What It Takes to Survive Marine Corps Boot Camp | Recruit Training

As soon as the bus arrives, a Marine Corps drill instructor boards and takes control, ordering the recruits off the bus and onto the infamous yellow footprints. When I tell you to, you will get off my bus and you will get on the yellow footprints. Do you understand? Yes, sir! From there, they line up in front of the doors. They will soon pass through, marking the beginning of their transformation from civilians into Marines. These hatches symbolize your transformation from a civilian to a United States Marine. You will pass through these hatches one time, and one time only. Do you understand? Yes, sir! Inside, they are processed rapidly, stripped of their civilian clothing, issued Marine Corps gear, and given a brief opportunity to make a phone call home. Thank you for your support. Goodbye for now. After the call, male recruits are sent to the barber for a full head shave, while female recruits receive instruction on proper hair standards. With those first changes complete, all recruits report to their drill instructors to receive further orders and begin formal training. Marine Corps Recruit Training is conducted at two historic coastal bases. Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego on the U.S. West Coast and Marine Corps Recruit Depot Paris Island on the East Coast. Each location offers a dramatically different environment, but both serve the same purpose, transforming civilians into United States Marines under some of the most demanding training conditions in the military. The biggest difference would be the geographic location. Out in California, obviously, you have the hills, and in Paris Island, it's relatively flat. Regardless of whether a person goes to Paris Island, South Carolina, or San Diego, California, at the end of the day, they become Marines. Marines are Marines. You earn the title of San Diego, you earn it at Paris Island, I don't think there's a difference. I mean, there's some infighting, if you will, between Paris Island and San Diego Marines, but it's competitive and fun. Recruits meet their drill instructors, who are responsible for their introduction to military life. Their drill instructors will push the recruits to their limits, taking them through various physical and mental events to test if they have what it takes to become United States Marines. These events include the obstacle course, a set of hurdles and barriers, designed to test recruits' physical fitness and problem-solving skills. So, basically, it forces the recruit to utilize their upper body strength, their core strength, and their lower body strength. So, you're going to have a little bit of aches and bruises from time to time here. Ultimately, the hardest part is going to be the rope at the end, because they've already exhausted energy. So, they have to set the break in order to get up to the rope, which is the biggest fundamental that we want them to see, is understanding how to set a break with a rope. Recruits are pushed through hikes that steadily increase in distance, while the weight on their backs grows as their strength improves. By the end of recruit training, each recruit is carrying a rifle and a pack, weighing more than 45 pounds. The confidence course comprised of 15 unique obstacles to challenge their mental confidence and help overcome their fears. Recruits mostly struggle with the slide for life, the one where they go on top of a tower and they slide down a rope over water. The kids are afraid of both heights and water, so it combines them. The confidence course betters the recruits by allowing them to face different adversities and seeing how they react to them, such as heights and water survival. Chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear training, commonly known as the gas chamber, will build recruits' trust in their equipment by teaching them how to properly use a gas mask when exposed to airborne chemicals. Every Marine is amphibious by nature, which means they must know how to swim. Each recruit will go through a swim qualification that will test their ability to traverse water and show overall confidence in water activities. A lot of them haven't been in a big body of water like this before, so most of them haven't even swam in the county floor or anything like that, so this is their first time entering the water. Kind of break the barrier right there. In terms of requirement, because we as Marines are amphibious by nature and we're deployed on MEWS throughout the year, it's obviously a good person to know how to swim. If a situation were to arise where you had to abandon ship, as the example I like to use all the time, you have confidence in your gear, gear being your canvies that the recruits wear, being able to float with that gear, just having the confidence to be able to swim in the water. So amphibious by nature, we're constantly deployed on ships. So I definitely say by land, obviously ship-to-shore movement. The guys are going to be on the AAVs, the amphibious vehicles. We're obviously going to need to do that because sometimes they're not going to be able to bring the vehicles directly on shore. They're going to have to tread water, probably like in the depth I'm in now. So just have that confidence to have a combat load on and be able to maneuver through the water from ship-to-shore movement. Confirmation, find three rounds at a time in 60 seconds. From the sitting positions, line ready. Ready one. Ready two. Ready three. Every Marine is first and foremost a rifleman. In phase two of recruit training, recruits will learn the proper handling and employment of their rifle. Before recruits qualify with their rifle, they will undergo grass week. During this week, recruits will be trained by primary marksmanship instructors. These subject matter experts are responsible for teaching recruits the fundamentals of marksmanship. Recruits learn several firing positions, how to achieve proper sight alignment with their reticle combat optic, and proper trigger control. They will put what they learned into practice via snapping in, where recruits dry fire on targets to practice the