Inside U.S. Coast Guard Boot Camp

Hurry up now! Hurry up now! Run to me! Follow! Henry up! Alright guys, we just landed here in Cape May, New Jersey. We're at the United States Coast Guard Training Center. This is where they drop off all the recruits that get loaded up on a bus and start their boot camp. They told me that they wanted me to go on the bus, so I got to go experience what it's all like and get the first introduction and we'll go from there. So, stay tuned and we're about to go do it right now. If there's an empty seat in front of you, you're already wrong. Move in, fill in, up front, do it now! You are now in the United States Coast Guard Training Center, Cape May, New Jersey. From this point on, the first thing out of your mouth will be yes, no, or aye-aye, followed by sir or ma'am as appropriate. Do you understand? Yes, ma'am! Do you understand? Yes, ma'am! Do you understand everything that I have explained to you? Yes, ma'am! Then get off my bus! Aye, aye, ma'am! Hurry up! Get out of the bus! Ma'am, stop looking around right now! We'll sit here and aye-aye, sir! Aye, aye, sir! Welcome to Training Center Cape May. This is how things work here now. Aye, aye! If you drop your bag, move! Move! Get your eyeballs posted on five recruits over there. And you must be fully clothed in case of emergency. If you can't put your clothes on, you have a tag. Do you understand? Yes, sir. You have your shoes on your feet when you're moving outside. Do you understand? Yes, sir. Move. Hurry up. Move faster now. Yes, sir. Move faster now. As soon as they put that bus in park, it was straight mayhem. After the loud greeting, the male recruits go straight to the barbershop for a full buzz cut. And then they got to go through a few health exams. And after that, they go straight to training. Captain Warren Jones. Si. Aye, Captain Warren. I'm Captain Warren Jones, your commanding officer here at Coast Guard Training Center, Cape May. The strengthening of the Coast Guard culture starts right here. Now, we want you to graduate. The Coast Guard needs you to graduate. Our country needs you to graduate as well. Don't quit. When things get tough, we know they will be tough. It's designed to be tough. Do not quit. I'm proud of each one of you. Now, let's get ready to finish. Are we ready for Coast Guard boot camp? Yes, Captain Jones. Are we ready for Coast Guard boot camp? Yes, Captain Jones. We have one mission here in Cape May, and that is to transform you from civilians into military members. Cape May is a term used to describe a line of military authority. Chief White, take charge and carry out the training plan. Aye, Mr. Nelson. Stand up straight and look at me. Aye. I am Chief White, your lead commander for India 206. We demand the following. That you obey all orders, willingly, politely, and without question. And above all else, 100% motivation and dedication at all times. Do I make myself clear, India? Yes, sir. Now, I'll be more pronounced as if you were to tell me, India. Yes, sir. Training starts now, the entire time. Do it now. Aye, aye, aye, aye. Training starts now, the entire time. Aye, aye, Chief White. We're going to your new home. Right face. Respond and react. Respond and react. Watch that gun. Push. Push. Push. Push. Push. Push. Watch the other right now. Push. Push. Push. Push. You be counting. We got to get a glimpse of what living in the barracks is like. This is where the recruits will sleep for the next eight weeks. Let's just say you get to know your shipmates very well. Once settled in, it's time to get to work. Say hello to your new company commander. Respect, devotion, and duty. Honor, respect, devotion, and duty. All right, we're about to get in the pool and do this survival swim training with a bunch of recruits. Looking forward to it, and we'll see how it goes. Morning, my name's Petty Officer Wilson. I'll be teaching you survival float today. If everyone takes a look at this board right here, you can see the title of this class is survival float. What we're going to be focusing on right now is hypothermia and what this Mustang survival suit can do in a situation of hypothermia and survival. We're going to do two floats. We're going to have the single-person float, and we're going to have the multi-person float. That takes me to the suit, Mustang survival suit. Boat crews use this whenever you're out on deck in cold temperatures. It does two things. It keeps you afloat, and it keeps you warm. This is an immersion suit. You will be immersed in the water. The water will go through, but it does allow that foam to keep the water warm up against your skin. It does keep some of that cold out, and it keeps you afloat very well. Let me get a volunteer to go ahead and show us how to put this survival suit on. First step, we're going to unzip the zipper that is in the front of the suit. You're going to take it at the waist, and you're going to put it on just like a pair of trousers. Once you have that on, you're going to put the top portion on just like a jacket. Fasten the Velcro over the zipper. If you look right here, this is a separate compartment that you can fill with air using the oral inflation tube. This allows you to lay your head back. It's almost like a little flotation pillow to keep your head up out of the water because if there's waves coming and going, you don't want to constantly be dealing with the waves and the water in your mouth and your face, your nose, all that. Right here, we've got retroflective tape. It's called SOLAS tape, Safety of Life at Sea. When we're looking down for a survivor, we're hoping they got that SOLAS tape on because as soon as our spotlight hits it, it's going to flash, and we're going to say, what