Staff Sgt. Jeremiah Driscoll, a cannon crew member instructor at the US Field Artillery School in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, walks us through 41 essential items an artillery soldier would bring on a mission. While some of Driscoll's gear is used by other units in the US Army, he showcases artillery-specific items like the M2 collimator and the fire-control computer.
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00:00Fire mission! Fire mission!
00:02JLA chief, UDD charge two, would it be verified?
00:04Roger that!
00:06Stand by, fire!
00:08That's complete.
00:09Hi, my name's Staff Sergeant Jeremiah Driscoll, Rock Hill, South Carolina.
00:13I'm one of the instructors here at Charlie Battery 178FA here on Fort Steele, Oklahoma.
00:17Here to give a quick explanation of some of the personal items I would carry to a 72-hour field exercise.
00:24Starting with my M4 carbine, we carry these for training purposes to prepare ourselves for combat situations.
00:33Go ahead and get that training mentality.
00:35Moving along from top to bottom, I have my advanced combat helmet.
00:38Because I am an instructor, I have this illuminating band to identify myself as an instructor out here on the firing point.
00:44So that trainees and anybody that approaches the range or the firing point recognizes me as an instructor, they can come talk to me.
00:50Above that illumination band, I have my battle roster.
00:53It has my initials, last four of my social security, my last name, and also my blood type for any combat situations if that was become necessary.
01:01On the back of my advanced combat helmet, I have these cat eyes.
01:04They also illuminate under night vision goggles or NVGs.
01:08And then on the front, we have an NVG carrier.
01:10Our base plate right here to attach the NVGs for night occupations or night missions.
01:17Moving down, I have my eye protection.
01:20These are the ballistic approved eye protection for when we are in the field.
01:24So I don't get anything in my eyes and cause any blur damage to my vision, especially when shooting howitzers and artillery.
01:31A lot of dust and debris can fly up and get me in the face.
01:34So I have eye protection to protect me from that.
01:36Moving down to my plate carrier, I have plates in my plate carrier to protect me during a fire mission.
01:42God forbid, if we ever have any kind of incident, we have our plate carriers to protect us and all of our internal bodily organs and everything.
01:49Attached to my plate carrier, which I would have on me during mission, is my approved gloves to protect my hands.
01:55We use a lot with our hands, whether working with ammo or the howitzers themselves operating the breach,
02:00even down to my weapon, my personal weapon.
02:03We want to protect our hands to accomplish a mission and go home safe at the end of the day.
02:09So on the front of my plate carrier, you'll notice I have these magazine pouches.
02:12They're empty at the time because I am in a training exercise.
02:15And then on my left, I have a pouch.
02:17You can put your water canteen in there.
02:19I don't have a water canteen. I have my camelback for my hydration source.
02:23Probably the number one thing we tell soldiers and trainees,
02:25always have a water source on them at all times to prevent dehydration.
02:28Here in Oklahoma, in Fort Sill, home of the artillery, it gets really hot.
02:32For when we are firing the howitzers, I use my ear protection to save my ears.
02:35I do have another set that goes over my ears for a dual protection.
02:39They're approved for the decibels that these howitzers create.
02:42However, I don't wear those as an instructor because I like to be able to maintain communication
02:47with my soldiers and trainees at all times, make sure they can hear me.
02:50And then I'm also hearing the fire direction center in case of any
02:54firing incidents or anything that I need to stop firing at that moment.
03:02Total noise canceling, so I can't hear anything.
03:05So when I'm trying to communicate with trainees, that can become an issue.
03:09But they are great for ear protection.
03:11So we do provide the subdued flags for these training exercises.
03:15They're different than the garrison colored flags that you would see on the installation
03:18soldiers wearing.
03:19Our trainees and our instructors, when we do go to the field, we try to make it
03:23as realistic as we can and get the trainees mentality for when they're
03:27in the force comm units or downrange, even down to the uniforms.
03:31The Army authorizes several types and brands of boots.
03:34Every soldier, in my opinion, is different on the boots that they like to wear
03:37for durability, whether they're running, rucking, or just mission boots,
03:41like they're operating daily in their boots.
03:4312 years of service, I've been able to go through a lot of boots.
03:47The tread on them is very good, so I have low slippage.
03:50I don't fall a lot.
03:51They also offer a lot of ankle support.
03:52So when we are moving rounds, heavy rounds, or operating the howitzers,
03:57I know they're not going to fold over and cause an injury to myself.
04:01I use them.
04:02I prefer them.
04:04I don't have much to say bad about them.
04:06They've been good boots.
04:08One of the tools that I use and highly recommend when going to a 72 or any
04:12field exercise with the field artillery unit is a multi-tool.
04:15Multi-tool has multiple tools on it to include the pliers and small screwdrivers,
04:20knives, things like that, because whether I need to work on my personal weapon,
04:24take anything apart for cleaning or maintenance,
04:28or even the maintenance on the howitzer, these become very handy.