techniques they have learned. The following week is range week, or table one. Recruits fire live ammunition, and their marksmanship is evaluated from several distances. Recruits shoot from the 200-yard line, 300-yard line, and 500-yard line, using all the positions they learned during grass week, such as the sitting, kneeling, standing, and prone positions. Every recruit must pass table one qualification in order to proceed to the next phase of recruit training. On Parris Island, our priority is training. So we are ready, and we set up the range in a day's notice. So entry-level marksmanship is pretty much, we're just giving those fundamentals and the basics to all recruits. Most recruits that come nowadays don't actually understand marksmanship, or they come with bad habits. So essentially with grass week, the PMIs try to break down the bad habits. Then once they come on to firearm week, the PMIs work with the block NCOs and also the coaches to instill the Marine Corps habits of shooting. Phase three of recruit training introduces recruits to field skills and combat tactics. They will undergo table two, the second half of their rifle qualification. Here recruits use more advanced rifle and movement techniques like position changes, multiple target engagement, moving target engagement, and speed reload drills. Unlike table one, recruits wear a Kevlar and flak jacket and engage targets at both the 25 and 100 yard lines. Next recruits take their combat fitness test or CFT. This test assesses a recruits physical capacity in a spectrum of combat related tasks. Recruits sprint for a half mile, lift 30 pound ammunition cans for two minutes, and perform the maneuver under fire. A timed 300 yard shuttle run where recruits must do sprints, low and high crawls, a body drag, a fireman's carry, an ammo can carry, push-ups, and a grenade throw. Basic warrior training or BWT teaches recruits several field skills such as land navigation, hand and arm signals, fire and movement, and detecting improvised explosive devices or IEDs. These different field skill sets are absolutely vital for various combat situations. On the today movement course, it's a simulated combat zone basically. So we get them out here, put them in a real life situation, got some battlefield noises, and basically putting them through some some hardship together, get them used to that mentality. Next recruits complete their final drill evaluation. This evaluation puts all of their drill movements and discipline to the test. Before they tackle the final culminating event, recruits are tested on their overall physical fitness by doing the physical fitness test or PFT. Here recruits are evaluated on pull-ups or push-ups, crunches or planks, and a three mile run for score. Finally, before becoming Marines, the recruits will encounter their most difficult challenge yet, the crucible. The crucible is the final test of recruit training, a 54-hour evolution that puts a recruit's physical, mental, and moral training to the ultimate test. Recruits will receive limited rations of food and only eight hours of sleep throughout this 54-hour cycle. They begin by hiking six miles in the middle of the night to Page Field, the crucible site. All recruits go through several events during the crucible designed to exhaust them physically and mentally while evaluating what they have learned at recruit training. The recruits will overcome stresses that they never thought they could conquer before. Some of these events include the day movement course, where each recruit must navigate obstacles such as high walls, barbed wire, low crawls, and buddy rushes. Another event is the Battle of Fallujah, where recruits work together as a team and low crawl several yards while transporting ammunition cans to the finishing area. The very last event of the crucible is the 12-mile hike. Nothing we do is by, you know, just that individual. We have to work as a team to get things done. As far as the hardest, I would definitely have to say it was the actual final march, the actual grim reapers, they call it. The reaper is part of the culminating event, which is the 12-mile hike of the crucible, and you go up this very large hill with, you know, a 40-pound pack on after you've done 12 miles of hiking already. I mean, there's really nothing else to it. I mean, you just have to push through it. You got to kind of dig deep and hopefully you can make it. I look back and it's hard to say that there's a negative side to it because when you get out of it, you're happy that you did it. Following the hike, recruits move from Page Field to the parade deck to receive what they have been working so hard for, their Eagle, Globe, and Anchor, the emblem of the Marine Corps. The Eagle, Globe, and Anchor ceremony signifies their transformation from recruit to United States Marines. Phase four is the last phase before the new Marines graduate recruit training. The drill instructors will transition from trainers of recruits to mentors of Marines. The Marines will no longer address their drill instructors as sir or ma'am, but rather by the drill instructor's respective rank. These new Marines will be taught various subjects that are critical to success and growth in all aspects of their personal and professional lives. In small group discussions, drill instructors teach the Marines about the Fleet Marine Force, how to act as a Marine, preserving core values, and driver safety, among other topics. The Marines will also go through the Battalion Commander's inspection. Here, the Battalion Commander will inspect each new Marine's uniform in preparation for their transition to the Fleet Marine Force. On Family Day, the Marines participate in the motivational run and see their families for the first time since entering recruit training. Finally, the milestone and end of recruit training, graduation. Here, the Marines are released from their 13 weeks of recruit training by their drill instructors and spend the rest of the day with their families until they transition to the next phase of their professional careers. If you're enjoying this video, don't forget to hit that subscribe button for more content like this.