That sounds pretty memorable to me!

Terry

just don't ask me what i remember about Ranger School...hallucinations, mostly...

We must be contemporaries. Remember the one where Johnny says to Lucy: "I was just kidding about being three qualified."? :D

Which would have been...

NFW...you're waaaaaaay older than i am...Bucky was Phase III OIC in '76 when i went through... :p

a motivational talk...in so many words explaining to us that whether we made it or not was up to us, no one was going to try to run us out of the course, that we would quit on our own...and of course, while i barely remember specific, but he had some rather unique expressions, some of which i remember, although not in the context of that particular discourse...

several of us 'older' guys (from the 82nd and other places) looked at each other as if to ask 'what have i gotten myself into?'

They must have passed them down the line. I remember we had at least one "Johnny" joke at the beginning of each class in MOI and Phase I. :D

My math is bad, I was thinking 94 - 20 was 64. Blush.

it is, for very small values of 94 or very large values of 20...

Gotten in to?
 

several of us 'older' guys (from the 82nd and other places) looked at each other as if to ask 'what have i gotten myself into?'


I was in Jump School in July of 74 with orders to go straight to Bragg for SF training. All told there was 6 of us going SF in the class.

The last jump was delayed 1 day due to weather so we got out of Benning one day late. There was about 30 guys on the bus and all but us 6 were going to the 82nd. We drove all night and got to the 82nd Repo Depot about 0600.

A sergeant came out of the building and took charge of the other guys and marched them off. He told the 6 of us to stand right there and somebody would come and pick us up. About 30 minutes later a short fat sergeant "Ranger Sledge" came by in a stake bed truck, said that we were late and took us to the training HQ. We were feed, inproccessed and issued field gear, given a packing list, told to pack by it and be out front at someting like 1400.

At the appointed time a 2 1/2 ton drove up and the driver said we were late and to get in the back of the truck. Everybody so far had said we were late when we thought we we early. The trucks back bow was broken and the canvas was flapping so it was hard to see out the back. All we could see were miles and miles of pine trees anyway. Man, we were in the middle of nowhere.

After a long trip the truck stopped and the driver told us to get out. We got out and he drove off. We found ourselves in the middle of a compound surounded by more pine trees. The habitations were mostly GP meddium tents, two large tar paper shacks and a few smaller shacks. Nobody else was in sight.

We were wondering just what we had gotten into when we heard shouting off in the distance that was getting louder. A large group of soldiers came running into the compound and over to the sawdust pit. There was a lot of shouting and then it got real quiet. The TACs had noticed us.

Within about 2 seconds the TACs pounced on us and tried their very best to make up for the 24 hours we had missed. We found out that the class had got out there the day before and that's why everybody had been saying "You're late".

For about the next 1 1/2 hours the TACs gave us their undivided attention while the rest of the class stood at ease in the sawdust pit. That night we were told that everybody in the class was damn glad to see us because they needed the break.

Of the 6 on the bus only 3 would make it to the end. That was better than the 118 total in the class that started. Only 34 would make it to the end.

Before survival hiding smokes in the bumper of the field ambulance, then finding them when we were done, only a little soggy. They worked though. Watching an industrious troop bring out an ammo can of smokes to patrolling, and minimal food, thinking he was crazy, but then him trading 1 pack of smokes for 2 mre's after two days. BTW the rabbit story is true. The double amputation was performed by a member of my class. And of course the chemlites!!!

Phase I memories
 

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away....

I was an 18 y/o buck private, March 1982. Just graduated jump school about 2 weeks before.

We got off the cattle trucks at Mackall (80-pax, they were called-shoulda been called 120-pax!). I was scared outta my mind, as I should have been.

SSG Laydon yelling at me "Hey Wildman, were do you think you're going?!! Do pushups!"

The instructors told us to dump EVERYTHING, in 30 seconds, to do a shakedown. Of course, I had packed everything into plastic baggies, to waterproof, etc. I did 10 pushups for every bag unopened. SSG Clayburn (older black guy, had been an R.I. at Dahlonaga with MAJ Howard, I was told) found about 25 unopened bags. I was quaking in 10 minutes, and in muscle failure in 20, before we even did PT.