was that? Oh, check that out again. Let's go over there and see what it is. On top, there's a piece of Velcro. Some crews will carry a strobe, which is just a flashing light, and that's the number one signal of distress. We see that flashing light about 60 flashes per second. That's the distress signal. Single-person float! Lay back, air in the ceiling. When will you see another boat? When will you see an aircraft? I bet you wish that you had a couple of people with you. Multi-person float! Now you have someone next to you to make you feel a little bit better, someone to talk to, someone to encourage. Now you have a lot bigger target for search and rescue to look at. Honestly, this is some of the most important. It might seem simple, but this is the most important training. I think Petty Officer Wilson said it so good, time is the most important thing, especially to learn how important it is to find time to get rescued. Coming together makes it even easier for aircraft or a boat to find you. All good stuff, all really, really good stuff. Enjoyed it. These suits are unbelievable. Mustangs probably did a great job with these. All right, guys, this is Petty Officer Wilson. Hey, thanks, man, for letting us do that. You think it's easy now, but when in the heat of the moment, it might not be. So, I mean, how often do you guys teach these kind of courses? So this course is actually a week five course that we do here for the recruits. And like you said, it's the basics, right? But a lot of times you don't know the background. Not every single person that comes through Coast Guard recruit training is going to have an extensive waterman background. Maybe they didn't grow up near the water. Maybe they didn't ever go out on boats. So the idea of hypothermia, being in cold water, putting on a survival suit, flotation of any kind is foreign to a lot of these recruits. So we try to just give them the basics to understand the dangers of hypothermia, how to put on the survival suit. And of course, they're going to get extensive training when they go to their unit, but this gives them that opportunity to kind of get that 101 first line course to enter into that. So my official title is Aviation Survival Technician. Our main collateral, the thing that people know us best for is being a helicopter rescue. Yeah. So everybody listen, this is Petty Officer Wilson, who actually did that rescue that I posted a while back of the guys that were trapped up in Barnegat Light on the end of the jetty who climbed up. So yeah, how was that? That was a really peculiar case. So we always train. This is a perfect example. This is a boat that we would train to. This is a 47 foot motor lifeboat. We can hoist the basket down to this boat for training. This is a Coast Guard boat, so we have access to it. I will go down to this boat for training. And it's kind of this small little platform. The funny thing about that case is the platform on that dayboard tower was about four by four, a little smaller than the back of this boat. But it was a textbook case for us because we're constantly hoisting down to that type of platform. We're constantly going down and retrieving people. Retraining on that tight platform. Exactly. And so it was peculiar in the sense that you don't find people stranded out there during a super moon, super tide and stuck on top of this dayboard. But it was exactly that. And the crew executed it perfectly. And really it was just me. At the end of the day, it was me dangling at the end of a line with an awesome pilot, awesome flight mech operating the hoist. And I was able to get down to that dayboard safely and hook them up and get them out of there. It was a one down, man. Awesome stuff. Maybe she can beat me. Maybe she can beat me. I am in the race. Hurry up. Hurry up. She may hurry up. Hurry up. She may hurry up. After basic training all morning, we went to the galley for some lunch. What I thought might be a little break ended up being the complete opposite. In the Coast Guard, timing is everything and lunch is very quick. Before recruits can eat, they are quizzed on required Coast Guard knowledge. Those who get it wrong must report it to the company commander and be held accountable. Mental fitness seemed to be 90% of the battle during training. Your company commander is going to push it to the next level. Be ready for the galley. We are the ones who push it. You are out. You are out. Hey, other guys. See you in a good hour. All the brains you know respond to her. After morning, ciao. No. No. No. No. You are the ones. You are the last ones to see us. Don't let it go. Don't let it go. Don't let it go. 1-1-7. 1-1-6. 1-0-1. 1-2-0. 4-9. 4-8. 4-7. 4-6. P-3. P-2. P-1. I'm here with Petty Officer Heywood. Thank you. He is here at the seamanship class for the Coast Guard. Those guys all come out here for their final test. I think they are on week, you said 7? 