Who Fights This War? -- MEDEVAC Pilot

This story ran in my newsletter yesterday and today 34th division published it in their newsletter and on their web site. I am posting it on my blog also because I really like the story.
----------


Maj. Anthony Meador is near the end of his third tour Iraq as an Army aviator. He served in Baghdad in 2004 and at Joint Base Balad in 2007. He now commands Company C, 1st Battalion, 52nd Aviation Regiment, a Wainwright, Alaska, based Army unit currently attached to 2nd Battalion, 104th Aviation Regiment, 28th Combat Aviation Brigade.

During his first tour Meador served as a MEDEVAC pilot during some of the most intense fighting in the war. "We were slammed in 2004 and in April things got really bad," he said. "One night we evacuated 44 soldiers in two and a half hours on six Black Hawks. We had burns, gunshot wounds, shrapnel wounds…the 2/5 Cavalry got ambushed in Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood. The whole year was non-stop for all of us."

Meador returned home in 2005 to his wife and his first baby boy, who is now five. He had almost two years of stateside duty before returning to Iraq with the surge of troops in 2007. "I was executive officer of a (General Support Aviation Battalion) based in Balad so I flew every kind of aircraft we had," said Meador. "With the surge, the operating tempo was high. Part of our mission was flying General (David) Petraeus, General (Raymond) Odierno and Ambassador (Ryan) Crocker."

His first two tours were filled with high-intensity, around-the-clock operations, but the weather was great. "In Baghdad and Balad the weather was not an issue. It was sunny all the time, no dust storms,” Meador said. At Contingency Operating Base Adder in 2009, the intensity of operations is often lower, but "the weather shapes every aspect of our mission planning: weather here, weather at the destination, weather along the route. We are constantly updating our planning based on the weather."

Difficult weather forces tough decisions with MEDEVAC flights. One of the toughest decisions for Meador on this tour was whether to fly on July 2. A call came in from the Adder emergency room. A patient with a pulmonary embolism needed immediate transport to Balad for a type of surgery not available here. Charlie Company would fly the patient to Al Kut and transfer him to a waiting medevac helicopter for transport to Balad.

The first segment of the flight was just 300 meters from the Charlie hangars to the COB Adder emergency room, but that flight was enough for Meador to reconsider the wisdom of flying with visibility less than a half mile in a huge dust storm. According to Meador, winds were 30 knots with gusts up to 45 knots. Vertical visibility was 125 feet. To further complicate the flight plan, the patient's condition meant they had to fly close to the ground, as pulmonary embolisms are aggravated by altitude.

Maj. Anthony Meador, a MEDEVAC pilot in Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 52nd Aviation Regiment, Task Force Keystone, inspects the tail rotor of a Black Hawk helicopter. Meador is wrapping up his third tour in Iraq. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Neil Gussman)
"We had to stay extremely low anyway because visibility was worse at 1000 feet. But flying at 50 to 75 feet with power lines and towers is very difficult," Meador said.

As they flew from the hangar to the clinic, he said, "We're going to have another conversation with the physician. I am about 60 to 70 percent sure we are going to cancel this mission.”

Staff Sgt. Jason Jones, a flight medic, talked to the physician on duty. The clot was moving toward the patient's lungs and heart and he would die without surgery at Balad. When Jones confirmed the patient's prognosis, Meador decided to go ahead with the mission. "When you get a patient on board, you're committed," he said. "Once you leave the airfield with a patient on board you’re committed to the entire mission."

"The trip to Al Kut is usually 43 minutes," said Meador. "We flew low and slow for an hour and 20 minutes. The chase bird was at our altitude, flanked right and about 10 rotor disks behind us." Meador explained that ten rotor disks, approximately 100 yards, is much closer than the normal following distance of 30 to 40 rotor disks, but necessary because of the low visibility. "We were coordinating moment to moment throughout the entire flight. When one of us would pick up a power line or a tower, we would advise the other right away."

Eighty minutes after takeoff, they landed safely and transferred the patient to a waiting MEDEVAC helicopter for transport to the Balad medical facility. They refueled and returned to COB Adder. The patient arrived at Balad in time and got the surgery he needed.

Meador has served 14 years as an Army Medical Service officer. He is a 1995 graduate of Virginia Military Institute. He and his wife Margaret have two boys, ages three and five. Meador calls Galax, Va., home and is currently assigned to Fort Wainwright, Alaska, where he will return after his current tour of duty.

