On Thursday, March 30, two UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters could be spotted landing near the athletic fields on the George Mason University’s Fairfax Campus. The helicopters were transporting 62 Mason ROTC cadets and two cadre to the Marine Corps Base Quantico for Mason ROTC’s spring Joint Field Training Exercise (JFTX), which it holds annually with ROTC students from Georgetown and Howard universities.
A number of cadets and cadre had travelled to Quantico early to set up the landing zone and prepare for training. During the exercise, ROTC cadets spend four days outdoors at Quantico conducting day and night land navigation, practicing marksmanship, radio and machine gun training, and force-on-force training involving small unit tactics.
Additionally, the Mason first-year and sophomore cadets were able to conduct UH-60 helicopter flights on Friday that were flown by the Virginia Army National Guard.
Overall, 117 Mason ROTC cadets participated in the training this year. Student leaders—Cadet Battalion Commander Yanaira Velasques, Cadet Operations Officer Anthony Peyton, Cadet Executive Officer Charles Scott, and Cadet Personnel Officer Ethan Zimmerman—were instrumental in planning the training.
