The announcement of the change of responsibility did not mention Russia or Ukraine, but it’s the latest in a string of deployments aimed at deterring further military action by Russia since it began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

“Once again, we have the privilege of standing together with our Polish allies, the Baltic States, and the rest of NATO,” said Maj. Gen. Christopher Norrie, the 3rd Infantry Division commanding general. “We have stood shoulder-to-shoulder against tyranny and oppression, and we pray that this alliance will continue to be a beacon of hope for all who yearn for freedom and justice around the world.”

With the changeover of troops at the Sept. 9 ceremony in Boleslawiec, Poland, came a change of names, from Task Force Ivy to Task Force Marne, in reference to the 3rd Infantry Division’s unit motto, “Rock of the Marne.” The saying dates back to the division’s service during World War I.

“The 3rd Infantry Division deployed as rotational forces to support NATO allies, deter further aggression against NATO member states, and train with host-nation forces to build readiness and interoperability,” Lt. Col. Matt Fontaine, a spokesman for the 3rd Infantry Division told Army Times.

Task Force Marne will serve in support of European Assure, Deter, and Reinforce efforts. The task force includes armor, infantry, aviation, and logistics units spread across the Baltic region and Poland, and will work with NATO allies in the region, according to an Army press release.

Roughly 4,500 soldiers under the 3rd Infantry Division will deploy across various locations in Europe in support of the mission, which is “to work alongside NATO allies and regional security partners to provide combat-credible forces to V Corps, America’s forward deployed corps in Europe.”

The V Corps Standards Book describes the mission as such: “In February of 2022 V Corps answered the Nation’s call again and deployed to the European Theater in support of the European Assure, Deter and Reinforce operation as TF Victory following Russia’s incursion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.”

The Task Force Marne troops will join 2,000 others from the 3rd Combat Aviation Brigade who are currently deployed there.

Treamon Dominic Lacy, a 39-year-old former staff sergeant, is charged with damage to government property and theft of government money, property, or records, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Southern District of Georgia.

On July 10, Lacy allegedly stole a Humvee from the motor pool at the base and drove it into the front doors of the headquarters building. Photos quickly made the rounds online showing the Humvee wedged between the front doors of the building under a sign atop the entryway bearing the unit’s motto, “Rock of the Marne.”

No injuries resulted from the crash and Lacy was detained immediately after the incident.

Lacy served in the Army from June 2002 until July 2013 as a wheeled vehicle mechanic and deployed twice to Iraq, Army Times previously reported. As an Army retiree, he had access to the base, according to Kevin Larson, a spokesman for Fort Stewart.

The July 10 incident took place a week after a similar incident occurred in California, where a Humvee was stolen from a National Guard armory and taken for a joy ride.

Lacy allegedly took the vehicle from the “87 BSSB motor pool” on Fort Stewart, according to a criminal complaint filed with the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia.

Jordan M. Poe, a special agent with the Army Criminal Investigation Division, wrote in the complaint that “Based on the mode and precision with which the Humvee was driven, I believe that [Lacy] intentionally drove the Humvee into Building 1′s front doors.”

The crash is estimated to have caused $1,000 in damages.

According to USA Today, which first broke the story, Maj. Gen. Eric Little, the director of the National Guard Bureau’s Manpower and Personnel directorate, was fired due to “counterproductive leadership.” Little’s former office is also known as the Bureau’s J-1, a reference to its staff numbering designation.

In one example detailed by USA Today, Little was reportedly dismissive after he was informed of workplace misconduct directed toward women under his command.

“Air Force women are emotional,” he said, according to USA Today, which quoted documents obtained by the publication. “I know this because all of my best friends are women.”

According to his official biography, and USA Today’s reporting, one of the complaints against Little was filed the same month he took over as the head of personnel.

Army spokeswoman Cynthia Smith confirmed to Army Times that the service’s inspector general substantiated complaints against Little, who was removed from his position after “appropriate administrative action.” Smith did not specify which complaints were substantiated or provide details on what disciplinary action Little faced as a result.

“The United States Army Inspector General Agency has concluded its investigations into allegations against Maj. Gen. Eric K. Little with several substantiated findings,” Smith said in her emailed statement. “Maj. Gen. Little received appropriate administrative action and is now currently serving as the Special Assistant to the Chief, National Guard Bureau. We consider this matter closed.”