Who Fights This War? -- Clerks Rescue Soldiers in Black Hawk Crash

These soldiers are clerks in Echo Company. Both of them are good soldiers who took a lot of crap from the mechanics and fuelers in the unit because most of their work is done indoors. Things are different now.
----------------
Pfc. Dennis Lucas of Gratz, Pa., and Spc. Nathan Montgomery of Chester, W.Va., both clerks in the motor pool of Echo Company, 2nd Battalion,104th Aviation Regiment, 28th Combat Aviation Brigade, helped perform first aid on victims after a Black Hawk helicopter crashed at Joint Base Balad Sept. 19.

Spc. Michael S. Cote, 20, of Denham Springs, La., was killed in the crash and 12 others were injured.

On that night, Montgomery and Lucas were in the containerized housing unit they shared preparing to return to Contingency Operating Base Adder the following morning. According to Montgomery, at roughly 8.p.m. he and Lucas heard a loud boom. Since there had been thunderstorms in the area during the preceding days, they first thought the noise was thunder. “We kept seeing rain and lightning and no thunder,” Lucas said. “So we thought this was the thunder.”

Montgomery went outside to smoke a cigarette and saw a man run up to the fence opposite their CHU and yell for help. He said he was the pilot of a helicopter that just crashed. Montgomery yelled for Lucas. “I was in flip-flops,” Lucas said, “so I put on sneakers and ran.” They ran to the fence, ripped a section of the fence from the ground, crawled under it and followed the pilot to the crash site.

"The Black Hawk was a mess," Montgomery said. Two Soldiers were outside the aircraft and on the ground when they got to the scene of the crash. "There were four of us that ran to the scene. Two other Soldiers who were outside their CHUs followed us over.”

"One of the Soldiers outside the helicopter was complaining of back pain, but he knew he was at Balad and he could move his legs and arms so we moved to the Soldiers in the bird," Montgomery said. "I went to a guy with his face busted up. He was missing teeth and was in a lot of pain, so I stayed with him. It turned out he had a broken jaw, broken teeth, a collapsed lung, internal bleeding in the abdomen and was fading by the time we got him loaded in the ambulance."

"Lucas went to a guy (Michael Cote) who was really bad. Lucas held him in his arms waiting for the medics, but he had a bad head injury,” Montgomery said. "The Soldier died in Lucas' arms. Lucas held him while he died."

After Cote was taken from Lucas, he continued to assist with getting other Soldiers clear of the wreckage. Montgomery stayed with his Soldier.

“He is a sergeant and crew chief of the Black Hawk,” Montgomery said. “He has a wife and two boys. The boys play soccer. I know all about his family. I know their names. The thing I want to know the most is how he is doing. He was fading at the end, starting to lose consciousness. I want to know if he made it.”

According to Montgomery, the EMS crews had to cut through a fence to get to the crash site and all of the patients had to be carried 150 yards to the vehicle. Montgomery was at the front of the litter for three patients. "I never was the lead guy on the litter in training, but I remembered what to do,” he said.
Enlarge

According to Montgomery, other witnesses said the pilot did an amazing job to get the Black Hawk down in the one open field in the entire area.

"There were (shipping containers) and CHUs and fences all around and he got it down in the one open area," he said. "There were surgeons on scene in (physical training) gear. People just ran to the scene. The last guy out was a really big sergeant with a broken leg who had to be cut from the wreckage."

“I felt like I was a passenger in my own body,” said Lucas. “I was calm the whole time. I knew what I was doing and I did what they trained us to do in (Combat Life Saver training). I thought the whole thing took about 20 minutes but it was an hour and a half.”

Lucas believes the training made the difference in how he and Montgomery reacted compared to others at the scene. “Some people ran up to the crash then stopped. Others just watched. I never ran so fast in my life as that hundred yards from the fence to the wreckage and I just went to work. Army, Marines, Air Force people all worked together to help.”

"The CLS training really kicked in," said Montgomery. "We didn't think. We just knew what to do. The pilot yelled for help. We were there so we went. Anybody would have done the same. I tell you what though, these guys are burned into our heads."

You Light Up My Life. . .

Bike Line just send me a shipment with two tubes, ten spokes, a Gatorskin tire for my road bike and a Seca 700 headlight. The people who can't believe I would spend more than $200 for a bicycle (the same people who spent $1,000--no kidding--on pizza and other delivery food) will be aghast if they find out I spent $415 for a bike light.

