2008 FNH USA-Leupold Shooting Competition

Ocean County duo poised for their first win at 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition.

Trent Lebo of the Maryland State Police concentrates on breaking the perfect shot during the Movement event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Ft. Meade, Maryland – The duo of Kenny Schiattarella and Jim Sharkey from the Ocean County, New Jersey SWAT team continue to maintain their hold on the overall lead with 132 points at the end of the fourth day of competition at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition. The New Jersey team has finished second in the match three times, and 2008 looks to be their year to take it all. Richard McCampbell and Nathan Mickle from the Baltimore County PD “B-Team are now in the second spot and trailing by 11 points, while another Ocean County team, Ted Kucowski and Steve Scaglione currently hold third with a score of 115 points among nearly 30two-person teams entered in the meet.

Kenny Schiattarella of the Ocean County, New Jersey SWAT team rapidly makes his way under the low-crawl wires during the Obstacle Course and Movement event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Today’s competition featured the physically demanding Obstacle Course and Movement event. Each team member had to complete a brutal one-third mile circular course that required negotiating ladders, concrete wall and barricades, logs and a hanging rope climb, all while carrying either a rifle or rucksack.

Each team then ran a quarter mile to the firing range, where one member fired 10 shots from various positions at disappearing targets ranging from 300 to 100 yards. The second member of the team fired the same at the same 10 targets in reverse order. Both overall time and score fired are combined to determine the winning team in this event.

Montgomery County (MD) SWAT team member Rob Kamensky focuses on a distant target during the Movement event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Due to a tie-breaking procedure, the Baltimore County PD “B-Team” posted the top score in today’s firing, but it was not enough to overtake the Ocean County veterans. The Montgomery County (MD) SWAT team of Rob Kamensky and Wayne Holt took third.

Salmir Danovic and Bojan Saric of Bosnia’s Security, Investigation and Protection Agency power their way over an obstacle at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

During the Obstacle Course, many of the competitor’s eyes were upon Salmir Danovic and Bojan Saric of Bosnia’s Security, Investigation and Protection Agency. Whatever the European pair might be lacking in shooting skill they more than made up for in determination and pure guts as they powered their way over the dozens of walls, rails and other obstacles to the cheers of their fellow shooters.

Salmir Danovic begins his assault on the obstacle course at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

The Known Distance event was also completed today after being delayed late yesterday by an urgent SWAT call-up that took several competitors off the range. The team honors in that event went to the Baltimore County PD “B-Team”, followed by Trent Lebo and Jamie Green of the Maryland State Police. The Montgomery County SWAT team finished third. Top individual honors in the Known Distance event went to Mickle, followed by Green and Lebo.

Trent Lebo of the Maryland State Police loads his rifle during the Movement event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

The competition concludes tomorrow with the highly demanding Unknown Distance event. Each team has only seven minutes and 10 rounds to complete the match, where they must locate, estimate the range and engage reactive steel targets placed at unknown intervals from 100 to 900 yards downrange. Targets that are located at longer distances are worth more points in the match.

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SWAT Call-out delays Known Distance event at 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition.

SGT Shaw Murphy of the Nebraska National Guard  confers with his spotter about shifting wind conditions at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

 
Ft. Meade, Maryland – The final outcome of the Known Distance event is still undetermined as of press time due to an urgent SWAT team call-out late on the third day of competition at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition. One local agency’s SWAT team was activated in the midst of the 500-yard portion of the event, preventing them from completing their full course of fire.

Kenny Schiattarella, a police officer from the Ocean County, New Jersey SWAT Team fires on his target with an FN A3 G rifle during the Known Distance event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

Today’s firing was the Known Distance event, with each team member firing from the standing, sitting and kneeling positions at 200 yards and then from a supported prone position at 500 yards. Each shooter will fire 50 total shots for a total possible team score of 1000 points.

As the second relay stepped to the firing line, cell phones and pagers came alive and a number of the competitors from at least one local law enforcement agency had to depart immediately to help contain a critical situation. Every competitor, both military and law enforcementalike, knows that the job and the mission come first.

Rich McCampbell of the Baltimore County Police Department readies for his next shot in the standing phase of the Known Distance event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Other volunteers stepped in to help finish the relay, after which all the remaining competitors met to decide how to determine the outcome of the match. Their unanimous decision was to allow the deployed SWAT officers to complete the 500 yard firing tomorrow to determine the final match results. As such, we will report the outcome of the Known Distance event in our next installment.

Nate Mickel of the Baltimore County Police Department reaches deep to find his best effort in the Known Distance event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

The competition continues tomorrow with the completion of the Known Distance event and the physically demanding Obstacle Course and Movement event. Each team member must complete a brutal one-third mile circular course that require negotiating ladders, concrete wall and barricades, logs and a rope climb, all while carrying either a rifle or rucksack. Each team will then run a quarter mile to the firing range, where one member fires 10 shots from various positions at disappearing targets ranging from 300 to 100 yards. The other member of the team fires the same at the same 10 targets in reverse order. Both overall time and score fired are combined to determine the winning team in this event.

Ocean County, NJ duo takes the overall lead during Day 2 of 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition.

Jim Sharkey and Kenny Schiattarella, police officers from the Ocean County, New Jersey SWAT Team fire on their targets during the Moving Target event at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

Ft. Meade, Maryland –Jim Sharkey and Kenny Schiattarella, a pair of police officers from the Ocean County, New Jersey SWAT Teamhold the overall lead on the second day of competition at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition. The pair has finished in the overall runner-up position three times in this competition, including a narrow loss in a tiebreaker in 2007.