Little’s official biography indicates that before being promoted to major general to become the National Guard’s top personnel officer, he had never served in such a capacity. According to his bio, the quartermaster officer never attended human resources professional military education, either, though it’s uncertain whether he attended shorter-length classes that don’t qualify as military schools.

Army Times senior reporter Davis Winkie contributed to this report.

On Tuesday, that soldier, Pvt. Matthew Cole, will be awarded the Soldier’s Medal in recognition for his actions during a ceremony at Fort Moore, Georgia.

Over Memorial Day weekend, Cole was enjoying some well-earned respite in downtown Columbus, Georgia, near the Chattahoochee Riverwalk, after completing basic training. Cole, at the time a One Station Unit infantry trainee with Echo Company, 1st Battalion, 19th Infantry Regiment, 198th Infantry Brigade, was on a day pass with his family when he saw a father and his 3-year-old daughter out on a dry patch of ground in the middle of the river — a stretch of earth that’s only accessible when the hydroelectric dam is closed.

However, when the dam releases water, the Chattahoochee can rise rapidly, and that’s what happened that day. As the water was released from the north, an alarm sounded, alerting visitors that they should make their way to the shore.

“The dam alarm started going off while we were walking,” Cole said in an Army news release. However, the father and daughter were not able to make it to safety before the water levels rose and they became trapped and began to be carried off by the current.

When he saw what was happening, Cole waded into the river and made his way to them.

“The dad was holding his little girl up,” he said. “I grabbed her and then swam down to the riverbank and got her out.”

Once the child was safely to shore, her father was able to move back to land.

First responders who arrived on scene credited Cole with saving the family’s life.

“We’re so glad that Pvt. Matthew Cole was there that day,” said Columbus Fire Department Division Chief and Fire Marshall John Shull. “I have every reason to believe that he made a tremendous impact, and there’s a very strong possibility that the 3-year-old and the father would not be there today if it wasn’t for the brave acts of Private Cole.”

The Soldier’s Medal Cole will receive Tuesday is awarded for heroism in a non-combat situation.

There are currently fewer than 300 recipients of the award still serving in the Army, Zachary Harris, a Fort Moore spokesperson, told Army Times.

Pvt. Matthew Cole’s award citation for the Soldier’s Medal can be read in its entirety below:

“On the 26th of May 2023 in Columbus, Georgia, Private Second Class Cole placed himself in harm’s way to save a three-year-old girl from drowning in the Chattahoochee River after the flood gates of the Georgia Power Dam released, sending powerful rapids and rising water through the river. He not only demonstrated heroism and bravery, but he also put his own life at risk by immediately jumping into the river and swimming through the rapids to rescue the young girl and bring her to safety before going back a second time to assist the father dislodge his foot from the rocks as the water rose. Private Second Class Cole’s actions are keeping with the finest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon him, the United States Army Training and Doctrine Command, and the United States Army.”

A U.S. official told Army Times that Pvt. Travis King, a 23-year-old cavalry scout on rotation in South Korea as part of the 1st Armored Division, was arrested on Oct. 8, 2022, following an altercation with two South Koreans. King also damaged a local police officer’s patrol car, the official said.

According to Reuters, King pleaded guilty to assault and destruction of public goods related to the October incident, and on Feb. 8, he was fined approximately $4,000 by the Seoul Western District Court. Army Times could not independently confirm whether the October arrest and the February fine reported by Reuters were from the same incident.

King had been held on assault charges and was released on July 10 and was being sent back to Fort Bliss, Texas, on Monday, the Associated Press previously reported.

The cavalry scout was awaiting an administrative separation from the Army upon his return to the U.S. due to his overseas criminal conviction, a U.S. official confirmed to Army Times.

After being taken to the airport, and escorted to customs, King then left and slipped in with a tour group headed to Panmunjom, the Korean border village. Once there, on Tuesday afternoon, local time, he dashed across the border, one that’s often filled with tourists and monitored by guards on both sides.

Upon reaching the North Korean side of the border, King was detained.