But what a great light. Instead of straining my eyes and riding slowly around the dark side of the base, I can ride as fast as I want with a headlight that throws a beam more than a football field. In fact, I am riding back to the office on the south side of the base in a few minutes and will ride fully illuminating my path.

Also, Larry Wise the Bike Guy here on base fixed my spoke so I can ride the Mountain Bike. The garrison put fresh gravel on a 200-yard stretch of road the south side that makes it hard for me to ride the road bike--I have to ride in the soft sand beside the road.

In other news, three of my stories got picked up by a combat medic who blogs at www.ffpblog.com the "Far From Perfect" blog. He linked to both of the flight medic stories, and also linked to a post titled "Eight Minutes and Gone" which I did not send for publication. Maybe I should. Second weekly newsletter goes out tomorrow. Let me know if you want a PDF.

Flight Cancelled

I was supposed to be in a Blackhawk now flying to a couple of the nearby small bases, but the flight got cancelled. Somebody with a real mission got the seat, so I am labelling photos and getting ready to transfer them to an Army computer.

This morning was the Ruck March half marathon. Since I was supposed to fly, I did not pick up my number. I suppose I could have walked, but I took some pictures of participants, then took a nap until the walkers were coming back in.

On Monday, I sent the first issue of a new newsletter I am doing for the battalion (700 soldiers). It is a six-page newsletter that goes the soldiers and families in the states by PDF. The layout is in PowerPoint! I would not have thought PowerPoint is the way to do a newsletter, but it is really easy to use--easier than Word. Of course, it is very limited in what it can do. I have very rectangular layouts. But it is a newsletter so it should be fine. I will be sending the newsletter every Monday morning from now till we leave.

Coincidentally, the Brigade (2000 soldiers) will also switch to a weekly format from a monthly. The article that was the Medevac Pilot who is also a state trooper will be on the cover of their newsletter, also Monday morning.

Part of my charge is to do Daily Life stories. So this week I followed a day maintenance team from the unit that flies only at night. I also followed the crew that sets up the helicopters to fly.

If you want the newsletter, send me an email or tell me in a comment.

So now I write stories, take pictures and go to events full time. Of course, I ride my bike everywhere.

War is Hell!

Who Fights This War? -- Flight Medic 2

This story was published on line on Wednesday and was also in a weekly newsletter I do now as part of my new job.

When the United States led coalition forces in the invasion of Iraq in
2003, SSG Quincy Northern, 32, began his first of three deployments as
a flight medic. For the first months of the war Northern flew MEDEVAC
along the invasion route led by the US Marines. "It was non-stop action
from the time we crossed the wire," said Northern describing his first
deployment following the Marines across Iraq in the opening days of
the war.

One MEDEVAC call he remembered vividly was an all-terrain, 8-wheel-
drive HEMMT cargo truck that hit a mine and rolled over. The call itself
was not out of the ordinary. He and his crew responded to many calls
for trucks that hit mines or had rolled over and trapped the badly
injured crew. What made this rescue different was the landing zone.
"They marked out the LZ (Landing Zone) right in the minefield," said
Northern. "We didn't know till we got to the vehicle that the bird and
us were right in the minefield."


They continued the mission. All of the Marines survived. Landing in a
minefield made Northern very conscious of security on MEDEVAC
flights. "When the 9-line (MEDEVAC call) comes in I review it to be as
prepared as I can to treat the injury. Then I think about security issues.
When we land I have to be ready to go and treat the injury, not be
thinking about anything else."

Northern enlisted in 1996 and trained as a flight medic in 2002. He
went to Kuwait in January of 2003 in preparation for the invasion and
followed the Marines until June. He was back in Iraq from March of
2004 to March of 2005 and returned in 2008 with Charlie Company 1-
52nd Aviation Brigade. The Alaska-based unit is currently attached to 2-
104th General Services Aviation Battalion. Northern says the current
deployment is by far the easiest. "On the first deployment we slept on
the bird," he said. "We slept in the same litters that carried the
patients."

Northern is a Native of Baton Rouge and admits to being an adrenaline
junkie, but says when he retires from active duty in seven years, his life
is going to be different. "When I retire, I am going to a get a job where
the toughest thing is just showing up every morning," he said with a
wide smile. He is married with two children, a boy and a girl. His wife is
staying with her family in Ellicott City, Maryland, until Northern
returns from deployment.

