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Marine missile is good to T.O.W.;

23 Jun 2005 | Lance Cpl. Antonio Rosas Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. -- Armor? No problem. Consider it destroyed - courtesy of the T.O.W. missile.

That's the Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided Missile System - one of the longest names in the world of weapons.

But it has extensive power to match its moniker.

Marines from Combined Anti Armor Team, Weapons Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, put their expertise with the T.O.W. to the test June 8 at Range 409. The team is enrolled in the Anti Armor Course with Division Schools.

All of the Marines involved in the three-week course are combat veterans from either Operation Enduring or Operation Iraqi Freedom. All of them had field experience with the weapon; only a handful had never felt the rush of launching a missile downrange.

Cpl. Shanen E. Dawson, 30, from San Jose, experienced his first live-fire with the weapon.

"Once you're behind the weapon, the muscle memory kicks in and all you're concentrating on is staying on the target and following the motions of what you know," Dawson said. "I was not intimidated by the weapon at all."

Although insurgents are not heavily armored, this weapon (normally mounted on humvees) is placed inside fortified positions in Iraq, said Cpl. Dale E. Schulz, 22, from Sellersville, Pa., an anti-armor instructor with the 1st Marine Division Schools.

The Marines fired four Ballistic-Guided Missile-71Ds at a simulated vehicle convoy 1,000 meters away.

The mission - create a roadblock, then target the last vehicle to create a trap.

Once the projectile is fired, its flight to the target is directed by a wire attached to the missile to ensure it stays on the intended path. Occasionally, a missile strays due to rocket design discrepancies. For example, one of the four rounds fired on this day plowed into the ground, exploding on impact far from the intended target.

"There is no control over preventing this from happening," Schulz said. "In this case, the gunner did everything correct."

The official maximum effective range of the round is 2.3 miles - but Schulz says it can go much farther.

Next up in the course: cross-training with the Javelin weapons system and a foreign weapons package - including those insurgents use to against Marines in Iraq.

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Marine missile is good to T.O.W.;

23 Jun 2005 | Lance Cpl. Antonio Rosas Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton

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MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. -- Armor? No problem. Consider it destroyed - courtesy of the T.O.W. missile.

That's the Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided Missile System - one of the longest names in the world of weapons.

But it has extensive power to match its moniker.

Marines from Combined Anti Armor Team, Weapons Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, put their expertise with the T.O.W. to the test June 8 at Range 409. The team is enrolled in the Anti Armor Course with Division Schools.

All of the Marines involved in the three-week course are combat veterans from either Operation Enduring or Operation Iraqi Freedom. All of them had field experience with the weapon; only a handful had never felt the rush of launching a missile downrange.

Cpl. Shanen E. Dawson, 30, from San Jose, experienced his first live-fire with the weapon.

"Once you're behind the weapon, the muscle memory kicks in and all you're concentrating on is staying on the target and following the motions of what you know," Dawson said. "I was not intimidated by the weapon at all."

Although insurgents are not heavily armored, this weapon (normally mounted on humvees) is placed inside fortified positions in Iraq, said Cpl. Dale E. Schulz, 22, from Sellersville, Pa., an anti-armor instructor with the 1st Marine Division Schools.

The Marines fired four Ballistic-Guided Missile-71Ds at a simulated vehicle convoy 1,000 meters away.

The mission - create a roadblock, then target the last vehicle to create a trap.

Once the projectile is fired, its flight to the target is directed by a wire attached to the missile to ensure it stays on the intended path. Occasionally, a missile strays due to rocket design discrepancies. For example, one of the four rounds fired on this day plowed into the ground, exploding on impact far from the intended target.

"There is no control over preventing this from happening," Schulz said. "In this case, the gunner did everything correct."

The official maximum effective range of the round is 2.3 miles - but Schulz says it can go much farther.

Next up in the course: cross-training with the Javelin weapons system and a foreign weapons package - including those insurgents use to against Marines in Iraq.