Fort Bliss Monitor

SPC. JESSIKA MALOTT

On the advanced rifle marksmanship range family members had an opportunity to shoot the M-16 rifle.

3-43 completes Range Density on McGregor

Spc. Jessika Malott
11th ADA Bde. Public Affairsf

MCGREGOR RANGE, N.M. – The 3rd Battalion, 43rd Air Defense Artillery “Courage and Honor” completed a week of weapons qualifications on the range complexes at McGregor Range July 28.

Over 50 percent of the Soldiers of the battalion had qualified as either a sharpshooter or expert on their respective weapons, ranging from M-249 squad automatic weapon to the MK-19.

“After this week we have over 50 percent sharpshooter and expert qualified during density week,” said Sgt. Maj. Jerry Callahan, 3-43 ADA operations sergeant major.

The battalion had several first-time accomplishments and tasks that they had emplaced for their Soldiers to achieve.

“For advanced rifle marksmanship, one of the first sergeants was able to get us civilian targets for the range this week,” said Callahan. “It teaches the Soldiers target discrimination, engaging a target accurately and fast. In 23 years this is the first time I have seen it done.”

For the same range that the Soldiers were utilizing the civilian targets the battalion leadership brought family members to experience what their Soldiers do while they are qualifying on the range July 27 for Operation Green Day. Green Day is a new program implemented in to the brigade to allow Soldiers’ families to become more acquainted with Soldiering tasks.

Some of the weapons that Soldiers qualify with are too large to simply hold in their hands. Weapons such as the MK-19 and M-2 are mounted onto vehicles. This was the first time that the battalion had actually fired these weapons from vehicles.

“We are firing these weapons from the vehicle because that is where they would be fired from in combat,” said Callahan. “This is the first time that we are doing this here.”

Soldiers qualifying with the M-9, 9 mm pistol, we are also qualifying while wearing their protective mask, to simulate firing in a chemical environment, and also qualified on their weapons for night time firing.
The Soldiers who qualified with an M-249 SAW we afforded the opportunity to engage abandon vehicles on one of the range complexes convoy live-fire ranges.

The battalion attributes the success of their range density to many attributes.

“Throughout the year we managed our ammunition closely,” said Callahan. “We had enough ammunition that if Soldiers wanted to get back out on the range to get a better score they could.”



www.bliss.army.mil	Published for the Fort Bliss/El Paso, Texas Community	Aug. 3, 2006

<map name="boxmap-b4"> <area shape="rect" coords="0, 589, 120, 600" href="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm/privacy-policy.html?o=1" > <area coords="0,0,10000,10000" href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?tag=&creative=92501&camp=8117&link_code=dl1&path=subst/misc/amazon-cobrand-cc/v3/marketing-from-associates-step1.html/ref%3Db1_assoc_29" > </map>	SPC. JESSIKA MALOTT On the advanced rifle marksmanship range family members had an opportunity to shoot the M-16 rifle. 3-43 completes Range Density on McGregor Spc. Jessika Malott 11th ADA Bde. Public Affairsf MCGREGOR RANGE, N.M. – The 3rd Battalion, 43rd Air Defense Artillery “Courage and Honor” completed a week of weapons qualifications on the range complexes at McGregor Range July 28. Over 50 percent of the Soldiers of the battalion had qualified as either a sharpshooter or expert on their respective weapons, ranging from M-249 squad automatic weapon to the MK-19. “After this week we have over 50 percent sharpshooter and expert qualified during density week,” said Sgt. Maj. Jerry Callahan, 3-43 ADA operations sergeant major. The battalion had several first-time accomplishments and tasks that they had emplaced for their Soldiers to achieve. “For advanced rifle marksmanship, one of the first sergeants was able to get us civilian targets for the range this week,” said Callahan. “It teaches the Soldiers target discrimination, engaging a target accurately and fast. In 23 years this is the first time I have seen it done.” For the same range that the Soldiers were utilizing the civilian targets the battalion leadership brought family members to experience what their Soldiers do while they are qualifying on the range July 27 for Operation Green Day. Green Day is a new program implemented in to the brigade to allow Soldiers’ families to become more acquainted with Soldiering tasks. Some of the weapons that Soldiers qualify with are too large to simply hold in their hands. Weapons such as the MK-19 and M-2 are mounted onto vehicles. This was the first time that the battalion had actually fired these weapons from vehicles. “We are firing these weapons from the vehicle because that is where they would be fired from in combat,” said Callahan. “This is the first time that we are doing this here.” Soldiers qualifying with the M-9, 9 mm pistol, we are also qualifying while wearing their protective mask, to simulate firing in a chemical environment, and also qualified on their weapons for night time firing. The Soldiers who qualified with an M-249 SAW we afforded the opportunity to engage abandon vehicles on one of the range complexes convoy live-fire ranges. The battalion attributes the success of their range density to many attributes. “Throughout the year we managed our ammunition closely,” said Callahan. “We had enough ammunition that if Soldiers wanted to get back out on the range to get a better score they could.”