04:31And I utilize mine a lot.
04:33The second thing I would highly recommend is a watch.
04:36Everything we do in the Army operates on a timeline,
04:39all the way down to our fire missions, and just a simple watch can come in handy.
04:43Yes, please.
04:44Something I know how to talk about.
04:47One of the howitzers we have here at the FAAIT Schoolhouse on Fort Sill,
04:51Oklahoma is the Mike 119er Alpha 3.
04:53This howitzer shoots a 105 millimeter projectile.
04:56So this weapon is a digital weapon system.
04:58We can shoot it digitally.
04:59What that means is the fire direction center can send us digital fire missions
05:03through a computer screen, and that is a fire control computer.
05:06This FCC was basically a big fancy iPad that tells the chief everything he needs to safe and verify
05:11and what exactly he's shooting on that fire mission.
05:14The section chief will receive that fire mission on the FCC,
05:17and it also shows right here on the gunner's display screen for the gunner
05:20to be able to see the deflection and quadrant.
05:23Our deflections are numbers that will basically tell the gunner if he needs to,
05:26what we call traversing.
05:27We don't say left and right.
05:28He got traversing left or traversing right with this hand wheel right here.
05:32We also have an elevation hand wheel.
05:34The quadrant, which are numbers that tell us whether we need to go up or down,
05:38and in artillery, we use the terms elevation and depression.
05:42We use the elevation hand wheel to go up to elevate or down to depress.
05:48That piece?
05:49Oh crap, I hate this piece.
05:51So this is our degraded primary aiming reference.
05:54This is the M2 collimator.
05:55So if you look inside here, which is very difficult to see
05:58unless you're looking through the gunner's sight that's on the howitzer,
06:01there's a lot of numbers.
06:02There's hundreds of numbers left and right of a vertical crosshair.
06:06I mean, I'm not seeing numbers.
06:08I'm seeing like, oh weird.
06:10Okay, maybe those are numbers.
06:11They're really small.
06:12Yeah, there's hundreds of them in there.
06:13Wow.
06:14And that gunner and the soldier who is setting this up
06:17are bringing those numbers in to match.
06:19This gunner's sight is basically a fancy telescope.
06:21The gunner will utilize this scope and look through that collimator
06:25and he'll be able to line those numbers up.
06:27Once they line the numbers up,
06:28the chief will verify all the data is safe and ready to fire.
06:32And then we will place the weapon from safe to fire and fire the howitzer.
06:37So underneath it, we just have the cover.
06:40We face the cover like this because of the concussions from the howitzer firing.
06:44Dust and debris, rocks will kick up.
06:46We put the cover in like that, not like that
06:49because you don't want to pull it out and there'd be a big rock in there.
06:51And then you dump it on your collimator causing it unserviceable.
06:54So the Mike 119 Alpha 3 is a towed howitzer.
06:57It's a light towed howitzer and it can be slung from a helicopter
07:00or also dropped from an airplane.
07:04Being a towed howitzer, we are able to hook it up to a Humvee
07:08and tow it to our firing point.
07:09To hook the howitzer to the Humvee, we would remove what we have, the hand spike here.
07:14This is just so the trainees and the soldiers have better control of the howitzer.
07:19They're able to move this howitzer with ease.
07:21This is the lightest howitzer that is in the Army right now.
07:24Two soldiers can pick this up from the hand spike and do a complete 360 degree with it.
07:29If we were to hook it up to the Humvee, we would remove this pin.
07:34We would set that out of the way.
07:37And then we have our lunette here, often called like a hitch or, you know, a trailer hitch.
07:41But in our tour, we have a lunette.
07:43They would hook it up to the pental on the rear of the Humvee.
07:47Would it be able to drive off?
07:51Now notice this howitzer is sitting on a big metal base plate.
07:54We call that our firing platform and it's held on there
07:58by these large steel cables, which we call stays.
08:01These firing stays, it secures this howitzer to that firing platform.
08:05It has two legs that come down from the left and right tires.
08:08Those are called the suspension lockout system.
08:10The suspension lockout system keeps the howitzer in place during firing
08:13and it also reduces recoil on the howitzer.
08:15So we're not bumping all the way back across the firing point with every round that we shoot.
08:22So right here to the left of the gunner's seat, we have the gunner's sight box.
08:26We can't move the howitzer with this sight on, so the gunner would take this sight off,
08:30remove it, and place it in his sight box.
08:33Also in the sight box, we have several other tools.
08:35He has a direct fire telescope in the event that we do need to shoot direct fire.
08:40We have a bore sight alignment device.
08:41That's a verification for the gunner and the chief to verify that during that travel,
08:46nothing happened to that sight mount or that tube to throw it off where they wouldn't match.
08:50So this is basically a safety check for us to make sure everything is ready to shoot and safe to shoot.
