November 14, 2009, I recline on a diminutive, unyielding, frosty cot in the nucleus of the Hindu Kush Mountains, Afghanistan. Sprouting to explosions with AK-47 bullets penetrating the scanty plywood wall adjacent to my sleeping area. Swiftly, I grappled my sweat-stained digital Interceptor Body Armor (IBA), Advanced Combat Helmet (ACH), and M-4 Carbine, arranging a race to a fighting position. Flinging my ½ in thick wooden door open, I beheld a spectacle from a war film I’d seen as a child. The mountainside speckled with tracer fire, rocket propelled grenade (RPG) explosions slamming HESCO ® barriers, echoes of shouting American Soldiers. Smell of gunpowder blended within a nearby burn pit latched onto my senses. “ALAMO POSITIONS!” reverberated
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With this new system, derived new tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) on how ground Commanders integrated this force multiplier. Presently, the Raven Operator course is a three-week program of instruction (POI), that educates Soldiers of all MOS’s, covering the ensuing subjects: “SUAS Mission Plan; Crew Mission Briefing; Operator Level Maintenance; Placing the SUAS into Operation; Operating the Hand Controller, Aircraft, Flight Simulator, and Falconview; Advanced Inflight Operations; Night Operations; Mobile Operations, and Incident Reporting procedures” (System, 2015). Based on the program of instruction (POI), there is no education of the Aircrew Training Program (ATP), implying that Operators are not receiving the proper schooling, mandated by TC 3-04.62 “Small Unmanned Aircraft System Aircrew Training Program”. ATP’s delegate SUAS programs, whereas it decrees an SUAS Operator meets requirements, detailed throughout the manual i.e. currency, certification, crew-rest requirements and phase training (Army, 2013). Consequently, it’s presumed that most non-Aviation commanders are not enforcing the ATP, which is …show more content…
During dialogue with a 150U UAS Tech, WO1 Aaron Krabbe, quantified, “It is a tactical asset, not a collections asset. It would run into the same issues that Shadow (and to a small extent Gray Eagle) has pertaining to its use and the Commander's responsibility. Shadows in a BCT have the same problems getting flight hour requirements because the company, battalion, and brigade leadership do not understand, and refuse to listen to the SMEs regarding its usage. Now, take a Raven to an infantry commander and tell him that he is now responsible for an ATP for a platoon of Soldiers whose primary job is no longer that of an 11B, and he just lost his mind” (Krabbe,
With this new system, derived new tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) on how ground Commanders integrated this force multiplier. Presently, the Raven Operator course is a three-week program of instruction (POI), that educates Soldiers of all MOS’s, covering the ensuing subjects: “SUAS Mission Plan; Crew Mission Briefing; Operator Level Maintenance; Placing the SUAS into Operation; Operating the Hand Controller, Aircraft, Flight Simulator, and Falconview; Advanced Inflight Operations; Night Operations; Mobile Operations, and Incident Reporting procedures” (System, 2015). Based on the program of instruction (POI), there is no education of the Aircrew Training Program (ATP), implying that Operators are not receiving the proper schooling, mandated by TC 3-04.62 “Small Unmanned Aircraft System Aircrew Training Program”. ATP’s delegate SUAS programs, whereas it decrees an SUAS Operator meets requirements, detailed throughout the manual i.e. currency, certification, crew-rest requirements and phase training (Army, 2013). Consequently, it’s presumed that most non-Aviation commanders are not enforcing the ATP, which is …show more content…
During dialogue with a 150U UAS Tech, WO1 Aaron Krabbe, quantified, “It is a tactical asset, not a collections asset. It would run into the same issues that Shadow (and to a small extent Gray Eagle) has pertaining to its use and the Commander's responsibility. Shadows in a BCT have the same problems getting flight hour requirements because the company, battalion, and brigade leadership do not understand, and refuse to listen to the SMEs regarding its usage. Now, take a Raven to an infantry commander and tell him that he is now responsible for an ATP for a platoon of Soldiers whose primary job is no longer that of an 11B, and he just lost his mind” (Krabbe,