Bike Update

As of yesterday, September 30, I passed the 3000-mile mark here in Iraq. I also cut 2 minutes from my 5k run time the previous week. It is much easier to improve when one is slow. Last week I ran it in 30 minutes and 20 seconds. This week I was down to 28:22. The civilian who runs the race gave me a medal for finishing 3rd in 50-plus (out of three guys who signed up). It was really a close race between the first two guys--they finished in 23:14 and 23:20. I was most of a half mile back in third.

The bike mileage means I have also made more than 200 laps of Tallil Ali's Perimeter Road. Katharine Sanderson, a friend from the UK, wrote recently. I replied to her something about the war. She said, "Somehow I forget that you're fighting a war at all. Weird. It must be your witty blog posts about books and PR!"

Along the same lines, my wife said, "I'm enjoying the other-personal glimpses on your blog.  Since I've been wrestling so intently with my students over verbs, I think your "fights" (as in "Who fights this war?") catches my eye . . . especially because there's not really any traditional fighting going on in your stories.  I know that "Who prosecutes this war?" doesn't have the same cachet, so I'm not suggesting you change this at all."

But they are right. Who would know from most of my blog posts or my current bike mileage that I am serving in a war?

I have more "Who Fights This War?" stories and will post another one tomorrow. Whether fight is the right word or not, we are here, there is a war and so I'll keep the word fight.

Envy is Relative

I have a new office. A really nice office. An occasion for envy for everyone in the unit I left and for many people who come to visit the other people that work in my office. The people in my office are the battalion commander, the executive officer, and their assistant--and me. I have an office with a real wooden desk, a book case, a table, a comfortable chair and a door.

I was working in a dusty corner of the motor pool on a folding table. This is a big step up in the world. But then, as my wife pointed out when I told her about my new digs, nobody I work with back home would be jealous. My new office is in a trailer. It is an Italian-made, double-wide, really nice trailer, but it is still a trailer and I still have to walk 75 meters to use the latrine trailer.

But it does have a coffee maker.

And the boss is a member of the Pennsylvania legislature so he gets an incredible amount of free stuff from home. So the office has great snacks.

I should get to stay in this office for three of the four months until we are finally back home. Late January to early February is becoming a more and more concrete time for us to get home.

I can't wait.

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.”

Who Fights This War? -- MEDEVAC Pilot

This story went on line yesterday on Armed Forces News service so if you want to see the pilot's picture, just Google my name under the "News" tab and this story will come up with photos.


CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, Iraq – Maj. Matt Stevenson sits alone in the ready room next to the medical evacuation hangar at 11 p.m. He is 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 2 a.m. call,” he says, mostly to the air. The rest of his crew is asleep or resting, waiting for the call.

Stevenson is a senior staff officer with 2nd Battalion 104th Aviation Brigade, but two to four days every week he is a MEDEVAC pilot on a 48-hour rotation with Alaska-based Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 52nd Aviation Regiment. His shift will be over at 9 a.m. the following morning, but he had a long flight in the afternoon and a long day of meetings on either side of the flight.

“I have to stay balanced, I have to stay rested, but I have to complete the mission,” he said.

It’s a challenge he faces both in civilian life and on deployment. Senior Trooper Stevenson 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 Stevenson 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 Black Hawks 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 while crawling on top of the Black Hawk underneath the rotors for pre-flight checks before starting the engines, he is clearly enjoying himself whether under, on top or at the controls of a Black Hawk helicopter.

Stevenson 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-hour shift, Stevenson 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 says they must be prepared to fly within 15 minutes of receiving a 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 Stevenson a sense of accomplishment.

“We make a difference here,” he said. “When a Soldier is down, we do everything we can to get them care and get them home. At home when we find the lost child or 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,” Stevenson said. Scanning for mines, Improvised Explosive Devices and the enemy are part of every mission in Iraq.

Bicycles in Thailand at the End of the Viet Nam War

From my uncle who served in Viet Nam several times and other parts of South East Asia for almost a decade:

This is another Thailand story but a very ordinary one. At Korat Royal Thai Air Force Base in 1974 bird colonels had staff cars, the rest of us whatever we could find. The Thais, seeing an opportunity, opened for business on the base selling (very) used Honda mopeds, provided repair services and sold gasoline by the pint, actually probably a half liter. A moped will run for a long time on a half liter of gas. Guys would buy a moped, ride it daily everywhere and sell it back when they rotated away.