"Hit it!-touch that ruck".

The gates swinging open, and swinging closed as we went around for a "mind-fuck lap".

MAJ Howard smoking all of our asses at morning P.T., then going out on a run at noon. He came back, and smoked us in the hand-to-hand pits around 1900.

Being on the land nav course was great. They gave us three C-rats a day, We did our land nav, and the TACs left us alone.

I was the first to finish the day phase, along with J.C. Dxxxxx. I came cruising in, thinking that I had failed. I looked around, and saw J.C. sitting about 50 meters from the last point, doing the rucksack flop. I thought, "Oh great--I boloed". Turns out that I had did it in 4 hrs, and we had 5. I read the timer dial on my watch wrong. SGT J-ski, a former 1/75 Ranger, was my grader on Land-nav. He handed me my packet, and says "Good job, killer. Go over there, and wait for the night phase."

I remember the first time I heard the term 'illustrious'. It was how our senior TAC, SFC Sharp described SFC Miller. We were doing pre-jump for the jump into the survival FTX. Two of the best NCOs I have ever been trained by.

During the 12 miler, I stayed right eside our XO, CPT Kelly. I knew if I stayed with him, I would finish on time. 2:40, as I recall.

Our team sergeant (then-SSG Ballogg) had to go to a meeting, so SSG Barron was making jokes, in formation. Just as he finished telling a lewd joke, MAJ Howard appeared out of nowhere, (as he often did!), and chewed our asses about profanity.

And the worst fear....worrying about the duffle bag drag back to Bragg. "Attention in the compound...the bus to Ft. Bragg leaves in 5 minutes. All recycles and dropped personnel need to report to the TACs office ASAP." Fortunately, I didn't have to answer that call.

(edited for first names--PERSEC concerns)

Have several, posted one or two. Some are not from my time in Phase 1, but as an "aggressor" for another class after Engineer training. Three weeks or so after "arriving" into/at Mackall, we were on patrol exercises. After being ambushed on a previous patrol one of the guys figured out that by peeling back the tape on the bottom of a smoke grenade, there is a small hollow chamber extending almost the length of the cannister, thickness of perhaps a Havana and 3 to 4 inches deep or so. Been a long time, anyway he took the blanks we were issued, popped the tops and filled the chamber in the smoke grenades with black powder and resealed the tape. Innovative,nicht wahr? Saw him do it. Thing was......... next patrol we were ambushed. He started hurling these things at the aggressors
:eek: Damn! A whole lot of color mixed with black smoke. however there was a tad of concussion mixed in. Some of the guys were deafish for awhile, a few scrapes/scratches. They didn't produce any shrapnel per se, other than the stuff on the ground. I did the aggressor thing later, was always prepared for that. I just know those guys wished to hell they had live rounds at that time. :) Did put a nice rip along the side of the cannister though. After a short, very short investigation by the instructors the guy was terminated.

I have heard that it was a good place for CS powder as well, back when it was still readily available.

One thing to remember about the smoke grenades is that there is zero delay on the fuze.

TR

The details waiting fpr class. :rolleyes:

The smoke grenade stories remind me of one. IIRC the old NCO academy at Ft. Bragg had a night defensive position problem. It may have been someone else but we were assigned to probe the positions. I noticed a machine gun position. When the gun fired I couldn't see any muzzle flash so I determined that it was improperly placed behind the military crest. Note: I don't think I would do this with real live pop-up shoot back targets with live ammo. Determining that I could safely crawl to within grenade range of the gun I did so and launched a smoke grenade in the direction of the gun. Dayem!! I hit one of the crew right in the chest with the grenade and singed and scared the shit out of the crew!!. I stealthily withdrew just in case some one in authority didn't think it was the proper thing to do. :lifter

two things i remember the most:

Sept. 11, 2001. I was waiting for SUT to start. We were on a detail policing up trash around the barracks when someone stuck their head out the window of the dayroom and said a plane had hit one of the WTC. Oh, how the world changed.

The other memory is Robin Sage Infil. What a hump!!!!