M240B Weapons Simulator

This weekend we trained on crew-serve weapons, which are the larger automatic weapons the Army uses in their infantry, and it usually takes 2-3 soldiers to operate, assist, and carry the belt-fed ammo (they can also be mounted on gunner vehicles).  A large part of our battalion had the opportunity to fire live weapons and ammo with the 50 cal (M2), SAW, M240B, and M249.

World's best video game


However, there were limited slots available for our group, so none of the officers were put into the live fire and we settled for second best - the weapons simulator.  It is basically a huge interactive video game, except the weapons are   

M240B

real, they've just been modified with the required electronics to work with the simulator.



Target Practice



It still has the same real-world feel and recoil effect, so it's still an effective training tool for soliders.  We had the opportunity to zero the weapons, go through a qualification course, and then shoot at moving targets.  At the end, all of your scores are recorded, you can see where you had hits, where you missed, and whether you were shooting high, low, the effectiveness of your trigger squeeze, etc.  Pretty high tech, and very cool.



Loving Life



We offically have one week + 10 hours before we board and head east.  The training has been good, but we're all ready to leave, get the clock started, and do our real jobs as engineers.  The more we hear from our counterparts downrange, its looking like we'll be involved with the drawdown and 'surge recovery', so we will be directly affected by the politics and the exact numbers of troops that will be brought home.  Might be more deconstruction than construction projects, but that just means we're getting closer to bringing most everyone home, which is a good thing.