A statement from Col. Isaac Taylor, a spokesperson for U.S. Forces Korea, released shortly after the news of the border crossing broke, described King, whose identity was not released at the time, as a U.S. service member who “willfully and without authorization crossed the Military Demarcation Line into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.”

On Tuesday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin stressed the fluid nature of the incident, saying “We’re closely monitoring and investigating the situation and working to notify the soldier’s next of kin.”

Austin added that “This will develop in the next several days and hours, and we’ll keep you posted.”

According to Army spokesperson Bryce Dubee, King joined the service in January 2021. He has no deployments and during his Korean Force rotation, he was originally assigned to the 6th Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division. Because his unit went home while he was in jail, King was administratively attached to a unit from the 4th Infantry Division when he crossed the border.

King’s awards include the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Defense Service Medal, and Overseas Service Ribbon.

Spc. Rene Rodriguez is assigned to 2nd Battalion, 35th Infantry, which is part of the 25th Infantry Division’s 3rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, according to a division press release. The award ceremony will take place on the division’s parade field, named for Gen. Frederick C. Weyand.

The Soldier’s Medal is the Army’s highest award for non-combat heroism, and qualifying circumstances must carry “a clearly recognizable personal hazard or danger and the voluntary risk of life,” according to service regulations. Less than 0.1% of the Army’s active duty troops wear the award, said division commander Maj. Gen. Joseph Ryan in a July 14 video newsletter.

On Oct. 22, 2022, while in the vicinity of Wahiawa on the island of Oʻahu, Rodriguez saw a man violently assaulting a woman off-post, according to the release, Ryan’s remarks, and the soldier’s award citation.

“Rodriguez, with complete disregard for his own safety, swiftly moved to protect a woman enduring a violent assault,” reads his award citation, a copy of which was provided to Army Times. After “recognizing the woman’s risk of serious injury or death,” he pushed through a crowd of bystanders and placed his body between the victim and the attacker.

“He used his body as a shield, endured numerous strikes from the assailant, all while moving the woman into his vehicle to depart the scene,” according to the citation. “He continued to protect the woman until law enforcement arrived on the scene.”

The specialist was unaware that the man “was a felon on the lam from California, wanted for murder,” Ryan said in the video newsletter.

Rodriguez’s heroism stands out even among the “little over 240″ active duty soldiers who have earned the award, Ryan said.

According to the Army’s award regulations, the Army Secretary may certify that a Soldier’s Medal recipient displayed “extraordinary heroism…equivalent to that required for award of the [Distinguished Service Cross],” the service’s second-highest award for valor. Enlisted troops recognized for extraordinary heroism will receive a 10% boost to their retirement checks should they reach 20 years.

Ryan confirmed that Rodriguez’s heroism was formally deemed extraordinary in his video statement.

“He did the right thing because he had a bias for action,” Ryan said. “And we’re damn proud of him.”

On May 29, Story will be interred at Andersonville National Cemetery in Georgia following a service in nearby Americus, where he grew up.

Story served with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division during the Korean War. While fighting against the Korean People’s Army near the towns of Pusan and Yeongsan in South Korea, the 19-year-old soldier was, by all accounts, utterly fearless.

After an enemy assault broke through the 9th Infantry Regiment’s lines, Story, along with his fellow soldiers, were at risk of being surrounded and cut off from allied forces. As a weapons squad leader, Story moved his soldiers to a position where they could engage their attackers as they advanced. Once there, he spotted a large group of enemy soldiers as they prepared to launch an attack on other elements of his company. Grabbing a machine gun from his wounded gunner, Story laid down a torrent of fire on the attacking force, killing or wounding an estimated 100 enemy soldiers.

Despite their efforts, Story’s unit was soon facing encirclement, and so the order came to withdraw. As they pulled back, Story saw an enemy truck carrying troops and towing an ammunition trailer making its way down a road.

What he did next is best summarized by his Medal of Honor citation, which states that after alerting his squad of the danger, “he fearlessly stood in the middle of the road, throwing grenades into the truck. Out of grenades, he crawled to his squad, gathered up additional grenades, and again attacked the vehicle.”

But Story’s heroism did not stop with his one-man stand in the middle of a road. As the company pulled back, they faced repeated attack from the much larger enemy force, and Story was wounded.

Knowing that he was too injured to keep up, his citation says, Story chose to remain behind in an attempt to slow the enemy’s advance.

