Firstly a ‘thank you’ to MAJ
Dhugald See for his efforts as BC in the past years, Dhugald has moved
on to a full time service position to further his military career.
Secondly a welcome to the new BC
of 113 Field Battery, CAPT Greg Applewhite, Greg started his military
career many yeas ago as a Gunner in the Australian Regular Army, he then
transferred to the General Reserve and later accepted an offer for a
commission. With this posting as BC 113 Field Battery Greg can boast
that he has been employed in just about every position within an
Artillery Battery during his career.
2008 will certainly see some
challengers for 113 Field Battery and 7 Field Regiment as a whole. As
most of the Ex Gunner fraternity will be aware this year sees the
possible introduction of 81 mm Mortars within General Reserve Artillery
units. The Defence Force’s decision to replace the 105 mm Hamel Gun with
the 81 mm Mortar has come about due to a number of factors mainly the
outcome of Project Land 17 and the need to provide ongoing training to
our personnel who have committed to the High Readiness Reserve (HRR)
Joint Offensive Support Teams (JOSTs). As you can imagine this decision
means some intense training in the new weapon system but also
maintaining our present Gunner skills.
This year has started as previous
years with all Battery members undergoing there Mandatory Training
requirements. So far to date we have conducted live fire exercise
involving Artillery and small arms.
Promotions within the Battery has
seen LBDR Vippond promoted from Gunner with the rest of the key
personnel as follows.
BC CAPT Greg Applewhite
BK WO2 Grant Nicholls
BSM WO2 Peter Linsley
SMIG WO2 Glenn Ryan
At present 113 Field Battery has members employed within HRR and Reserve
Response Force (RRF) positions as well as signing up for operational
deployments.
