Page 42 - MERCIAN Eagle 2017

Pl Comm Capt Jake Berridge Pl Sgt Sgt Chris Wightman Guns Platoon Section Commanders:
Cpl Stephen Harper
Cpl Connor Foley
Assault Pioneer Section Commanders:
Cpl Matt Brock Cpl Michael Farrell
40
3 (MG) Pl Year Review
3 Platoon, the A (Grenadier) Company Machine Gun Platoon, had a very busy year along with the rest of the company. For the majority of the last year, Guns Platoon has not been used for machine gun purposes and for the last 8 months of this period, the platoon has been bolstered by members
of the Assault Pioneer Platoon for its deployment on Op TRENTON 3 to South Sudan.
The platoon was primarily machine gun focussed in the run
up to Christmas
last year, with Sgt
(SF) gunners and controllers. The cadre was both physically and conceptually demanding, with some soldiers learning this aspect of infanteering for the first time.
In January, the PDT for Op TRENTON 3 started, and the platoon was joined by 11 members from the Assault Pioneer Platoon. The first major test for the newly ORBATed Platoon was the LFTT package in Brecon. This was the first time the platoon, in its current form, had worked together whilst
rerolling as a light role platoon. The machine gunners provided GPMG (SF) support to the RCOs by setting up the FFG and OHF gun on multiple ranges. Guns Platoon was required to blow out their cobwebs as the
package culminated in a platoon attack, this saw two sections from Guns Platoon and a section of Assault Pioneers work together to execute a successful Platoon attack.
Wightman, Cpl
Foley, and Cpl
Harper attending
the Machine Gun
Commander’s Course
at Warminster. All
three performed
extremely well, with
Cpl Harper finishing as top student on the entire course. The Platoon conducted a machine gun cadre which allowed new members of the platoon to qualify as GPMG
Cpl Farrell / Pte Downes / Conducting visitor checks / Bentiu / South Sudan / Oct 17
Capt Berridge / Cpl Foley / Meeting locals at the Bentiu Independence Stadium / South Sudan / October 17
‘Guns Platoon was required to blow out their cobwebs as the package culminated in a platoon attack’
THE MERCIAN EAGLE