Extraction to safety

By Noelle WieheOctober 7, 2015

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(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT BENNING, Ga., (Oct. 7, 2015) -- Soldiers of the Reconnaissance and Surveillance and Leaders Course exemplified smart Soldier skills as they remained focused and alert on the objective of getting to a safe area, despite debris flying as the Black Hawk descended to extract them from their first field training exercise Sept. 30.

The exercise used the special patrol insertion extraction system to evaluate the RSLC students on what they learned on reconnaissance and surveillance as well as radio systems and cameras over the preceding three weeks of the course. Their experience will allow them to go back and train Soldiers at their own units.

"One of the biggest (challenges) about a reconnaissance team is that they are moving as a small team, so they have to be as stealthy as possible," said 1st Sgt. Edward Cummings, D Company, 316th Cavalry Brigade.

The students were inserted to an area using vehicles and patrolled the terrain area before infiltrating a known area of interest. There, they set up surveillance sites inside the buildings.

Throughout the FTX, the Soldiers are given named areas of interest to travel to, set up surveillance and report any activity back to higher command.

Capt. Matthew Dieterich, RSLC senior instructor said for the small-unit missions, the planning is one of the most important parts. He said Soldiers must be adaptable and precise in predicting what could happen during the mission to the point that their higher command feels safe sending a small unit out on a high-risk mission.

For training purposes, Soldiers will typically find enemy personnel conducting activities or need to identify high-priority targets.

Dieterich said in combat, a small reconnaissance team is inserted before a larger force. This is done to gain situational awareness on the ground so that the commander has this intelligence during the planning process to determine a course of action.

Toward the end of the exercise, the students find out they need to leave quickly. Soldiers move out of their areas and move to the extraction sites where they form up in pick-up zone posture and prepare for extraction by means of SPIES.

A rope hooked to a Black Hawk is dropped to the ground and the Soldiers hook themselves to it. Once safely hooked, the Soldiers are extracted to a safe zone.

During the training, Soldiers learned how to react to both indirect and direct contact. At the end of the course, they leave with an additional skill identifier.

RSLC students come from Special Forces, battalion scouts, Infantry Basic Officer Leader Course officers to Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape School instructors and more.

"As instructors, we get to see a lot of different techniques that people bring from their own unit," said Marine Staff Sgt. Dayton McConnell, RSLC instructor.

Students volunteer for the course to learn how to properly and doctrinally execute reconnaissance and surveillance missions and how to do in-depth planning for those missions. The RSLC classes start with anywhere between 50 and 60 students and typically graduate between 25-35 students, Dieterich said.

"I'm confident that everything I learn here with (the instructors), I'll be able to use in real time," said Staff Sgt. David Heindell, RSLC student.