MEDEVAC Training in June 2012, Fort Indiantown Gap, Pa.

Some photos from Annual Training 2012 with Charlie Company (MEDEVAC), 2-104th GSAB, at Fort Indiantown Gap, Pa.  

Family Black Sheep Flies a MEDEVAC Blackhawk

Brooklyn-born Amira Talifi, (not her real name) is a helicopter pilot I served with in the Army National Guard. She is one of seven children, the only one who is not a doctor, a lawyer or in finance.  She flies a MEDEVAC Blackhawk helicopter. Her parents wonder where they went wrong.

            When her parents came to America they were determined their children would work hard, go to college and then law school, medical school or into business.  Asian families that come to American, whether from Beirut, Baghdad, Bangkok or Beijing, are known for pushing their children toward professional success.  Amira followed the family program until age 20 in 2008 when she enlisted in the New York Army National Guard as a Chemical Specialist.  She chose that field because the armory she trained in was near her home in Brooklyn and the career field paid a $20,000 bonus.

            During her first two years in the Guard, she continued to attend college, though she switched her major from Philosophy to Industrial Organizational Psychology.  “I thought it made sense of the Army and how they do things,” she said.  While she switched her major, she continued with a minor in French.  But it was her ability to speak Arabic, which she spoke at home, that proved much more useful when she deployed to Iraq with a Military Police unit from Queens, New York.

            In 2010, Amira and her Military Police unit deployed to Iraq. They were attached to the 82^nd Airborne Division.           

“When we first got Iraq we were under 82^nd for about three months, then with 3^rd Infantry Division,” she said.  The leadership of 3^rd ID “approached my commander about getting females to come with them on their civil-military engagements. Iraqi females would come in and needed to be searched.”

“Whether we were the primary searchers or just supervising the Iraqi police women searching, they needed women,” Amira said.  “Then my commander said, ‘I have an Arabic girl for you.’ So I ended up going on every single one of those missions.”

Amira speaks fluent Arabic.  “The Iraqi dialect took a while for me to pick up, but once I did, I was good to go,” she said. “I think I was pretty useful. I like being actively engaged.”

The desire to be actively engaged led Amira to switch from security to aviation when she returned from deployment in April 2011.  “I like being an expert,” she said.  “That’s what attracted me to being a pilot.”

            The switch from security to aviation became complicated. “New York had no slots for aviation,” she said. “People were on like a three to five-year waitlist. In New York, you go to the board. You do everything that you have to do, then you wait for your flight seat to come up, and then they give you two weeks notice, or a week’s notice, and you pack your bags and head down to Fort Rucker (in Alabama) for flight school.”

            She went to Pennsylvania and was accepted for the warrant officer flight program, even before she was officially a Pennsylvania National Guardsman.  “My full-time job was for the New York National Guard, and I didn’t want to leave that until I had my flight seat. So, Pennsylvania was nice enough to let me sit for the board, even though I was not a Pennsylvania National Guardsman. That’s not something that they normally do,” Amira said. “When they sent me to flight school, so I switched to Pennsylvania and haven’t looked back since.”

            The plan at the time was to become an NYPD officer after Flight School.  But after flight school, the plan changed. Amira moved to Pennsylvania to get in her required flight hours without the 100-mile drive each way from NYC. 

            “After being in flight school and, just thinking like long-term, what I want my life to look like, I don’t think I would be happy as a cop.” She said, “It’s not really my personality type. I realized I would like to make a career flying. Not necessarily helicopters. I like flying Blackhawks and doing Army missions, but airplanes interest me also, and I like the lifestyle of a commercial pilot. It’s nowhere near as fun as flying a helicopter. It’s just like, I mean helicopters are super exciting. But I don’t know if I want that excitement all my life.”

            She likes the intermittent schedule of the National Guard—one weekend a month, two weeks in the summer, maybe a few weeks of school here or there.  “It’s an escape from the real world,” she said. “You go away and it’s like, ‘Oh, I’m a soldier again’.

The reason I’m not active duty is because I like having a separate life and having my civilian life, my own apartment and all that.”