The counter culture was bicycles. The BX did a bustling business in Japanese bikes. Most guys, me for instance, bought a bike, dutifully had the Air Police mark various parts of it stamped with an ID number--bike rustling was a big issue-- and rode it everywhere as if it was a car. After a while guys referred to their bike as their "horse." Korat was as as flat a table, being in the central highlands of interior Thailand, so a bike was ideal. The difference from mopeds was that most guys took their bike home when they rotated away, fully intending to ride it. I did. When it arrived I discovered that the seat stem had been replaced with one that was too large and driven in with a hammer. I had to use a wheel puller to extract it. Didn't matter. I never rode that bike once I got home. Eventually, I gave it to some charity when I was cleaning out the garage.

Lapsed Evangelicals

In other posts, I have written about the choirs and the services at Church and how different it is from civilian life. Of course, one of the big differences in the Chapel versus home is the number of women. More women than men attend Church for the very good reason that women are more likely to be poor and disadvantaged than men, and the Church ministers to those with needs--material and spiritual. And for the same reason, the Church has more old people than young people.

So Chapel services are about 90 percent male regardless of denomination, which more or less reflects the population. But considering that 80 percent of the military is under 25, the soldiers attending Church are, by Army standards, somewhere between old and ancient.

So where are the kids? Avoiding Chapel just like their college-bound counterparts avoid Church. In fact, I've talked to young men who were active in youth group, went to Church every week and chucked all of it right after basic training. You want to go to Church during basic because those who don't clean the barracks.

I asked one young man I have known for a while about why he never goes to Chapel after being in Church every week. He said that everybody went to youth group because they hung out there, but they were all getting drunk on Friday and Saturday. He said that a lot of things they were taught turned out not to be true. And he was sick of feeling phony.

It was hardly the first time I had heard that. The Lapsed Evangelicals are actually fairly easy to spot. They are among the leaders in getting in trouble, but they are genuinely polite when I get one of them for a work detail. The bad kids whine and complain by reflex. The LEs break the rules, but generally accept the punishment and are good soldiers.

They still have the culture game to play when they go home. More than one of the LEs avoided that problem by going to Europe, Hawaii, or some other place rather than home for leave. A lot of studies say they will come back to the Church when they have kids. I'm not sure. The guy I talked to today and other LEs are rejecting what they see as a fraudulent subculture for what they see as real life.

And an aggravation of that perception is some of the people they see in the Army who attend Church. There is choir member known for having fits in the workplace, a guy who got relieved for incompetence as a squad leader and believes (and talks about) many conspiracy theories, arch conservatives who talk about Liberal conspiracies, and a whole collection of strange people. There are, of course, some of the best people in the unit--soldiers who work uncomplaining in the worst conditions this deployment has.

One of the things I most looked forward to on this deployment was meeting more of the kind of believers I served with in Germany. But my last overseas assignment was before the Evangelical Church was swallowed by the politics of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and the Christian Right. The Army reflects the nation it recruits from and even the LEs vote straight Republican. They may be doubting God and rebelling against their family, the Church and (particularly) their youth group, but the don't go so far as to become "Librals." The LEs that go to college do that.

Riding in the Dark

I've got another riding buddy who gets stuck in meetings till a few minutes before dark but really wants to ride so I go with him. He has got a five watt (dim) headlamp. I have a blinking LED headlamp that is bright enough for on-coming cars to see us, but even though I am getting close to 200 laps of this place, I miss a gouge or a hole once in a while.

It is a lower intensity workout because we can't sprint in the dark--not actual dark, we've got a quarter moon and lots of security and airfield lights.

Although the rifle halves in the pack seemed like a good idea, my back hurt from riding strictly on the seat. I will have to solve the rifle barrel whacking my helmet problem before I can carry the rifle in backpack.

For those who read the Nick and Nora Nordstrom story, Lenore Skenazy, formerly of the New York Post, now of freerangekids.com is interested in their story so they may become minor celebrities.

I did stories about medics that should be able to go up soon as "Who fights this war?" stories. From the email and comments I get, those are the mst popular entries on the blog.

