<span style="font-weight: bold">By H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY, 9 May 2012</span>
Cpl. Luke Stapleton, left, and Sgt. Christopher Broussard take a written exam at the U.S. Army Sniper School at Fort Benning. Nestled amid Georgia’s gentle hills and pine forests, the school teaches students about marksmanship, stalking, observation and other skills.
Sgt. 1st Class Adam James, a master trainer at the school, demonstrates the use of a ghillie suit to blend into surroundings. Students learn how to create the suits, which are complemented with local vegetation so that snipers can blend into the background when stalking a target.
Pfc. Robert Hamersly, left, and Pfc. Michael Trischler shoot at targets. Students in the Army’s five-week course learn complex formulas designed to predict how a bullet’s trajectory will be changed slightly by the atmosphere. When firing across long distances, wind variations and even barometric pressure can knock a bullet off course. Bullets travel faster at high altitudes where there is less resistance in the thinner air.
Soldiers fire .50-caliber M107 sniper rifles during qualifying.
Sgt. Clayton Celmer, left, and Spc. Wade Sparks fire at targets during the stress-test portion of their training.
Sgt. Charles Wilson, left, and Spc. Cody Cronberger continue shooting during the stress test.
Spc. Wade Sparks, left, and Sgt. Clayton Celmer run during the stress-test portion of their training. Students must run for several hundred yards in full combat gear before entering a building and completing a set of exercises before each of four separate firing positions. At each position, the snipers are given a short time to fire at targets hundreds of yards away.
Sgt. 1st Class Richard Vest, an instructor at the sniper school, counts down the seconds as soldiers shoot at targets during the stress test.
Instructor Arturo Prieto puts soldiers through a stress test.
Staff Sgt. Matthew Hammond, an instructor, indicates a hit on a target with a thumbs up as students go through qualification on M107 long-range sniper rifles.