            In the Army the biggest step for an enlisted soldier is to be promoted to sergeant. Suddenly you are in charge.  And the senior leaders, if they are good, do their best to move you from the culture of “the guys” to the unit leadership. An even more jarring transition is to become an officer.  Your drinking buddies become the soldiers who salute you. Amira had that transition when her training overlapped with her former military police unit.  They were training at the base Amira was assigned as a pilot.  Her current unit was packing to leave while her former unit was arriving.  She was now an officer,  meeting up with people she served with in the enlisted ranks.

            “I went over to their barracks and saw all my friends,” she said. “The people that I had been there in the dirt with. I showed them my uniform. They’re like, ‘Holy shit, Amira, you really did it. You’re really a pilot.’”

Amira was clear that the move up to the warrant officer ranks put her at the bottom of a different hierarchy.  “I may be a Warrant Officer instead of Specialist now, but I’m just a junior pilot,” she said. “I graduated flight school and the learning has just begun, but I know that being a pilot is not like you just graduate and bam you’re a pilot. It’s a lifetime of learning, but that’s what I signed up for.”

Five Years Later

I interviewed Amira several years ago shortly after she left flight school and was anticipating her first flights as Blackhawk pilot. In the years since we spoke, she has moved to central Pennsylvania and is one of the pilots in the MEDEVAC company that is part of the 28^th Combat Aviation Brigade. 

Flight crews train on different schedules than the other soldiers in an aviation unit, so I only spoke infrequently to Amira in the years since she became a Blackhawk pilot.  About three years ago, she went to school and became a fixed wing pilot. She got a job with a regional airline.  She is a pilot in the Army and a pilot in civilian life. 

Her choice is not unusual. Although an airliner is vastly different than a combat helicopter, a lot of the skills are the same. Many men and women who fly in the military have aviation jobs in civilian life. In fact, one of the Army air traffic controllers who guide pilots in the 28^th is a regional airline pilot in civilian life.  

Amira also has a quirky presence on Facebook unlike any other Army pilot I have followed.  Her page is jokes and comments about life in general and life as a pilot in particular.

Her sunny face on Facebook and her radiant smile on the flight line cover serious thinking and choices on her part. She started college as a philosophy major.  Though she switched to a business major, she speaks with passion and insight about classical and contemporary philosophers and about all the choices that add up to a direction in life. Amira is a Muslim woman in the U.S. Army, a combat veteran of Iraq, and a MEDEVAC pilot who could be called to serve in a war at any moment. 

While I was still serving with the 28^th I wanted to write about Amira for an Army publication, but she gently refused. It would have been fun for me to write about her, but she lives in a culture that profoundly hates the media. Soldiers, from Generals to enlistees are mostly suspicious of the all media, even their own media.  So even if I wrote about Amira for an Army publication the soldiers she served with would be negative about her simply consenting to an interview. 

Amira is just over five feet tall with long black hair nearly to her waist that she ties up under her helmet to fly. She often flashes a bright smile, has a wicked sense of humor and is both an airline pilot and a MEDEVAC Blackhawk helicopter pilot, wearing a uniform for both jobs.  Did I mention she is funny?

Some of the funniest things she says are about dealing with men, both in an out of the Army.  Recently she posted this on Facebook:

How to get men to stop talking to you:

“You look exotic, where are you from?” 
“Oh I’m from the islands” 
“Which one?” 
“Rikers”
#orangeisthenewbacktfup

            I never flew in her aircraft as a civilian or in the Army. MEDEVAC helicopters don’t carry passengers. But I would be happy to fly with Amira at the controls of any aircraft.  And it is interesting to see through social media how she navigates life in 21^st Century America.

 

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Surprising Follow Up with a MEDEVAC Pilot

I do not have a photo of MEDEVAC Pilot Suzy Danielson

But this poster covers her attitude towards life

Yesterday I posted a story on the DUSTOFF Facebook page I wrote about a MEDEVAC pilot I served with in Iraq.  The story is here.  She was a pilot in the Gulf War in 1991, left the Army in 1993 and forgot she was still a reserve officer.  In 2009, the Army reminded her with a FEDEX package telling her to report for duty.  She was 44 when she returned to active service and deployed to Iraq.  

After I posted the story, I sent Suzy an email, not knowing if she was still using that address.  At midnight, I got an email back from Suzy.  She is in Afghanistan!  Apparently she liked returning to the Blackhawk helicopter cockpit.  I asked her to follow up with me when she returns.

