Community Corner
Military: Armored Vehicles Here for Driver Training
Military spokesman said M1117s that drove through Southampton, East Hampton and Southold were not on the East End for a funeral, as previously reported.
A convoy of armored vehicles that were spotted on the South Fork on Thursday and then on the North Fork on Friday, stirring all kinds of rumors, including , were in fact just on the road so army reservists could familiarize themselves with the new vehicles, according to a military spokesman.
Capt. William Geddes of the 200th Military Command, headquartered at Fort George G. Meade in Maryland, said army reservists from the Rocky Point Army Reserve Center were driving the vehicles, known as M1117s. Geddes said the M1117s were not on the road for a funeral procession, but, rather, the reservists were performing scheduled “driver familiarity training” to practice maneuvering the vehicles. “It’s a little bit different than driving their Honda or Toyota or Ford,” he said.
M1117s are rugged armored security vehicles known as the Guardian. It can cross water depths of 5 feet, climb gradients of 60 percent and can get over vertical obstacles of 2 feet high, according to army-technology.com.
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The reservists, who belong to a military police unit, for lunch Thursday on their way to Montauk. Then on Friday — the same day there were — the reservists .
News 12 had , and a New York State Division of Military and Naval Affairs spokesman corroborated, that the vehicles were practicing on Thursday for a funeral, and participated in the procession on Friday. However, Geddes said Tuesday that was not the case.
