Lance Cpl. Logan Miss from HMLA 775 disarms an AH-1W Helicopter March 14 at the new Forward Arming and Refueling Point here. The new FARP has increased training time involving aircraft from 20 minutes a day to 6 hours a day for lieutenants at The Basic School.

Many of these Marine lieutenants in the basic officer and infantry officer courses will go on deployments overseas. These young officers can be leading Marines into combat in as early as a year.

‘‘The training at TBS should reflect the latest tactics and procedures used by the operating forces,” said Maj. Kristopher Faught, the air officer at the basic school. ‘‘Close air support by fixed rotary-wing assets is critical to teaching young officers to how to employ these assets in combat. It’s part of learning to fight as a Marine Air-Ground Task Force.”

That’s why Quantico has implemented the FARP – to help these officers get the training they need and deserve before deploying, according to Capt. Jesus Leon, the head of Range Management Branch.

‘‘This FARP has been needed for a long time; we have never had one here at Quantico,” Leon said.

Previously, the amount of effort it took to get the needed training for these officers was immense, and thus made it difficult to get experience before deployments. All aircrafts needing to fly to here for training from Marine Corps Air Station New River, N.C., had a difficult time getting adequate training time.

New River is out of range of Quantico for AH-1W and UH-1N aircraft, so the aircraft have to stop for fuel. During refueling, they cannot have ordnance on the aircraft, so they must conduct ordnance loading and unloading here.

The refueling of these aircraft must be done in one of two places, either in a civilian field or the Marine Corps Air Facility here. MCAF does not have ordnance arming, de-arming, handling, or loading capabilities, so MCAF could not be used by armed aircraft except in an emergency divert situation, Leon said. All ordnance had to be trucked or flown here by separate aircraft.

In the case of Johnstown, Pa., a reserve squadron, the aircraft can make it here, but once they arrive, they do not have enough fuel to complete the amount of training needed to accomplish their training mission. The convoluted process of downloading ordnance, flying to a civilian air field to refuel, flying back to Quantico and reloading ordnance was highly disruptive to training, according to Leon.

With the new FARP in use, flight training time has gone from 20 minutes a day to six hours a day, which means the Corps’ next batch of lieutenants will be all the more prepared to conduct crucial missions in combat.