MEDEVAC Story from Iraq I Never Posted: Brett Feddersen, Pilot

My supervisor at Camp Adder, Iraq, in 2009 was Medevac pilot, Brett Feddersen. 

            Major Brett Feddersen sits alone in the ready room next to the Medevac hangar at 11pm hunched over his personal computer editing a document for a meeting the next day.  “I’ve got to get some sleep in case we get a 2am call,” he says mostly to the air.  The rest of his crew is asleep or resting, waiting for the call.

            Feddersen is a senior staff officer with 2-104^th General Services Aviation Battalion, but two to four days every week he is a Medevac pilot on a 48-hour rotation with Alaska-based Charlie Company, 1^st Battalion 52^nd Aviation, an active Army unit attached to 2-104^th for the current deployment.  His shift will be over at 9am the following morning, but he had a long flight in the afternoon and a long day of meetings either side of the flight.  “I have to stay balanced, I have to stay rested, I have to complete the mission,” he said. 

            It’s a challenge he faces both in civilian life and on deployment.  Senior Trooper Feddersen has served with the Pennsylvania State Police since 1995, most recently flying Aviation Patrol Unit One in the southeastern area of the Commonwealth.  Adding Medevac pilot to his staff duties makes life hectic, but Feddersen lives to fly.  He arranges his life to complete the staff tasks to the best of his ability, making the time necessary to fly Medevac Blackhawks every week.  He is serious and professional when discussing staff duties, but is all smiles and broad hand and arm gestures describing a favorite Medevac mission.  Even crawling on top of the Blackhawk underneath the rotors for pre-flight checks before starting the engines, he is clearly enjoying himself whether under, at the controls, or on top of a Blackhawk helicopter.

            Feddersen said flying Medevac in Iraq has many similarities with flying for his civilian job.  “Flying for the state police is always on an emergency basis,” he said.  “The mission can be a lost child, lost hikers or hunters, or a bad guy pursuit.  We get the call.  We go.” 

            Medevac is the same.  On the first 24 hours of his 48 hours shift, Feddersen and his crew are “second up,” the backup team that goes if a call comes in and “first up” is already on a mission.  During the first day, the crew must be ready to take off within a half hour and can travel a short distance from the ready hangar.  On the second day the crew moves to “first up.”  The Army standard said they must to fly within fifteen minutes of receipt of the Medevac call.  In Charlie Company, the standard is eight minutes. 

            Whether at Ali Air Base or in Pennsylvania’s Twin Valley the emergency response mission gives Feddersen a real sense of accomplishment, “We make a difference here.  When a soldier is down we do everything we can to get them care and get them home.  At home we find the lost child, get the bad guy, it’s a great feeling.” 

            “One big difference here is we have to be more vigilant when landing at a point of injury,” Feddersen said.  Scanning for mines, IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices), and the enemy who just came in contact with an injured soldier are part of every mission in Iraq. 

            Feddersen will turn 37 on this deployment.  He served as an enlisted military policeman for the first 5 of his 17 years of service and also attended college.  He went to Officer Candidate School in 1997 followed by Army Aviation School.  Feddersen is married and the father of two boys.  His current deployment is his second.  He was deployed to the Balkans with the Pennsylvania National Guard in 2005.

MEDEVAC Training at Fort AP Hill

These photos are from MEDEVAC Training at Fort AP Hill at Annual Training in 2013 for 28th Combat Aviation Brigade. SFC Jeff Kwiecien is supervising the training.

Dunker Videos

Here are several of the underwater videos I shot at Dunker training in December.

Enjoy!!!

Dunker Training--Flipping Upside Down in the Deep End of the Pool

Last week I went to Dunker Training for Detachment 1, Charlie Company 2-104th.  Aircrew members are strapped in seats with five-point restraints then flipped upside down in the deep end of the pool.

Chris Calhoun made an excellent video of the training:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QW8q03Xsihg&feature=youtu.be

Here's two more videos:

First one going into the pool:

When a helicopter crashes in water, the crew has to be able to get out of the aircraft and get their passengers out of the aircraft. "Dunker" training teaches downed aircraft drownproofing to pilots, crew chiefs, flight medics and other aircrew members. On December Drill Weekend, Det. 1 of Charlie Company, 2-104th (Medevac) put eight aircrew members through a day of "Dunker" training. This first video shows a pilot and a flight medic flipping into the deep end of the pool at Somerset Senior High School. They are wearing flight suits and helmets and land upside down in a five-point harness in 12 feet of water. They cannot unstrap until the divers doing the training stop shaking the Dunker--this is to simulate moving blades in the water. Each trainee flipped into the water several times. 

