Fort Riley ? Shortly after sunrise, soldiers of the 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor mounted their tanks and headed toward a gunnery range.

The training, known as Table 8, tested the four-man M1-A1 Abrams tank crew’s ability to identify and destroy enemy targets on the vast range at Fort Riley. With stern faces, soldiers called it the playoffs of combat exercises and war, the Super Bowl.

On this day, halfway around the world, Spc. Irvin Medina became the 14th soldier from Fort Riley to die in combat in Iraq. A few days later, the 15th died, Capt. James Shull, 25, of California, a field artillery officer with the 1st Armored Division.

And on Wednesday, after reporters’ repeated inquiries about how soldiers and families are coping, Fort Riley officials invited news organizations on post for informal interviews.

“You never know, hour to hour,” said Staff Sgt. Robert Greeley, a liaison for 900 families in a battalion of the Army’s 1st Division. “You can be helping a family at 10 a.m. and get a casualty report 10:30.”

As the death toll mounts, soldiers, families and residents near this central-Kansas post are reminded of the dangers facing those in uniform, leaving questions of why and how long they will remain in harm’s way.

“When we get to Iraq, they’ll be shooting back,” said Capt. Andrew Turner, commander of Alpha Company in the 34th Armor’s 2nd Battalion. “The guys realize in a month, we could be there.”

During the Gulf War, Fort Riley lost 18 soldiers out of 12,000 deployed between November 1990 and May 10, 1991.

But Pearl Speer, the post’s community services director, a civilian employee, said most of those casualties came in a single month.

Two tankmen sit on an M1A1 Battle Tank with the Alpha Company of 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor waiting their turn to take the range during training at Fort Riley. On Monday, Capt. James Shull, 25, of California, a field artillery officer with the 1st Armored Division, was killed in Iraq, the 15th Fort Riley soldier to die in the conflict.

“After that month, everyone was able to breathe again,” she said. “This is more prolonged.”

Staff Sgt. Kenneth Reeves, commander of Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor, said combat deaths weighed on everybody, but the intensity of gunnery training took soldiers’ minds off the war, even if only briefly.

His soldiers are getting training in urban warfare and security details to hone skills essential to Iraq.

“It’s not a notion of if, it’s when,” said Reeves, 35, of San Antonio, Fla. “You take advantage of every training that you can get.”

Turner said information coming back from Iraq was priceless. His unit is part of the 1st Brigade, 1st Division deployed in Iraq since August.

“I have a lot of friends over there right now,” said Turner, of Bellevue, Neb. “It’s a two-way rifle range. No plywood targets over there.”

At the gunnery operations center, a soldier printed an Associated Press article off his computer, detailing how two soldiers and a contractor died.

“See, we get the information from you guys,” said Lt. Danny Eakins, assistant intelligence officer with the 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor.

Eakins, 27, of Eaton, Ohio, joined the Army after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He left his job in personnel with Ohio’s state government, following a family tradition of military service.

Fort Riley is Eakins’ first experience with an Army community. In his neighborhood, almost every husband is deployed in Iraq. He’s been married for a year, forcing his wife to come to grips with a soldier’s life.

“It’s been rough sometimes, and there’s been some uncertainties,” Eakins said. “But it does make us closer in a number of ways.”

At Fort Riley, a strong north wind brought a chill to the post. Steel shells fly down the gunnery range and fall to earth. No rounds are coming back.

“It’s easy to forget sometimes that the job we do is dangerous, especially when we’re in the garrison,” Eakins said.