FORT DRUM, N.Y. -- As the rains began to melt the snow and turned dirt to mud, Soldiers of Ghost Squadron piled into their tactical vehicles and made their way to the field to conduct semi-annual light cavalry gunnery April 7-15 on two different training areas north of Fort Drum.
Throughout the training, Soldiers of 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (LI), completed two practice lanes and qualified with their crew-served weapon systems.
"We are doing gunnery lanes 4-6," Capt. Brian Choi, incoming A Troop commander, explained while waiting for his crew to begin lane 5. "Lanes 4 and 5 are practice lanes where we improve our ability to communicate and get the feel for it. Then we will be moving to another range to complete lane 6, which is the qualification range."
While most units complete both the practice lanes and qualification lane on the same range, 3-71 Cavalry decided to add some variation by conducting qualification on a different range from where they practiced.
"This is the first time I have done gunnery where qualification is on a different range than the practice lanes," Choi said. "We will know what the next target is -- trucks, troops, etc. -- but we won't know where it's going to be like we would if we were to stay on this range."
Each vehicle has a three-man crew assigned to it: a driver, a gunner and a truck commander. While each member has his own role to play, the crew cannot be successful without being able to effectively cross-talk and communicate fire commands.
"Having the crew-served wea-pons, being able to use them properly, and getting that cross-talk going is kind of our bread and butter," said 1st Lt. James Rankin, a platoon leader with 1st Platoon, B Troop.
The machine gun gunnery program is designed to train scout crews, sections and platoons to use their weapon systems effectively in a combat environment.
As 3-71 Cavalry prepares for deployment later this year, Rankin is taking this training very seriously.
"I've never deployed myself, so I don't know exactly how much you can do to prepare for the real thing, but it certainly helps," Rankin said.
"Making sure (the crews) can talk well, so that (the gunner) can get his proper target engaged -- those are fundamentals that will come in handy wherever we are," he added.
The training enables crews to become proficient on operating their equipment and allows them to work on making the three-man team function as a single unit.
"Gunnery (is) great for camaraderie," said Command Sgt. Maj. Bobby Hanvy, squadron operations sergeant major for 3-71 Cavalry.
"If you have a solid crew that trains together doing this type of training, they are able to gain the confidence between members of the team. If something happens to one member of the team, someone else will be able to jump up and take over," he added.
In addition to just going through the lanes, each crew is graded and receives feedback from a vehicle commander.
"Each vehicle has an observer to grade how well the team does. B Troop is observing and grading A Troop and vice versa," Choi said as he looked out across the practice range. "They have been tough on us, but we have received some really good feedback on ways to improve."
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