The Navy Has Made History Again: First Female SWCC

This past week, a major historical event took place quietly in San Diego at the Navy’s Special Warfare Combat Crew (SWCC) training base. For the first time, a woman has successfully completed the grueling SWCC training program and has become an SWCC Boat Operator crewman.

To say this is an accomplishment is an understatement. The SWCC training program has a 60-65% attrition rate. Only about a third of the men and women who enter it will make it to graduation. The young woman who is the first to do this will now be assigned to one of the three SWCC Boat Teams as a fellow crewman with her SWCC brothers. She was one of the 17 trainees to graduate from the most recent 37-week SWCC training program, which is considered one of the toughest training courses in the business. She is also the first of 18 women who have attempted to enter the SWCC crewman community to earn the SWCC badge.

Because of the nature of Special Operations Teams, the woman’s name has not and will not be revealed, nor will her image be publicly revealed. These Special Operators are engaged in highly classified missions around the world; therefore, the names and images of the SWCC crewmen and women are necessarily kept out of the public domain for obvious reasons.

Be that as it may, as you will see in this video, it is not easy to become a member of one of the most elite military units not just in the Navy but in the world. You will also get an idea of what they can do and about the esprit de corps they develop as SWCC crewmen. These SWCC Boat Teams conduct missions with the SEALS and many of the other Special Operations units across the military. They deliver those other Special Operators to their missions all over the world.

SWCC boats and their crews are the best-kept secret of the U.S. Navy. There are about 800 SWCCs in the Navy. Today, they are joined by the first and only woman to have been tried and tested by the grueling rigors of this elite Special Operator unit’s training program. This is a great accomplishment for this woman and for the SWCC boat crew teams. You do not get there without the physical and mental attributes that are necessary for such a difficult and important Special Operations Team.

We congratulate the first woman to earn the SWCC Badge and to become an SWCC crewman. We wish you and the SWCC community Fair Winds and Following Seas in all that you are asked to do. May you always be “On Time, On Target, and Never Quit.”