I did have one guy say I should write less about bicycling. Sorry, this is my blog, my life, and that life includes bicycling!!! BTW--2,850 miles on Tallil Ali Air Base so far! I should be at 3,000 by October!

Biking to Work on the South Side

Roadside Sign on my Route to Work

Part of my new job is an office on the south side of the base. It is a 4 or 6 mile ride depending on wind direction. When I worked in the motor pool it was a one-mile ride, so I did not have to think too much about carrying a weapon, but now having the M-16 digging into my back every day I was trying to think of some better way to carry it. One of the aircraft mechanics said, "Break it in half and put it in your pack." He was right. I have to switch packs though. With the smaller pack I used today the barrel of my rifle stuck out just far enough that it hit the back of my helmet when I stood up to pedal. With the larger pack, the whole weapon will be inside.

An M-16 breaks in two pieces in about 10 seconds with just two pins so it is an easy solution to the problem of how to take my gun to work every day. When I ride around post for exercise in PT uniform I am exercising so I don't have to carry the weapon. MUCH easier that way.

Who Fights This War?

One of my regular riding buddies is a senior colonel in the armored brigade headquartered here. He has only been riding a couple of years, but is an avid and competitive runner and likes riding a lot. He is 46, planning to retire after this tour, and looking forward to riding in Colorado where he and his wife plan to live.

During the Gulf War in 1991, he was a platoon leader in charge of five M-1 tanks during the invasion of Iraq. By the time he went through the armor officer training in the late 80s, the M1 had completely replaced the M60A1 that I served in back the 70s. But we are both old armor guys (No tanks here at Tallil) and sometimes talk about tanks.

He is very animated when he talks about crossing the desert in an M1 and some of the battles he fought before that brief war ended. He has a look that is so happy that it shows through a helmet and sunglasses even when we are riding 18mph side by side when he talks about the Gulf War. "Our tanks were in charge of the battlefield," he said. "We could engage targets effectively at 3000 meters--they couldn't hit us at half that distance."

The other night he told me about on particular engagement when a company of Iraqi infantry were surrendering, moving toward his vehicles from a position a few hundred meters away. Suddenly the group of surrendering soldiers got fired on by other Iraqis concealed behind them. Iraqi tanks appeared at 2000 meters out. He and the other tank in his section fired on the infantry in ambush with machine guns, the other three tanks fired on the approaching Iraqi tanks. "We got the two Iraqi tanks with first-round hits," he said. "One was 1980 meters, one was 2340 meters. I saw the hit on the near tank. The turret flipped 10 feet in the air and landed beside the hull."

We then started talking about firing tank rounds and how cool it was that was firing fin-stabilized solid shot ammo with a 5700-foot-per-second muzzle velocity. He is currently involved in reconstruction and all of the very unwarlike things that soldiers do in this war, but when the talk turns to tanks, he is a happy guy.

Ramadan

This morning my wife wrote:
Eid Mubarak to you (or, happy Eid)!  How strange it is that you are in Iraq and don't even mention that most holy of holy days in your blog!  Is that because your base is so American that the holiday makes no difference, or is it because you're trying to focus on one small part of your life at a time?

In Bonchek [residential hall at Franklin and Marshall College], we had a standing-room-only crowd for the Eid dinner we hosted.  That's partly because we don't have many chairs -- but we really did have 70 people lined up for food, and everyone had a lovely time in spite of the wait.  Many of the international students talked about how they hadn't had a chance to get together yet this semester, so this was a grand reunion for them; but many Americans intermingled and got to eat yummy food as well.


I knew it was the end of Ramadan because two Jewish friends of mine mentioned that Rosh Hashonah was starting this weekend--Islam and Judaism use a lunar calendar for holy days.

I suppose most everyone in this ambiguous war thinks it would be a relief to fight as their grandfathers did in World War Two. They fought German or Japanese soldiers. The enemy wore uniforms and was always the enemy. Here we don't have an identifiable enemy. Once in a while a real enemy will fire a rocket or mortar at our base, but to very little effect and at very great danger to themselves--so it doesn't happen often.

September 11 and September 19 were both supposed to be days that we could be attacked. We weren't. Who knows why or why not. But in the meantime we do live in a very American place, with a 22-mile perimeter of fence patrolled by Americans with big guns. So my wife and her colleagues in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, were a lot closer in fellowship and spirit to Ramadan than those of us who live a kilometer from the Ziggurat of Ur.

