Georgia National Guard travels to Florida for convoy live fire training

Photo By Ching Oettel | Army Col. Reggie Cook, the G3 for the Georgia National Guard, visits the convoy live fire range to observe Georgia's 1177th Transportation Company during their recent training exercise at Camp Blanding Joint Training Center.  

STARKE, FL, UNITED STATES

07.25.2016

Story by Sgt. Christopher Milbrodt 

Florida National Guard Public Affairs Office

STARKE, Fla. (July 25, 2016) – Typical sounds of summer are laughter, crashing waves and the calls of passing seagulls. At Camp Blanding Joint Training Center summer sounds like machine gun fire, explosions, vehicles, and Soldiers from around the United States perfecting the art of combat.
Every year Camp Blanding Joint Training Center, Florida’s premier training site, provides military units, federal agencies, and law enforcement with the training resources and firing ranges to make sure they are ready for any situation presented.
The 1177th Transportation Company recently travelled from their home station of LaGrange, Georgia to take advantage of a key component needed to test a new weapon system.
Outfitted with the Common Remotely Operated Weapon Station (CROWS) system, the 1177th used the convoy live fire range at CBJTC to take their new system on a realistic road test. The new system allows Soldiers to remain hidden from the enemy inside their vehicle while still being able to fire upon them.
“With this system we are able to identify and engage targets at more than 1,000 meters with an M-240B, 30 caliber machine gun and never leave the safety of our vehicle,” said Sgt. Gregory Shedd, a 1177th Soldier and subject matter expert on the CROWS system. “Using the CROWS system allows Soldiers to gain confidence in the weapon and in themselves because they are able to hit targets at long distances instead of not being able to see far enough to engage.”
The Soldiers of the 1177th prepared for the live fire exercise by using the convoy simulator also located on CBJTC. The simulation allows trainees to safely go through every step of the exercise without firing a single live round and get immediate feedback for lessons learned.
“We’re virtually running the same route we’ll be running on the range tomorrow just to give the drivers and gunners familiarization on how to scan their sectors of fire for the upcoming live fire range.” said Sgt. Samuel Raybon, a Soldier from the 1177th. “Using the simulators before you go out to the range really helps the younger Soldiers who might not have experienced a convoy live fire range before.”
The simulators and ranges provided by Camp Blanding gave the 1177th the ability to put all of their training into practice.
“The infrastructure here is great for what we need to do, they have the virtual battlefield simulator, the computerized gaming system,” said Capt. Patrick Jarvis, 1177th Transportation Company commander. “What we can do is put this live fire on the computers, run through it, we call that our crawl phase, then from there we can move on down range, and work our walk and run phase and start shooting rounds down range.”
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• Date Taken: 07.25.2016
• Date Posted: 07.27.2016 10:16
• Story ID: 205198
• Location: STARKE, FL, US
• Hometown: LAGRANGE, GA, US