Hundreds of Army Reserve Soldiers with a multitude of units descended on Fort McCoy in July to train in the 87th Training Division’s Warrior Exercise (WAREX) 87-24-02, said Training Coordination Chief Larry Sharp with the Fort McCoy Directorate of Plans, Training, Mobilization and Security.

The dates of the exercise are July 13-27, and it covers a wide variety of activities for units participating in the training. For example, at the 87th Training Division’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/87thTrainingDivision, a post from July 16 where Soldiers in WAREX were completing M249 shooting at a Fort McCoy live-fire range, division officials gave an idea of what the exercise was about.

“Part of the WAREX is validating Soldier warfighting capabilities in both individual and collective common Warrior tasks,” the 87th’s post stated.

Similarly, on July 18, Soldiers with the 1006th Quartermaster Company familiarized themselves with the M2 .50-cal weapon system under the guidance of Task Force Stormbreaker’s Sgt. 1st Class Daryll Slimmer and Sgt. 1st Class Antonio Lott before heading out for qualifications. Again more Soldiers building their warfighting capabilities.

To qualify on an M2, Soldiers need six out of nine targets, an 87th Facebook post states from July 18.

In a video by Capt. Christina Winters, she interviews Sgt. Joseph Aguilar and Staff Sgt. Brenda Chairez with the 974th Quartermaster Company as they recall their experience during the convoy lanes at WAREX.

Aguilar explained how he and his team worked their way through a scenario, engaged with opposing forces, and more, including calling a 9-line medevac. A 9-line medevac is a standard collection of codes that every service member, military officer, helicopter and medical personnel, and all security personnel are trained in so it can be universally applied.

A further description of a 9-line at https://www.operationmilitarykids.org/9-line-medevac/#whatisit states, “Each one of the nine lines provides vital information that’s used to transmit from how many patients there are, the mechanism of injury, necessary equipment to bring, the location, and the possible hostile/non-hostile scenarios that could have manifested.”

Chairez stated in the video that the overall training experience for her was great.

“Being in the Reserve, we don’t really get to do training like that often,” Chairez said. “So being able to come out here and experience that, going through that is really great. I know other Soldiers really loved it. I think we should do this more often.”

Besides the training, troops in the exercise have had some important visitors. Lt. Gen. Jody Daniels, chief of the Army Reserve and commanding general of U.S. Army Reserve Command, visited with exercise participants on July 20.

Command Sgt. Maj. Gregory Betty, the U.S. Army Reserve command sergeant major, also visited with exercise personnel July 20.

And Brig. Gen. Sonya Powell, commanding general of the 87th Training Division, has also been everywhere with troops throughout the exercise.

Through all of the training, the July weather at Fort McCoy has been favorable with regular temperatures in the 70s and 80s with minimal precipitation.

Sharp said as this exercise wraps up, even more training will be lining up at Fort McCoy for a busy August schedule.

Learn more about the 87th Training Division by visiting their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/87thTrainingDivision or their Army Reserve page at https://www.usar.army.mil/84thTC/87thTD.

Fort McCoy’s motto is to be the “Total Force Training Center.”

Located in the heart of the upper Midwest, Fort McCoy is the only U.S. Army installation in Wisconsin.

The installation has provided support and facilities for the field and classroom training of more than 100,000 military personnel from all services nearly every year since 1984.

Learn more about Fort McCoy online at https://home.army.mil/mccoy, on Facebook by searching “ftmccoy,” and on Twitter by searching “usagmccoy.”

Also try downloading the Digital Garrison app to your smartphone and set “Fort McCoy” or another installation as your preferred base. Fort McCoy is also part of Army’s Installation Management Command where “We Are The Army’s Home.”