08:55Some other little tools in there, screwdrivers and things to take apart our breech.
08:59This is our breech right here.
09:00This is the breech block assembly and the breech.
09:03Once the round gets placed into the tube, the assistant gunner would then close that breech.
09:07Hearing that metallic click tells the chief that, hey, the round's in there and it's ready to fire.
09:12We talked about the gun being digital.
09:14If our howitzer is digital, obviously we need something to power that digital
09:18and that computer capabilities.
09:20So right here we have our sled.
09:21Inside this sled is several batteries to power the howitzer and also a radio for our communications.
09:29In any operation or any mission, we need to maintain communications
09:33with our platoon leadership, our battery leadership.
09:35So we do have just our basic ASIP radio here.
09:39An RTO, our radio personnel who will be on the hand mic at all times
09:43in case information comes down or we need to let FTC or commando of anything.
09:49You do have the inertia navigation unit.
09:51So this gun knows where it is at all times.
09:54It does have GPS capabilities.
09:56If you notice these big spikes in the ground, these are what we call safety stakes.
09:59These basically give us a left and right tolerance so we don't shoot out of our safety box window.
10:04This is the max limit that the tube can go left and right
10:07so that if we get it out of traverse mission or what we call azimuth where we have to change azimuth.
10:13Azimuth is basically the direction of which we fire these howitzers.
10:16So if they want to change our azimuth or direction, we can go left or right,
10:19but we also have a tolerance of where we cannot shoot safely.
10:23So these are here to stop us.
10:26So this one right here, the small one in the ground, this is our initial azimuth of lay.
10:29This is where the howitzer was laid when we occupied this firing position.
10:34And this is where the howitzer will come back to upon every end of mission.
10:38So they can fire out of, they can shoot at different azimuths
10:42maintaining inside the safety box.
10:44But after every end of mission,
10:46the soldiers will then bring the howitzer back to our original starting point.
10:50Absolutely, let's move on to ammo.
10:52So here in front of me are the Mike 105 millimeter projectiles,
10:56the rounds and the propellants for the Mike 119 or Alpha 3.
10:59It comes in this casing right here.
11:01We'll uncase the round and inside it will be this canister which holds our powder increments.
11:08They are all numbered one to seven.
11:10This is what basically lights the, hold on, pause.
11:14Somebody give me a better explanation than lights the TNT.
11:18Ignites the explosive train.
11:20There we go.
11:20Once it ignites, it starts the explosive train
11:23to send that projectile outside the fuse and to its destination.
11:26They're numbered because we shoot different charges.
11:29We can pack all of them in there or if the FTC calls for just a charge five,
11:34we'll remove bag seven and six and then place the round on top of the canister.
11:40And then the chief will verify that the charges are correct.
11:43And then we can fire that round safely.
11:45The FTC will calculate how many charges we need inside this canister
11:49to upon the round hitting its target or destination.
11:53Moving on to the round.
11:57This is our 105 high explosive round.
11:59On top, it has a point detonated fuse, so it will activate upon impact.
12:04And then like I described, if it is a charge five, just for example,
12:08we'll remove six and seven, keeping charge five in there.
12:13And place the round.
12:15And then the round is ready to take to the chief to verify the charge.
12:20He verifies the type of round and he also verifies
12:23that it's correct fuse and the fuse is on there tightly.
12:28The chief, once he verifies that round and that charge is correct,
12:32he cuts the charge.
12:33He just gives it a quick swipe or this acrylic cord will break away pretty quickly.
12:37He gives it then to the round runner and he sends them to what we call our powder pit
12:41or a burn barrel.
12:42And they basically just get this propellant outside of the net and away from the howitzer.
12:46Charge two, would it be verified?
12:49Verified.
12:53Three, four, five, six, seven.
12:54Three, four, five, six, seven to the rear!
12:56Three, four, five, six, seven to the rear!
12:58The number one cause of firing incidents infield artillery is wrong charge.
13:02So we want to make sure that that charge is not in that howitzer and not in that tube.
13:06And that round is safe and ready to fire.
13:08This round is a highly explosive round.
13:10We call it HE round.
13:11This is one of the most common rounds that we do use in our training exercise.
13:15It gives the full effect of the fire mission from all the way from when we received the
13:19fire mission to point of impact.
13:22And here on this range, we are able to observe where our rounds hit.
13:25So it's kind of cool for the trainees and new FAA soldiers to be able to see that.
13:29Yeah, it's pretty cool stuff.
13:30So let's shoot some fire missions.
13:32Charge to ready, verify.
13:36Verify.
13:40Three, four, five, six, seven.
13:40Three, four, five, six, seven to the rear!
13:42Three, four, five, six, seven to the rear!
13:44Is that ready?
13:45Lakey, Beckley, no one on that should stand by.
13:51Oh, crap.
13:58You can edit a lot of this out, right?