What is your most memorable moment from Basic Training?

When I applied for OCS in my 6th week of basic training at Ft. Leonard Wood, MO, my senior drill instructor stood up in front of the company formation and said, "Private Ross wants to go to OCS, he want's to be an officer. What a joke. Ross you wouldn't make a good tenth lieutenant much less a second lieutenant." You see, the good SFC and I didn't see eye to eye on just about everything. He was constantly on my back giving me a raft of s**t.

A little more than two years later after graduating from OCS and completing my first tour of duty in Vietnam, I was assigned to Ft. Leonard Wood as a company commander. I sought out my old SDI, also a Vietnam vet, who was still assigned to basic training. Upon receiving a smart salute from him I thanked him for what he did to turn me from a boy into a man and giving me the skills I needed to graduate from OCS and survive combat. Since then, I've always understood why NCOs like that are the backbone of the U.S. Army.

I have so many but keeping it light...
Fort Jackson, SC, June 1991. Graduation day, Full Class A uniform. ((Hot as a mo-fo.))

My battle buddy and I made tracks for last minute trip to local port-o-potty before kicking off Graduation parade. Bugles start, I go to zip it and my zipper busts. My battle, without skipping a beat, yanks out a bobby pin from her perfectly coiffed hair, zigs and zags that bad boy in through my zipper closing it up. And away we go! We giggled all through the parade.

She was like friggin MacGyver!!! It was absolute genius! :)

Fort Jackson's Victory Tower, I've been always a heavy guy so when I had to swing from one side to the other of the tower, it was tough! I tried and failed 7 times, but as they say, "Fall 7 times, get up 8", I gave all in that last 8 and I did it. When I got to the other side I yell, "I WILL NEVER QUIT!" (even though I wanted to quit really bad). It felt great when I made it, it was against all odds. 1SG(P) (Join to see)

Note: Picture, is not me.

I actually have two moments. The first moment happened to be on our way to the gas chamber at Fort Knox. I was there in 96 for Armor OSUT. The DS's were rucking us out to the gas chamber and half way there they stopped the formation gave us a right face and at ease. The SDS start going on about how we were in the final stretch and if we wanted the drills to take it easy on us then we had to make them laugh. A few guys got out front and did their best but only got a little chuckle. I wasn't gonna do anything but my platoon ratted me out that I been doing impersonations of the drills since day one. The drills called me out to post and the senior said alright private make me smile. Since I couldn't turn it down and realized I was smoked no matter what I went ahead and impersonated every drill we had in the company. I was good to the point that the senior asked how I learned to do it to which my reply was I didn't know I have always been able to mimic accents and with enough time I was able to mimic the speech patterns of people. I had the drills rolling the whole time.
My second moment was leaving the gas chamber at Knox. The exit door for the gas chamber is right in front of a tree. 3 feet in front of. The drills brief you that upon exiting the chamber make an immediate left or you'll hit the tree. Well I was briefed and in my haste to leave the chamber I forgot. I couldn't see anything and burst out the door and at full speed face first into this big old oak tree. Worst part. It was caught on video by some group making some video thing on our training. I still have a copy of the VHS they gave me

A guy I went through MEPS with used the pay phone to call in a red cross message to himself saying that his mother had died. So the SDS immediately went hands off, believing it to be real just like the rest of us. I was in a mixed-gender basic, so of course the majority of the females were all emotional about it and were giving him lots of attention. The SDS personally got the kid's leave form prepped and had made all of the calls to ensure the private would be on the next flight out.
So the SDS calls the kid's home of record, and wouldn't you know it, the mom answered! She thanked him for calling, since she had gotten the phone call from the private that he had been shot by someone going crazy in the barracks! He told her he couldn't talk about it because it was all "G-13 classified".
So the wheels are spinning, the Drill Sergeant figures out the ruse, and proceeds to play it out. He called everyone into the bay, brought the private up to the front, and started saying how he expects to see the private in the next basic training group and thinks that he has a lot of potential. The kid is straight faced and standing firm.
Then the DS drops the FUCKING HAMMER on this kid and talks about how badass he is for surviving being shot by someone rampaging through the barracks and is an inspiration to everyone. We all look confused as balls. The kid is panicked and sweating. The DS continues, saying how he talked to the kid's mother this morning and she can't wait to see him.
Everyone slowly realizes they've been played and you can see the hate just start boiling over like a pot full of tortellini. I'm in the back, chuckling because holy shit this is hilarious and I'm not being smoked.
What followed was every bit of compassion from all those female privates turned into absolute hatred in just a few moments. They were livid and the majority of the males were too at their emotions being played with. Guys had hugged him without even saying "no homo" and how betrayed they felt.
Ended up with the kid being on suicide watch that night. He tried to strangle himself with his dogtags and when the fire guard got the on-duty Drill Sergeant, the private tried to kill himself by smacking his head into the wall locker over and over.
I learned what the blue light was for that night, and how to watch another man go to the bathroom to make sure he didn't try to drown himself in the toilet.

I, for reasons still unknown to me, was put in charge of our group of recruits traveling from the induction center to basic training. Thst meant I had all the paperwork, meal tickets, etc. When we finally got off the bus around midnight at Lackland I was a man short. One of the guys changed his mind and got off the bus somewhere between Houston and San Antonio. The remainder of that night made me wish it had been me.

The "peanut butter bandit" incident. 4 people in our platoon were caught with peanut butter packets in their lockers and were going to be punished. One of them had over 20 packets, so he got the worst punishment. He had to squirt peanut butter into his cover and wear it everywhere, including indoors. He only had to do it for a day, but it was a pretty hilarious way to punish him. He had peanut butter oozing out of his hat everywhere he went.

The last few days of basic at lost in the woods, our drill sgt all 6'6" was trying to catch some loafer in the room down the hall from us. That moring we were cleaning our gear for turn in and he walked in, look out at the ledge and said I got the bastards. He slide out our window and walked down the concrete ledge to the next room and let them have it. He finally caught them sleeping, they always had a guard peeking out their door down the hall, never expected him from the window three stories up.

I have a couple, one pleasant the other I don't know what to call it.

The pleasant was seen some childhood and HS friends again after 3 to 8 years of not seeing them.

The other unforgettable to this day, 'cause it could have been a gory and tragic accident. It was a DS looking down the barrel of an M14 that had a live round still in the chamber. The trainee was trying to pull the somehow jammed operating rod back. After the round flew out the chamber, the DS scream and yelled at the guy. But those of us who saw the whole thing as it happened, knew it was the DS who was at fault, his (the DS) Super-stupidity could've caused him to have his brains blown out. You just DON'T LOOK DOWN THE BARREL OF A WEAPON being hold by somebody else. Even we basic trainees knew that by the time of Firing Range training.

They day we were in Quonset hut classrooms and had a 5 min break the latrine was around the backside of the building and a 50 yard sprint form there. I turned the corner and run into a Drill Candidate SGT, full force, the only thing that kept him form hitting the ground was my arms wrapped around him.

I brought him back up to vertical and he asked what the rush was and who my DI is? I told him SFC Baker and he sent me off to the latrine. I cam running back to the class room and turned the corner to go into the door and yes SFC Baker was there.

He asked me if it was proper to run over Drill Sergeant Candidates, of course my response No Drill SGT. Then he proceed to tell me how important his candidates were and how wrong it is for a private to touch or hit them. I learned all this while pushing FT Sill closer to Texas for the next hour and missed out on good Army Training LOL