Two women make history in Navy SEAL training before grueling Hell Week
( NewsNation ) — Two female Navy service members made it through three weeks of intense SEAL training, the furthest any women have ever advanced in the program.
According to a CBS report , the women were an enlisted sailor and a naval officer who entered Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training several weeks ago. One left the course just before the fourth week, known as Hell Week, while the other was medically withdrawn during Hell Week.
The notorious five-and-a-half-day endurance test pushes trainees to their physical and mental limits, requiring constant physical activity, including running about 200 miles, in harsh conditions while getting only about four hours of sleep over the entire course.
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Hope Hodge Seck, investigative reporter for the Military Times, told "Jesse Weber Live" that the pair endured "the most challenging, difficult, intellectually just grueling" exercises in the selection process, which are front-loaded into the first few weeks to quickly narrow the field of candidates.
"They really want to get rid of as many people as they can, so they can focus their investment and training on the people who will make it all the way," she said. "And so that is what these two women were able to accomplish."
Roughly 250 people out of more than 8,000 who attempt the course ultimately become Navy SEALs.
"This is a huge deal," Seck said.
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Very little is publicly known about the identities of the women who participated.
The U.S. Department of Defense officially opened all military occupations and positions to women without exception, including elite special operations roles, in 2016. As of 2024, only four women had entered the SEAL selection pipeline.
The achievement comes as the Pentagon launched a review in January into the "effectiveness" of women serving in ground combat roles.
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