Navy bootcamp is eight weeks long and is located at one place, recruit training command in Great Lakes, Illinois. In Navy bootcamp, you’ll learn how to be a sailor on a ship regardless of what job you enlisted as. Because of that, a lot of what you do will be different from the traditional military boot camp you might think of. A majority of your time here will be spent indoors, and you won’t get the combat training like you would in the army or marine boot camp.
Navy bootcamp kicks off with the infamous P days, which are the processing days. This first week is where all the fun admin stuff happens. You’ll get your immunizations, get medically screened, get your haircut, gear issue, and a lot of waiting around. After an introduction to watchstanding and all your basics, to begin boot camp, you’ll have to take your baseline PFA, which stands for physical fitness assessment. The Navy PFA is max push ups in 2 minutes, max sit ups in 2 minutes, and a mile and a half run. You’ll have to pass one of these in order to complete boot camp, and you’ll have plenty of opportunities to do so. After P days, you’ll meet your RDC, which stands for recruit division commander. RDCs are the drill sergeants of the Navy. Now that you’ve kicked it off with boot camp, you’ll learn military drill, rank, structure, Navy corps values, and you’ll perform the Navy swim qualification test. There will be a lot of uniform and rack inspections, classroom instruction, pt marching, and you’ll learn the basics of being a sailor. You will receive firefighting training, go to the gas chamber, receive firearm familiarity training with the M nine, and get some basic seamanship skills at the end of boot camp. All of this culminates in a test called battle stations. It’s a twelve hour test performed throughout the night where you learn how to respond to several casualties that may occur on a ship. Once you complete battle stations, you’ll lose that ugly recruit ball cap and put on your eight points. Upon completion of boot camp, you’ll be sent to your follow on training to get brought up the speed and your rates, which is known as a school. Let’s move on to marine boot camp.
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