The last his fellow soldiers saw of him, Story was alone firing any and every weapon available as he waged a one-man battle against the enemy force, all in a desperate attempt to slow their advance so his brothers in arms could make their escape.

After the battle, a search was launched to recover his body, but to no avail. In 1951, Story was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, which was presented to his father by Gen. Omar N. Bradley.

Then, 70 years later, he was found. As Army Times previously reported, Story’s remains were exhumed from Sangde-po, South Korea, along with 652 other unknown combatants, in June 2021. Dental and anthropological records were used by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency to identify Story among those buried at Sangde-po, and scientists with the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used DNA analysis to confirm the discovery.

According to an Army press release, more than 7,500 Americans who fought in the Korean War remain unaccounted for.

The Medal of Honor citation for Cpl. Luther H. Story can be read in its entirety below:

Pfc. Story distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action. A savage daylight attack by elements of three enemy divisions penetrated the thinly held lines of the 9th Infantry. Company A beat off several banzai attacks but was bypassed and in danger of being cut off and surrounded. Pfc. Story, a weapons squad leader, was heavily engaged in stopping the early attacks and had just moved his squad to a position overlooking the Naktong River when he observed a large group of the enemy crossing the river to attack Company A. Seizing a machine gun from his wounded gunner he placed deadly fire on the hostile column killing or wounding an estimated 100 enemy soldiers. Facing certain encirclement, the company commander ordered a withdrawal. During the move Pfc. Story noticed the approach of an enemy truck loaded with troops and towing an ammunition trailer. Alerting his comrades to take cover, he fearlessly stood in the middle of the road, throwing grenades into the truck. Out of grenades, he crawled to his squad, gathered up additional grenades, and again attacked the vehicle. During the withdrawal the company was attacked by such superior numbers that it was forced to deploy in a rice field. Pfc. Story was wounded in this action, but, disregarding his wounds, rallied the men about him and repelled the attack. Realizing that his wounds would hamper his comrades, he refused to retire to the next position but remained to cover the company’s withdrawal. When last seen he was firing every weapon available and fighting off another hostile assault. Pvt. Story’s extraordinary heroism, aggressive leadership, and supreme devotion to duty reflect the highest credit upon himself and were in keeping with the esteemed traditions of the military service.

That was the gist of a recent post on the popular Army subreddit by Chief Warrant Officer 3 Blake Furman. In the post, Furman recounted what it was like to have the Army’s top enlisted leader as his drill sergeant, and did so in the time honored tradition of current and former service members: By telling a story from basic training about an instructor absolutely ruining lives because someone else screwed up.

About 24 years ago, in the winter of 1998, before his career with the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division, or his current post at Training and Doctrine Command, where he teaches special victim courses for criminal investigations, Furman was a young private, sitting in a crowded classroom with 60 other soldiers with Echo Battery, 1-22 Field Artillery Battalion, and a furious Sgt. 1st Class Grinston.

The story takes place during one of those welcome breaks in basic training when soldiers file into a large auditorium for a traditional class with guest presenters. The respite took a turn, however, when one of the junior soldiers decided to whistle at the guest instructor as she walked to the stage.

Silence descended and hell was soon to follow, with Grinston as its herald. There would be only one chance to avoid mass punishment: Whoever whistled needed to step forward.

No one moved, presumably due to complete and utter fear — the kind that paralyzes entry-level trainees living under the iron fist of their instructors.

For the next 50 minutes, the class went on with the Army staff judge advocate lecturer running through the course material as if nothing was amiss. Meanwhile, the future sergeant major of the Army loomed over his charges, eyes roving the seats, searching for the one. By the end of the lecture, no one had come forward to take responsibility, and so responsibility would be shared by all.

“What makes it even worse is that you know he’s right,” Furman told Army Times. “It’s not fury over nonsense just to screw the privates for random stupid rule violations that they made up. You know he is 100% justified in that absolute rage.”

Once the class was finished, Grinston ordered the battery to exit the auditorium. The soldiers headed back toward their building, made their way past it and formed up near the unit’s laundry facilities and bathrooms.

