LAV III Courses - questions

[combat_medic]

Is there anyone here who can answer some questions on the LAV III courses (no rumours or guesswork, please... I've heard too much of that already and am looking for definitive answers):

1. Is there a separate course for each posn of Driver, Gunner, and Crew Commander, or is it one course?
2. What is duration of each course?
3. Do you have to take them all in order to be qualified? ie., can you take the crew commander course if you don't have driver/gunner?
4. How often are they run and how difficult is it to get a position?
5. Any news of these course being offered to Reserve augmentees for upcoming tours?

 

[D-n-A]

Heard from my brother(031 in 2VP) LAV III Driver is 6 weeks. Can't answer the rest of those though.

 

[PPCLI MCpl]

In response to your questions:

1)  There is a seperate course for all three positions(however, see answer #3);
2)  The duration depends on how compressed the CI decides to run them, usually between 6-8 weeks;
3)  You do not have to take them sequentially, My first course was C/C, which also qualified me as gunner;
4)  Depends on the unit. 2 PPCLI runs them at least twice a year; and
5)  I can't comment on this question, no idea 

Keep in mind, my answers are specific to 2 PPCLI.

 

[George Wallace]

Is there anyone here who can answer some questions on the LAV III courses (no rumours or guesswork, please... I've heard too much of that already and am looking for definitive answers):

1. Is there a separate course for each posn of Driver, Gunner, and Crew Commander, or is it one course?

Each is a separate Crse.

2. What is duration of each course?

Each is approx 6 weeks.  Gunner and Crew Commander have to do a week long Gun Camp, also, to qualify.

3. Do you have to take them all in order to be qualified? ie., can you take the crew commander course if you don't have driver/gunner?

No, you don't have to take them all, nor in any order.  Crew Commanders must have the Gunnery Crse first before a CC Crse.

4. How often are they run and how difficult is it to get a position?

They are run by the Units that hold those vehicles, and Crses depend on requirements for qualified Per, funds avail to run the Crses, etc.  Usually the CTC will train soldiers off of the BMQ/SQ on one of the Qualifications if they are Armd, and perhaps Engr and Inf.

5. Any news of these course being offered to Reserve augmentees for upcoming tours?

Not very likely.

 

[MJP]

Is there anyone here who can answer some questions on the LAV III courses (no rumours or guesswork, please... I've heard too much of that already and am looking for definitive answers):

1. Is there a separate course for each posn of Driver, Gunner, and Crew Commander, or is it one course?
2. What is duration of each course?
3. Do you have to take them all in order to be qualified? ie., can you take the crew commander course if you don't have driver/gunner?
4. How often are they run and how difficult is it to get a position?
5. Any news of these course being offered to Reserve augmentees for upcoming tours?

1- Yes there is a separate course for each one.  However most often LAV Gnr and Crew Comd (CC) will be run in conjunction.  But there are still people that only have their gunners and when they get into a posn of leadership are thrown onto another course to get their Qualification.

2- Depends on how they run it.  If you are mandated to have PT periods, Sports afternoons, Maintenance days the courses can really drag out.  Courses can range from 5- 12 weeks, but usually fall within the 6-9 week range.

3- Driver requires having air brakes and whatever they teach on driver wheel now.  Gunner/CC by itself has no prerequisites that I'm aware of.  We put several soldiers on Gnr/CC as their first course recently.  You can just take CC but it don't usually happen to often, usually to catch NCOs/offficers up if they have been ERE for a while or have never had the oppurtunity to take a Gnr course.

4- How often they are run depends on a units requirements, place on the ATOF (or whatever they want to call it now) cycle, and a few other factors.  We had a huge brigade driven one awhile ago where we had 3 courses going on at once to help qualify troops for TF1-06.  In a normal non deployment year we will usually run 2-3 PCF cycles with 2 as the norm.  Driver is usually ran at the same time.  Not hard at all to get on them if your in a Mech Bn.  Kind of a waste for anyone else as the skill fade with regards to the gunnery is huge.  

5- No and (FWIW) we unanimously agreed and  pushed up the chain that it really wouldn't make much sense.  A crew needs time together to work well and work-up training isn't the time to be doing it.  Makes more sense to put the augmentees into the sections and other spots.  Sucks for Reserve NCOs as there ain't a whole lot spots for them in a LAV Coy, and they will have to be employed elsewhere.

 

[combat_medic]

Well that pretty much answers everything. Thanks!