The 10th Mountain Division rebuked a viral video showing troops from the unit flagrantly pointing weapons at one another and failing to clear corners during live-fire room clearance training.
Command Sgt. Maj. Mario O. Terenas said his office determined the video depicted soldiers from 10th Mountain Division, which is based out of Fort Drum, New York.
The video was derided online for the frequent “flagging” of teammates, a term for when troops point the barrels of their weapons at one another instead of down at the dirt when another soldier moves past them.
None of the trainers observing the melee appear to be correcting the troops or calling out the dangerous situation.
Terenas said the shoot-house display was “not the 10th Mountain Division’s standard” in a video posted to Twitter Monday night.
“It is our folks, and it really, really hurts to say that,” Terenas said. “It is not the standard. It is not how we do business. It is a not acceptable. So we’re running this thing down to the ground. We will investigate, we will take action and we will retrain. That is a guarantee.”
When exactly the video took place was not stated. Terenas did note that the shoot-house video was filmed “some time ago, so it’s going on a few months.”
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Soldiers who appear to be trainers are seen in the video on a catwalk observing the shoot-house below.
It’s not clear from the video whether any trainers provided remedial training after the event, but someone should have called “knock it off” as soon as live ammunition was paired with rifle barrels aimed at teammates.
Aside from the immediate safety concerns, there’s also the fact that, as many viewers pointed out, some of the soldiers aren’t properly clearing the room.
The soldier filming the exercise appears to immediately point his weapon at where he know the targets are located, which wouldn’t be known in real-life.
Kyle Rempfer was an editor and reporter who has covered combat operations, criminal cases, foreign military assistance and training accidents. Before entering journalism, Kyle served in U.S. Air Force Special Tactics and deployed in 2014 to Paktika Province, Afghanistan, and Baghdad, Iraq.
