Mantis Marksmanship Dry Fire Suite

Photo By Tech. Sgt. Stefany Leyva | U.S. Army Sgt. Gage Young, a member of the California Military Department Combat Shooting Team, demonstrates the Mantis dry fire suite during a two-hour demonstration at Joint Force Headquarters Sacramento, California, May 11th, 2021. Mantis components attach to a rifle or pistol to provide real-time feedback via a smartphone application. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Staff Sgt. Stefany M. Leyva)  

SACRAMENTO, CA, UNITED STATES

05.11.2021

Story by Staff Sgt. Stefany Leyva 

129th Rescue Wing

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- U.S. Army service members with the California Military Department Combat Shooting Team showcased a potential replacement for the Engagement Skills Trainer (EST) during a demonstration at the California Military Department Joint Force Headquarters Sacramento, California, May 11th, 2021. 

The Mantis suite is a small-packaged portable component composed of two commercially available firearm attachments, known as MantisX and Blackbeard, which relay shooter analytics to a smart phone application, giving the shooter real-time feedback to identify areas of improvement.

Members of the Combat Shooting Team set up an interactive demonstration to show how the Blackbeard and MantisX components combined can help improve Soldiers' functional elements of a shot process - stability, aiming, and control.

"MantisX provides feedback by way of a score - zero to 100, which scores how stable the gun is prior to pressing the trigger, the moment you press the trigger, and immediately after," said U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Ian S. Tashima, Assistant State Marksmanship Coordinator. 

The current EST is set to be replaced, and the Mantis suite is one of the commercially-owned products up for consideration due to its ability to evaluate shooter mechanics, as well as target accuracy.

"It's no longer a subjective experience. It is an objective metric you can use to score over time your improvement, or perhaps, your degradation of skills,” said Tashima.

This suite is a cost-effective and functionally effective system that can replace the EST and satisfy the Pistol and Rifle Qualification table requirements. It would be a big win, said Tashima.

"The value of this can be huge. A lot of benefits can come from dry fire, and it costs nothing but time," said Tashima. "The ease of accessing this sort of feedback and its portability makes it fairly compelling."
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• Date Taken: 05.11.2021
• Date Posted: 06.01.2021 11:19
• Story ID: 397390
• Location: SACRAMENTO, CA, US