Another law enforcement duo from Ocean County, Ted Kucowski and Steve Scaglione currently have possession of the second spot overall, while the Baltimore County Police “B-Team” of Richard McCampbell and Nathan Mickle arestanding third among the nearly 30 two-person teams entered in the meet.

Today’s morning competition kicked off with an unannounced Poker Run match, in which each team fired five shots at a playing card matrix target placed at 100 yards to assemble the best hand possible. Complicating the marksmanship equation was the requirement that each team run three laps totaling nearly three miles with a rifle and spotting scope, made all the more challenging with both temperature and humidity hovering near 100.

The Poker Run was trumped by a duo from the San Diego, California PD, by combining the experience of age and the speed of youth. The oldest member of the agency’s counter-sniper team, Wayne Doeden, 50, teamed with its youngest member, Gordon Campfield, 27, to win the shooting match by firing a royal flush. “We’re shooting with young eyes and running with the old guys!” laughed Doeden after the match.

San Diego, California PD’s counter-sniper team of Wayne Doeden and Gordon Campfield make good time on their way to winning the Poker Run at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

Next up in the day’s schedule was the Moving Target event, fired from supported prone positions at both 200 and 300 yards. Each team fires 20 shots at each distance for a total of 40 rounds and 400 possible points. Ocean County’s Sharkey and Schiattarella won the match posting solid scores from each distance. Both shooters remarked that they felt it was a good performance with clean breaks for every shot, and that the bouncing, hand-carried moving target was much more challenging than the mechanical moving targets they had trained on.

The afternoon competition today featured the Range Estimation exercise, requiring each team to accurately establish the range to 10 everyday objects set at unknown distances varying from 50 to 1000 yards using only the mil-dot reticles in their rifle scopes or spotting scopes. Each target had to be accurately ranged within a tolerance of just 25 yards.

The CO-PEN team of USCG CPO Thomas Bowes and US Pentagon Police officer Aaron Clark posted the maximum possible points on the exercise, including a very impressive feat of accurate ranging in spite of a heavy mirage caused by the day’s 100 degree heat by placing the most distant target, a compact car at well over 650 yards, within a single yard of its actual distance. “Perfect practice makes perfect” smiled Bowes in a post-match interview.

US Pentagon Police officer Aaron Clark and USCG CPO Thomas Bowes make another careful observation to win the Range Estimation exercise at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA photo.

The competition continues tomorrow with the Known Distance event, with each team member firing from the standing, sitting and kneeling positions at 200 yards and then from a supported prone position at 500 yards. Each shooter will fire 50 total shots for a total possible team score of 1000 points.

Maryland State Police and U.S. Army’s 5th Special Forces top leaderboard at opening of 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition.

SGT Jamie Green of the Maryland State Police finds a way to beat the heat as he engages his targets during the warm-up phase at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Ft. Meade, Maryland –Sgt. Jamie Green and teammate Sgt. Trent Lebo of the Maryland State Police “A-Team” battled their way through the year’s most oppressive heat thus far to post an early lead on the first day of competition at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition. The U.S. Army’s 5th Special Forces SOTIC shooters out of Ft. Campbell, Kentucky, are also making a strong showing in the initial stage with the group’s “B-Team” made up of MSG Peter “Bull” Palmieri and SFC Joshua Buchanan standing the second spot and the unit’s A-Team of SFC Tracy Broadbent and SFC Shane Kerwincurrently third among the nearly 30 two-person teams entered in the meet.

The U.S. Army 5th Special Forces Group’s MSG Peter “Bull” Palmieri spots for SFC Joshua Buchanan during the warm-up phase at the 2008 FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition at Ft. Meade, Maryland. FNH USA Photo.

Firing at 100, 200, 300 and 500 yards with optically-sighted precision high-power rifles during this morning’s warm-up, all competitors were allowed to verify their zero for each of the four distances, striving to keep every shot inside the 10-ring. As one member of each pair fired, the other peers through a spotting scope to observe the strike of the bullet on the target and inform the shooter of any sight adjustments and corrections needed due to changes in wind or lighting conditions. These sight settings are carefully noted for future reference during the coming week’s matches.

During the afternoon, each team also participated in a field exercise requiring them to act as scouts, carefully observing a tightly scripted tactical scenario, making careful notes of the smallest details to prepare for an exhaustive written test on the activities of the suspects they had just observed. This was the first event that counted for points and established the current leaderboard noted above.

Tomorrow morning’s competition is scheduled to be the moving target, fired at both 200 and 300 yards. The afternoon will feature the range estimation exercise, requiring each team to accurately establish the range to various everyday objects set at unknown distances varying from 50 to 1000 yards using only the mil-dot reticles in their rifle scopes or spotting scopes.

Background Information on the Event

The FNH USA - Leupold Long Range Precision Shooting Competition is being held at Ft. Meade, Maryland and is co-hosted by Baltimore County PD Tactical Section and U.S. Capitol Police C.E.R.T.

Nearly 30 teams representing the elite in military, law enforcement and special operations organizations have been invited to participate in five days of a demanding test of tactical rifle marksmanship, scouting, observational skills and physical fitness. Proceeds from the non-profit event are donated to the Wounded Warrior Project and Redwing 19 Special Warfare Family Fund to help support soldiers who have been wounded in action, and to help their families deal with the costs of their medical care and rehabilitation.

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