Then, as many have before and since, they endured a gauntlet of physical exercises. Corrective training, as it’s called, is a rite of passage for all who serve and a common training technique, wherein drill sergeants use physical training as a disciplinary tool, but with the added benefit of soldiers getting some more PT in during the day.

“It was constant and continuous,” Furman said, adding, “they would give us breaks, but the breaks would be the exercises where you don’t move, like putting your arms out and just holding them there. Like, ‘We know you’re at muscle failure for push-ups, so we’re going to give you a break. Stand up and put your arms out.’ That kind of stuff.”

And so it continued.

“They just rotated through each one, changing muscle failure to a different group, so eventually in a half-hour you could get back to that group again, and muscle fail it again,” Furman said.

With the caveat that some of the details are hazy, given the gap in time, Furman noted that throughout it all, Grinston, who was the unit’s senior drill sergeant, hammered home the why behind the training: “Reinstilling Army values, talking about how harassment is not tolerated, this type of behavior is not tolerated, every soldier is equal, we don’t treat anybody different because of their race, gender, nationality and that type of behavior would not be tolerated in the military.”

Looking back on that day in 1998, Furman says it helped shape his view of service in the Army and “that harassment of that type would not and should not be tolerated in the military.”

Grinston, for his part, has not forgotten either, telling Army Times, “I remember that story very clearly,” he said. “I’ve never tolerated harassment in any form. I hope those soldiers understood that after our corrective training and continue to live by the values instilled at initial entry training.”

Based on the Reddit thread that surfaced nearly a quarter of a century later, it certainly seems at least one — and likely many more — remember the lesson well.

The original Reddit post has been edited lightly for style and clarity:

Picture this: A small, flat, auditorium style room, elevated stage up front. Chairs filled with baby soldiers, still with mama’s milk on their lip.

An easy training day, random classes by outside presenters. Get the instructors on stage, sit down somewhere, make sure the trainees don’t fall asleep. Try not to kill anyone.

Last class, then the drill sergeants get to go home. The end is almost here.

Ethics and EO, guest instructor, SJA Office.

1457: Stage is empty. A soft cacophony of voices from rebellious but terrified privates.

1458: CPT (random female SJA) walks onto the stage with SFC Grinston.

1458.03: A loud, crisp, clear, cat call whistle …

1458.04: Pure … silence …

1458.05: Mid-stride, like a slow motion movie, SFC Grinston slows his gate and cocks his head toward the soldiers, with a “what the f*@k did I just hear” face. The face of a man who can’t comprehend what just happened. The face of a man that knew right from wrong … and he just heard the voice of evil call out across the aether. A face of a future SMA, that WOULD see justice.

But who would pay? No one would (or did) admit to the crime. Who would pay? That face said they would all pay. Everyone will pay.

50. Long. Minutes… of EO training. CPT (SJA) taught slide by slide, as though all was right in the world. Meanwhile, SFC Grinston stood at the edge of the stage, arms crossed, burning eyes.

50 minutes knowing it was coming. Would he find the offender? Or would we all …

40.

30. Those eyes …

20. He can’t actually … kill one of us … can he?

10. Please, it wasn’t me.

0.

CPT (random): ‘Thank you for the wonderful presentation.’ Turns to the soldiers.

[Grinston]: “Battery … ATTENTION! Formation OUTSIDE! You have 2 minutes to fill your canteen.”

That was the first of 3 times we filled our canteens that evening…

“We have an enormous strain on soldiers,” Sergeant Major of the Army Michael Grinston said earlier this month. “We’re busier now than we ever have been.”

The Army’s top enlisted leader recently issued the dire warning at the Fires Symposium in Lawton, Oklahoma, calling current strains on personnel a “huge concern” for him, according to a release by the Association of the United States Army.

The high operations tempo, coupled with the shrinking size of the force, means that soldiers are being asked to do more with less.

For the second year in a row, the Army missed its target recruiting goal. According to AUSA, the Army’s projected strength for fiscal year 2024 is roughly 951,800 soldiers, counting active duty, Guard and Reserve. That total marks a 20% decrease from the service’s end strength in 2022.

Contrary to claims that the U.S. military has scaled back its operational tempo during what has been branded as peacetime — a claim that overlooks the risks shouldered by service members still serving in combat zones, like Iraq and Syria — American soldiers find themselves deploying regularly for missions abroad as well as at home.