Above CW2 Sara Christensen and SSG Pamela Leggore were the lucky duo upside down in the water.

Below is an underwater view of Dunker training.

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman, Part 3

Six Minutes to Midnight I crossed the finish line.  Many times after bicycle races I felt good enough that I thought:   'I didn't try hard enough.'  That thought NEVER crossed my mind as I limped and to the car after the Ironman.  I looked for a fork sticking out of me, because I was DONE!

I wrote in previous post that time I spent training for the Ironman exceeded anything I did for the Tough Mudder.  In fact my second Tough Mudder was easier because of the Ironman training.

Now that I have actually finished the Ironman, the contrast between the two events is much sharper.

After I crossed the finish line, a smiling woman grabbed my arm and steered me toward my finisher's medal and asked me if I need anything.  She was looking at an old guy she was worried would collapse.  She guided me to the end of the finishing chute.  I told her I could walk to the car a half-mile away.  She let me go.  It took nearly a half hour for me to walk, limp, shuffle, stop, lean on walls and railings and finally get my very sore self back to the car.  I was as completely exhausted as I have ever been.

After the last Tough Mudder I jumped on a single-speed bike and rode 18 miles including several mile-long hills back to my car.  I was bruised, cut, and smelled like a barnyard, but the next day, I was fine.

Although I shared 16 miles of the marathon with a great guy I met on the Ironman course, hanging with friends is not the point of the Ironman.  I only did the second Tough Mudder because I had a friend who would do it with me.  If I ever do another Tough Mudder it will be with a group from my Army unit or my Church or some other group of people I would like to share a tough experience with.

If you are thinking "Which should I do?" my advice would be form a team and do a Tough Mudder.  But if you want to see how much you can suffer in one day, train for the Ironman.  You will feel awesome when you finish--but not so good the next morning.

Tough Mudder and Ironman Posts:

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman, Part 2

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman is Here

Second Tough Mudder Report

First Tough Mudder Finish

First Tough Mudder Photos

First Tough Mudder Entry

Ironman Friendship

Ironman Plans

Ironman Training

Ironman Bucket List

Ironman Idea

Ironman Danger

Beginning a Friendship at the End of the Ironman Triathlon

My story of finishing the Ironman Triathlon in Louisville, Kentucky, on Sunday, August 24, will begin with the end--or near the end.  At mile three of the marathon that ends every Ironman, I jogged past a guy who saw my tattoo and said, "I was in first armored."  So I slowed to a walk and started talking to Chief Warrant Officer 4 Mike Woodard, a Blackhawk helicopter pilot in the Kentucky Army Reserve.

Mike has done the Louisville Ironman for several years.  He was convinced we could run-walk to a finish just before midnight, so we started walking and running together--and stayed together until mile 19.  During the 16 miles we walked and ran together we got a lot of encouragement.  When people on the side of the road would say, "Looking good!" I would tell them that Mike and I were 115 years of good looking.  I yelled this to one group of women wearing matching t-shirts supporting another competitor at mile 5.  We passed by them on mile 9 and one of them said, "Here comes that 115 years of good looks."

We agreed that at 10:30 p.m. if we were not at mile 22, we would run till we made it or cracked.  At 10:30 we were at mile 19 and started running.  Mike took a break a mile later.  I kept running and finished six minutes before midnight.  Mike finished just before midnight.

Before the last mile I was thinking of waiting for Mike at the line, but the final effort to get to the line was so painful, I lost track of everything except getting back to my car.

That half-mile walk from the finish line to my car took more than 20 painful minutes.  When Annalisa and I got back to the hotel room, I told myself I should eat before going to bed.  I microwaved some leftover spaghetti.  I tried to eat it, but the effort of lifting my fork was too much.  I went to sleep.

It turns out Mike is a writer in addition to being a pilot and an Ironman.  Here is something he wrote about flying MEDEVAC in Afghanistan.  Mike also flew through the base where I was stationed in Iraq, although a few years before I was there.

