Photo By 1st Sgt. John Etheridge | Soldiers with the 787th Explosives Ordnance Disposal Company, 3rd EOD Battalion, 555th...... read more read more
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FORWARD OPERATING BASE APACHE, Afghanistan – The explosive ordnance team on Forward Operating Base Apache, Afghanistan, had their bomb disposal robots out in force June 21, but this time it was for training not for work.
During a break from a busy route clearance schedule, Soldiers with the 787th Explosives Ordnance Disposal Company, 3rd EOD Battalion, 555th Engineer Brigade, 7th Infantry Division, held training on using bomb-disposal robots with their working partners of the 927th Engineer Company (Sapper), 769th Engineer Battalion, Louisiana Army National Guard.
“This is just refresher training today,” said Spc. Henry Cordero, an EOD specialist with the 787th EOD, and native of Atlanta, Georgia. He explained there were a couple of different training scenarios set up to give the engineers a chance to learn how to better operate the bomb disposal robots to interrogate suspected explosive devices.
Cordero also explained the differences between the two robots being used for the training.
“The Packbot is better used for reconnaissance and checking an area out,” he said about the smaller robot. “The Talon is the heavy-duty one that can do all the work. The Talon is the robot of choice,” he said about the larger one.
“It’s very good training,” said Pfc. Randall Antill Jr., a combat engineer with the 927th, and native of New Orleans, Louisiana. “The EOD guys are very knowledgeable and helpful.”
Randall said that during the 927th Eng. Company’s premobilization training they were trained on the Talon and a Packbot, but the EOD teams have more experience with them. He also understands why it is important to have the robot training even though the bomb disposal teams are a part of the engineer’s route clearance convoys.
“If EOD needs an extra robot out there we can roll out with one,” Randall said. “Any of our guys will be able to help out if there is a secondary explosive device.”
Spc. Steven Lavergne, combat engineer with the 927th Engineer Company, echoed that sentiment.
“If something was to happen and we went out without EOD we would be able to operate the robots,” he said, also recognizing the EOD teams’ training is much more advanced. “EOD is embedded with us and they know what they’re looking for and how to defeat it better than us.”
“What usually happens is the engineers will interrogate a suspected improvised explosive device with their vehicles and once they realize they have an explosive, they turn it over to us,” said Staff Sgt. Andrew Tuttle, an EOD team leader with the 787th. He said that this kind of training gives the engineers with whom they work on a daily basis a better idea of what the EOD teams have to do when out on route clearance missions.
“We like the engineers to know first-hand what we do when working on a device,” said Cordero.
Both Cordero and Antill recognize the importance behind the robot training and how it keeps soldiers safe.
“It’s easier to use a robot than a person. You don’t want to get one of your own guys hurt,” said Antill.
“On my team I’m the designated robot driver,” said Cordero. “I’ll blow up these robots all day long as long as I can keep my team leader from walking down to the explosive device.”
| Date Taken: | 06.21.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 06.23.2014 03:52 |
| Story ID: | 133988 |
| Location: | FORWARD OPERATING BASE APACHE, AF |
| Hometown: | ATLANTA, GEORGIA, US |
| Hometown: | BATON ROUGE, LOUISIANA, US |
| Hometown: | JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WASHINGTON, US |
| Hometown: | NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA, US |
| Web Views: | 837 |
| Downloads: | 2 |
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