There are advise and assist deployments in Iraq and Syria, some of which rely on detachments with unique capabilities, such as air artillery defense units. At home, the Army and National Guard have been called upon to serve as duct-tape fixes for everything from the COVID response to support at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“The link of everything we’ve done has been the Army,” Grinston said, according to the release. “Whether it’s COVID, hurricanes, forest fires, Russia, Ukraine, all the way to what we’re doing today. That’s why, again, I’m concerned about our optempo.”

The tempo may be grueling, but soldiers continue to meet the high expectations set before them, Grinston added.

“We’ve never said no,” Grinston said of the Army. “I’ve watched these soldiers, year after year, they’ve said, ‘Yes, I’ll go do that.’”

Grinston’s remarks at the Fires Symposium come on the heels of another conversation in which he raised workload concerns of the average soldier. In April, Grinston told Military.com’s Steve Beynon “the average citizen doesn’t know how stressful this is on our families. I think it has been an incredible strain on our soldiers and our families.”

Ahead of a deployment overseas, soldiers must meet a series of requirements before even beginning pre-deployment training. Individual tasks may only take a day here or there, but they pile up. This period is followed by a month-long pre-deployment training evolution — often hosted at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California, or the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana — that may be further augmented by unit-level exercises specific to select commands or career fields.

Atop the pre-deployment period, personnel must meet unit-level logistical requirements, individual preparations for necessary armor and gear, screenings, staffing and so on. Finally, when every task has been completed, the deployment and all the rigors and risks that come with it await.

Soldiers eventually return home and are afforded a breather, albeit brief, before doing it all over again. With manpower issues looming and a tempo that won’t slow, it remains to be seen whether this cadence is sustainable — not just for the Army, but for those who fill its ranks.

“[The] toughest part is the mental aspect of it,” said Capt. Joseph Palazini, a company commander with the 21st Brigade Engineer Battalion, 3rd BCT, 101st Airborne Division out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

Palazini, along with his teammate, Capt. Matthew Cushing, who serves as the assistant operations officer with the same unit, took first place in the 16th Annual Lt. Gen. Robert B. Flowers Best Sapper Competition that ran from April 21 to 24 at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

A total of 100 sapper-qualified soldiers from across active duty, the Army Reserve and the National Guard took part in the competition, working in two-person teams. The competition spanned 58 hours and a range of nearly 60 miles, during which time soldiers tested their mettle in marksmanship, demolitions, first aid, urban breaching, and a host of physical fitness challenges.

Two of those events — an X-mile ruck march and X-mile run, so named for the fact that the distance was unknown to participants — proved particularly difficult, according to the winners and one of the architects of this year’s competition.

“It may seem kind of trivial, but my little diabolical addition to the competition was taking their watches from them at the X-mile ruck march,” said 1st Sgt. Christopher Hoffman, who helped set up this year’s events. “A lot of people, how they time themselves and track all that, a lot of them have paces and stuff like that and most people try to shoot for 15 minutes per mile. So when I was like ‘hey, if we take their watches and they don’t know how far they’re going, they don’t know how long they’ve been out there, then they can’t do that.’ And it was just that additional little challenge and kind of a mind game to set them back a little bit.”

To make matters worse, the soldiers’ performance on the ruck 18-mile march impacted how much rest they’d get between completing that event and starting on the next. For one unfortunate team, by the time they completed the march they had just 15 minutes to drop their 50 pounds of gear before starting the next challenge.

The mind games — part and parcel of military life — weren’t the only curveballs thrown at the soldiers.

For Cushing, the competition offered a chance to put academic knowledge to the test, which can be an invaluable opportunity for soldiers so that their first real attempt at trying a technique doesn’t take place during a real-world operation.

“We studied a lot, and some of the calculations you study you have to use out here, so the saddle pitch, which is a diamond shape steel-cutting charge made of C-4 explosives, we know the calculation and how to do it based off the diagrams, but we’ve never done it in real life,” Cushing said. “So, having to form it to the shape of the object we were putting it around, that was a little more challenging than we expected. So I guess in the future, it’s not just about going over the demolitions calculations, but in the real world ‘how do you actually mold it onto the object you have to destroy?”