The night before the Ironman, we went to dinner with Pam Bleuel, a friend from Iraq who lives in Kentucky.  My next trip to Kentucky, I will be visiting Pam and Mike.

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman, Part 3

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman, Part 2

Tough Mudder vs. Ironman is Here

Second Tough Mudder Report

First Tough Mudder Finish

First Tough Mudder Photos

First Tough Mudder Entry

Ironman Plans

Ironman Training

Ironman Bucket List

Ironman Idea

Ironman Danger

Happy New Year

As this new year begins, the flight companies of my unit are on the way to or are already in Afghanistan.  If you follow me and my unit on facebook you have seen now photos going up in both places.  Several soldiers are posting and sending photos from training and from Afghanistan. Our MEDEVAC unit was in a feature story on army.mil about a new program they are testing to save more soldiers.  Here's the link to the story.

Wish I was along for the ride, but not this trip.  I will continue to write about life in the National Guard until May of 2015 when my enlistment extension is up.

Here a picture from the army.mil story:

Happy New Year!!!

Family Groups at MEDEVAC Departure

Since September 28, I have been posting photos of the family groups of soldiers who left for pre-deployment training with the F/1-169th MEDEVAC.  The photos are on the 2-104th Aviation Facebook page.

You can see photos from the departure ceremony there.  Later this week I will be attending another departure ceremony.  This group is bigger, so it will mean more photos on the facebook page.

Here are the three MEDEVAC Blackhawks making a final pass around Muir Field before flying to Texas.

For Nigel--A MEDEVAC Blackhawk Takeoff--Afternoon, into the Sun

Who Fights This War? -- Flight Medic

Army Staff Sergeant Cynthia Dalton, 

Camp Adder, Iraq, 2009-10

“I am never nervous on the flight out,” said Staff Sgt. Cynthia Dalton, describing her experience as a flight medic in Iraq. “I go over every possible scenario in my mind. But when we touch down, I just go.”

Dalton, who is assigned as a flight medic to the 2nd Battalion, 104th Aviation Brigade, part of Task Force Keystone, said her first rescue mission in Iraq was the hardest. It was a vehicle rollover in bad weather. One Soldier was dead at the scene, two more were badly injured. She and the other medics at the scene treated the Soldiers as much as they could and then loaded them on their Black Hawk helicopters for transport to the nearest emergency medical facility.

“Both Soldiers made it,” she said. “But after a mission like that I am really hard on myself. I can see why people burn out. I go over everything I could possibly have done differently. We did our jobs, but it always seems like there is something I could have done different or better.”

Dalton, a daughter of military parents who hails from Orwigsburg, Pa., said she knew from an early age she wanted to help Soldiers, but tried various jobs before finding a career path that was right for her.

“I joined the Army at 17 when I was a junior in high school,” she said. “I went to basic training between my junior and senior years and started training to be a medic right after high school.”

While serving in the Army Reserve, she got additional medical training as a civilian and worked for a nursing agency.

She was serving as a reservist in Germany on September 11, 2001. She was activated in Germany in a medical support unit and helped Soldiers prepare for deployment to the Middle East.

“I did literally hundreds of immunizations every day,” Dalton said.

When she returned to the states, she switched to the Pennsylvania Army National Guard to take advantage of the education benefits.

After getting Soldiers ready for deployment at the very beginning of the war in Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002, Dalton spent the three years prior to her current deployment helping Soldiers return to civilian life after deployment.

“I love helping Soldiers,” she said. “Soldiers come back from deployment needing many kinds of help to reintegrate into civilian life. The Guard has the help available. I make sure they can get access to the right resources.”

In preparation for deployment to Iraq, Dalton trained as a flight medic. She has worked with two medical evacuation companies during the deployment, including an Oregon-based unit during training in Oklahoma and Kuwait. She is currently serving with an Alaska-based active Army MEDEVAC unit. Dalton works a 48-hour cycle, sleeping and eating at the hangar waiting for MEDEVAC calls.

When she returns to the United States, she plans to take a full-time job as the medical sergeant for the Pennsylvania National Guard’s 55th Brigade in Scranton. “That will be the end of flying for a while,” she said. “I am sure I will miss it.”