons. That just sucked because everyone wanted to win so
badly, a lot of people just had an off day. After the announcement, we
were told to get our body armor and throw it in the truck. Thank god!
That meant we would not be ruck marching with it back. We put all our body armor in the truck and
then put on all our gear. The DS marched us across the road and into the
woods enough so the entire company would fit, then we just stopped and
waited. We were told it was too hot and we wouldn’t start until 21:30.
The
gut truck came and we were told we could buy anything from it. This was
a first. The gut truck sold a number of items, but I just got a
powerade, powerbar, and skittles. Some got sub sandwiches and others
even got hamburgers.
We
rested until about 20:30 then got all our gear on and formed back up on
the road. We started our ruck march about 21:00. The ruck was 15k (9.3
miles), but I swear we went 30k. We did take two breaks to refill our
canteens and camel baks. These breaks came at just the right time. My
back and shoulders would be in pain… almost to the point where I was
wondering how I could keep going, then we would get a break. We would
take off the ruck and lay down in the prone position and rest. That
little rest would get me through until the next one.
By
the end of the march my feet were starting to go numb, my shoulders
were on fire, a blister was forming on my right pinky toe and my calves
were sore. I was so happy to see our barracks.
Something
was different this time. The entrance to out CTA was lined with tiki
torches. I could also hear faint music. As we got closer, I realized the
music was coming from our CTA. Once in the CTA we saw a huge American
flag that covered the entire area between the company barracks. It had a
spotlight on it and had a pair of combat boots and a rifle with a
helmet on top in front casting a shadow on the flag. It was pretty cool
looking. We all formed up gave each other high fives and dropped our
gear. The company then gathered in the center of the CTA for a couple of
speeches from the battalion and company commanders congratulating us
on pretty much finishing basic training. All the DSs then went to their
platoon and placed a US pin on our uniforms. Our 3 DSs all came though
and actually shook our hands.
We
were told to eat an orange and get all our shit upstairs. This right of
passage has been completed. The journey was hard, but it was pretty cool
to make it to the end and have the little ceremony. We finally got our
stuff up and got showered and in bed about 1:30am. I would have so loved
to sleep through the night, but I got fireguard duty from 3-4am with PFC Metal. Oh well… I can update my journal.
Random DS Quote:
“Get your fucking ass of the ground” (Our senior DS being very
sensitive and compassionate after a guy fell down during our ruck march
today.)
1st Platoon after the 15K march. The dark areas on everyone's
ACUs are drenched with sweat :)
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