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Fort McCoy Trains A Record Number Of Soldiers

U.S. Army Official Says There's Capacity To Train More

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soldiers training
Wisconsin National Guard (CC-BY-NC-ND)  

A record number of people went through military training at Wisconsin’s Fort McCoy again this year, according to U.S. Army officials.

The exercises drew 155,000 personnel from across the U.S. and Canada.

Fort McCoy exceeded last year’s record attendance by more than 10,000 people and has reached capacity during the regular training season from May to September.

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U.S. Army Col. Steven Nott said the fort’s record numbers aren’t an accident and come from a renewed focus on training after their overseas mobilization mission ended in late 2011.

“In early 2012, we really took a hard look at what does that mean and where should we go,” Nott said. “So, we identified what we thought were going to be the most likely future needs of the military for training.”

Nott said Fort McCoy has developed several original programs for the army and is one of only a few bases that hosts training exercises involving multiple branches of the military.

“We have some very unique capabilities especially in urban training,” he said. “Some of the products that we have developed are home grown and are quite literally unique in the army as well.”

Nott said Fort McCoy hopes to maintain their high attendance numbers and even expand opportunities to train more personnel during the off-season.

“We can still grow more in the winter training realm,” Nott said. “We’re doing things right now to make that happen to include acquiring the most recent and up-to-date, newly fielded equipment in the department of the army for winter training.”

Fort McCoy is located in western Wisconsin’s Monroe County and is the state’s largest military base.