13th Aviation Regiment (United States)

The 1st Battalion, 13th Aviation Regiment manages new recruits who have recently graduated basic training and who have reported to Fort Rucker to receive their military occupational specialty identifier before reporting to their first duty station. The battalion orchestrates and implements the majority of enlisted training at Fort Rucker. The 6th Military Police Detachment and an element of the 46th Engineer Battalion is also assigned to 1-13th. Fort Rucker’s military and civilian firefighters are assigned under the 6th MP Detachment.

The 2nd Battalion, 13th Aviation Regiment, which replaced the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Training Battalion (UASTB)(Provisional), is based at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. Its primary mission is to train soldiers in the operation and maintenance of the RQ-7B Shadow and MQ-1C Gray Eagle unmanned aircraft systems. 2–13th Aviation is a tenant unit of Fort Huachuca, but its parent unit is the 1st Aviation Brigade at Fort Rucker, Alabama, home of the United States Army Aviation Center of Excellence.[1]

The battalion operates the largest UAS training center in the world,[2] with over 125,000 square feet (11,600 m²) of training space, four hangars, two runways, and 24-hour operational capacity.[3] The battalion trains approximately 2,000 Soldiers, Marines, and foreign military students each year.[1]

Formerly part of Company E, 305th Military Intelligence Battalion (E-305th MIB), the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Training Battalion (UASTB) (Provisional) was activated on 19 April 2006 during the transition of authority for UAS training from the U.S. Army Intelligence Center to the U.S. Army Aviation Warfighting Center.[4] The UASTB was later redesignated as the 1-210th Aviation Regiment and was finally redesignated as the 2–13th Aviation Regiment on June 11, 2011.[1]