0-7. They come out here and do line handling, correct? Yep. What is seamanship? What do you guys all go through in this building here? Seamanship is just from weeks 3 through 7. They are learning anything that they could possibly have to do their first day or first few months at their unit, whether it's a cutter or a station. They are learning helm lookout, how to take commands from an OOD to drive the boat, how to stand lookout on a cutter, how to stand lookout on a small boat, how to handle lines, how to tie knots, what types of lines are used for what, and then just basic day 1 stuff, port, starboard, bow, stern, things like that. This is the foundation of what they'll do as nonrates at a station or a cutter operational unit. In the Coast Guard, once you show up to your unit, you're doing the job day 1. Yeah, yeah. So this is helping them be ready to at least learn what they need to learn when they show up. Heads up on the pier! Bittman, pay out slack so the people at the pier can pull it in. You pay hand over hand. Hand out. Drop. Good. Throw it. Slack out. Slack in your offhand. Bittman, don't move. You're holding the slack. If you let go, you're putting slack back into the line, and everything you've done up to this point, that's been you. There you go. Slack out. Lean back. All right, get some slack in your offhand. Put it in your right hand a little bit. Roll it around the post. Line 3 down to a work turn. All right, make line 4. Make line 4 out. Line 3. Make line 3 out. We're down to a work and turn. Take your line 4 down to a work turn. Take your line 4 out. Heads up on the pier. Line 2 down to a work and turn. Pull tight each time you get on there. Line 2 made. Line 1 made. Line 2 down to a work and turn. A fire on board is one of a captain's biggest fears. During boot camp, all recruits go through fire prevention and firefighting courses. Having this background on firefighting is so important. There is no fire department to call out in the middle of the ocean, so you better know how to react. All right, guys, we've made it to the end of the week. It's graduation day. People from all over the country just arrived. About to go sit down and enjoy this. It's a very special moment for everybody. They're just outside. They can hear you. We're ready to see your loved ones. Because right now, it doesn't sound like you're ready to graduate some recruits. If we're not loud, we're not going to graduate. How about that? All right, let's go! There we go! The first thing I'd like to do is ask all veterans and first responders, if you are able, please stand. Let's go, baby! All right, we're going to do 10 together. Let's go, we ready? Let's go! All right, everybody. Let's do 10! Let's go! Right here. All right, hey, no, hey, wait, I got a Coast Guard. Let's go, Coast Guard. Let's get in here. Let's go! Down 1, sir. Down 2, sir. Down 3, sir. Down 4, sir. Down 6, sir. Down 7, sir. Down 8, sir. Down 9, sir. Down 10, sir. All right. Hey, honor guard, ceremony team, I can't tell you how grateful I am. Your families are here. Have fun. Enjoy the moment. You earned every right to be here. Show them what you know. I got it, Coach. Ice! Hey, thank you very much. It's because of you that we have 82 individuals ready to graduate. Yes, you cry. Yes, you want to give up. But you stay on the grind. You stay in the fight. You stay in the battle. This is what it's about. This is why you win. You are all champions. Right now, each one of you are a champion. There's only one place where the success comes before the work. And that's in the dictionary. It's only in the dictionary where success comes before the work. You put in the work to get to this point. For that, hey, I'm humbled. I'm grateful for each one of you. Don't give up. Don't forget your foundation, your shine shoes, your uniform, your haircut. This is how you win every day, all day. Let's go. I said one mission. One mission. Let's go. One mission. And repeat after me because you believe. When you believe, you achieve. Let's go. I got this. Let's go. I got this. Congratulations, guys. I'm proud to see each and every one of you standing here today. When we saw you in week two, we told you, you control your attitude, you control your effort, and you'll be standing here six and a half weeks, seven weeks from the first time we saw you. Now here you are, one unified team, one company, ready to go on and do great things. Congratulations, Delta. Delta 206, today is the day we've been waiting for for eight weeks. You made it, just like we said. You're here. You have one more thing to do, and that's graduate, right? Yes, General! Very well, Pete Officer Kelly. Job well done to you and your staff. Bravo Zoo. Members of Delta Company, your basic training is now complete. It is my pleasure to officially advance you from Seaman Recruit to Seaman, Seaman Apprentice, Fireman, or Fireman Apprentice. Congratulations on your first advancement in the United States Coast Guard. One member of Delta 206 also completed the requirements to become an American citizen. The following member will report front and center. Seaman AJ is from Ghana. That I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America, America's newest citizen. Today, you stand as the embodiment of the Coast Guard. You've earned your place in this proud and storied service. Hold your heads high and carry the flag of the United States Coast Guard with pride, because you are part of something truly special. Congratulations, Delta 206. May your service be filled with success, purpose, and the deep pride that comes from knowing you answered the call to serve our country. Thank you. Fireman Lexi Martin, Air Station Sitka, Alaska. Seaman Apprentice Broderick Beard, Matt Charleston, South Carolina. Receiving their citizen certificate and the Best Shipmate award winner is Seaman Peter AJ, Sector New York, New York. Ladies and gentlemen, these are the graduates of Delta 206. We wish you great success and hope your lives and careers are blessed with fair winds and following seas. Post the company guidon. Everything from getting off the bus to the basic seamanship classes to the physical training, it was an amazing experience to see. Hats off to these guys. I got to go through the graduation. Very emotional, but rewarding to watch. If any of you guys are listening or interested in joining the Coast Guard, go to the website gocoastguard.com, or you can click the link in our bio. And if you also have any other questions, you can DM me personally, and I can help find you guys a recruiter.