Photo By Chief Petty Officer Patrick Gordon | Construction Electrician Constructionman Dominique Delane takes a breath after a...... read more read more
GULFPORT, Miss. - Training proves its worth when it replaces fear with confidence in the mind of a first-time deployer.
“I got the call to go back in October,” said Construction Electrician Constructionman Dominique Delane, a member of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 25’s (NMCB 25) Communications Department. “I was shocked. I mean, I knew we were going, but I was also like, ‘Meh, they keep saying that and I haven’t gone yet.’ It didn’t really hit me until I was sitting at home by myself one day and I was just thinking ‘Oh my God – I am going to Afghanistan. What am I going to do with myself?’ I was scared, I kind of cried a little bit. I thought, ‘I don’t want to die,’ and every time I’d turn on the news you’d hear about something happening over there or someone getting hurt.”
Delane’s story is not unique. Like many Reservists, she is deploying for the first time, and didn’t know what to expect prior to her mobilization. But in the course of training sailors like Delane, instructors aim to take the mystery – and as a result the apprehension – out of the pre-deployment stage.
A sailor’s first deployment can bring with it a great deal of fear, especially if it takes them to a combat zone. Mostly, fear of the unknown. This fear can drive anxiety in service members unfamiliar with the challenges ahead, but constantly faced with “what if” situations presented in the pre-mobilization process and daily reports from the war zone.
This fear can also drive them to learn, adapt, and eventually, overcome it. The training that these Sailors receive is some of the best in the world, and they perform it side-by-side with those who have deployed before, creating a learning environment rich with experience.
“Right now we have four primary training courses that everyone goes through, the weapons qualification, the counter-Improvised Explosive Device course, CBR, and we have the rollover training,” said Builder 1st Class (SCW/EXW) Chad Smith NMCB 25 training department leading petty officer, who has deployed to Afghanistan three times in his career. “For a first-time deployer, these are big.”
Smith explained that in addition to training the individual sailor how to react in an operational environment, the training cycle often mitigates the fear they feel about going to a combat zone through simple exposure and education. To this end, the training staff seeks to prepare the first-time deployer mentally as well as operationally.
“Regardless of the training, the situational awareness after they take a course is probably higher than when they started,” said Smith. “In any of these situations, when the time comes, the average sailor can say, ‘My heart is racing, but I’ve had the training and I know what to do.’”
Delane, Smith, and other members of NMCB 25 have spent months training for what will likely be the last Seabee deployment to Afghanistan. In addition to the four primary courses, members of NMCB 25 have also undergone extensive training in basic and combat life-saving, as well as Afghan culture and language, which Delane admits diminished most of her fear.
“The cultural training was really helpful, because it really helped to let me know what kind of situations and people we’ll be dealing with once we’re over there,” said Delane. “It put my mind at ease a little bit because, before the training, I thought that everyone in Afghanistan would be hostile towards us because everything you see on the news is ‘Taliban’ this and ‘al-Qaida’ that. But it was really helpful to learn that there are people there that want and appreciate our help. So after that training I felt more at ease about deploying and interacting with the Afghan nationals. A lot of the training has sort of taken the edge off.”
Once a sailor trusts in their training, their worry often subsides and they can focus more on the fundamentals of deployment life, said Smith.
“Outside of the training spectrum, the first-time deployer wants to know more of the drilled down information about this is where you’re going, this is what you’ll be doing, this is what the people are like around you,” said Smith. “That’s what’s in their heads the most – not necessarily instead of the training but on top of it – those little things. What’s the living situation, what’s the time difference, am I going to be able to contact my family back home easily while I’m there? These are the things that they really want to know.”
When the training cycle ends and Delane and her fellow first-timers start deployment, they can be confident that their time spent training has mentally prepared them for the challenges ahead.
“I feel better now that I’ve gone through some of the training. They’ve given me all of the tools I need to save myself and possibly someone else. We don’t know exactly what to expect but, thanks to the training, in the event of the unexpected we’re covered, we know how to handle this. I know it, I’ve done it, I’m good. I’m one of those people that if I don’t know how to handle a situation then I’ll freak out, but if I know how to handle it before it happens, I’m good. I trust my training.”
| Date Taken: | 03.27.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 03.27.2014 18:16 |
| Story ID: | 122884 |
| Location: | GULFPORT, MISSISSIPPI, US |
| Web Views: | 63 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Sharpening the spear, taking the edge off: Eliminating fear through training, by CPO Patrick Gordon, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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