We are in a hostile place with an enemy we neither see nor can identify. I might go to the Ramadan party on campus next year. This year I am glad it passed without anyone getting hurt.

My New Job--Then and Now

Abel is the dancer in the middle. 1-70 Armor Motor Pool, Weisbaden, West Germany, 1977.

As I mentioned Saturday, I have a new job. Not, of course, in the sense of I am moving to a different base or even eating in a different chow hall or, God Forbid, wearing different clothes. But I will be doing public relations work full time for our battalion. For those not keeping score on my work life, until Saturday my duties were the following list:
--Squad Leader
--Maintenance Team Leader
--Echo Company Public Affairs
--Battalion Public Affairs
--Morale, Welfare, Recreation NCO
--Drug Test NCO

My new duties:
--Battalion Public Affairs
--Echo Company Public Affairs
nothing else!

My best friends from the 70s, Abel Lopez and Cliff Almes will think this is very funny, back to the future, circle of life, reincarnation or whatever metaphor you use for history repeating itself.

On December 23, 1977, one year and three months into our three-year deployment to Germany, our new brigade Command Sergeant Major had an NCO meeting at 1030 hours. Hundreds of us filled the base theater. Our CSM, by the way was 48 years old and could still do the weekly brigade 4-mile run. All of us were astounded that someone that old could still run. He was a tank gunner in the Korean war according to some of the legends surrounding him.

Anyway, the CSM wanted a line company sergeant to be the brigade public affiars sergeant. He did not want "ragged-ass sissy Army journalist writing about real soldiers." I had a story on his desk before he got back from lunch. I got the job. And most everyone in the tank company I left was some level of envious.

So 32 years later, eight months into taking a year off from public relations to serve my country, I am full-time PR again with a very limited wardrobe and drastically reduced salary. Cliff and I are going to be talking Wednesday night. Cliff really liked Germany by the way. He is Bruder Timotheus, part of a Franciscan Brotherhood in Darmstadt Germany in a place called the Land of Canaan. Cliff was my roommate in 1978 until he got out to become a novice at the monastery where he still lives. I will try to call Abel also. He was commander of the tank next to mine in the first platoon of Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 70th Armor. He is now a retired fire captain in San Diego.

Half Marathon the Next Morning

WITH MY RUCK--READY FOR THE MARCH

The first thing I noticed when I got out of bed this morning was my age. It took a while to get out of bed. After the run yesterday my heel ached. I expected worse this morning. But when I stood up for the 200-meter limp to the latrine, my heel felt OK. Swollen. Sore. But not too bad. No sharp ache.

My thighs hurt a lot. The front of my shins hurts some. I have upper body aches, but no special pain in my heel. I think this means I can run again. I may even be able to do the 5k Wednesday race. There's a chance that two months of rest from running combined with stretching may have helped me adapt to the bone spur. I don't know. But it is weird not to have acute pain on the bottom of my heel.

Now having said all that, it hurts to get on the bike, it hurts to pedal the bike, it hurts to walk. And some Delta guys are doing the Ruck March, so there can be a Delta, Echo competition during the October 3 half marathon.

Great news for me, at least for now, that all the pain I am having is just what you would expect for an unprepared participant in a half marathon. When I walk down the two stairs in the front of my CHU my legs ache and I lean against the wall.

And they gave us a really cool medal for finishing inside 3.5 hours.

Marathon Man

This morning my alarm went off at 0405. I dragged myself out of bed and walked to the latrine to shave and brush my teeth. I was thinking as I walked my heel feels great and I am about to screw it up. Three weeks ago I signed up for the US Air Force half marathon. The plan was that I would walk the 13.1 miles with a few aircraft mechanics and see if I could walk the distance in under 3 1/2 hours. In two weeks our base is having a parallel event with the Portland Half Marathon. Several of the guys in my unit are planning on walking it as a Ruck March--that's a march in boots with a 40-pound pack. I said I would try to do the Ruck March which led me to sign up for today's event.

In addition, some Delta Company aircraft mechanics said they would walk the half-marathon distance. So I thought I would have a good walk. Luckily I brought my iPod. Just as this deployment seemed like a good idea until I actually arrived, the marathon walk seemed rational until it started. The Delta guys were gone at the started. They lined up at the back, said they would walk, then started running.

Within 100 meters I was alone at the back behind 300 airmen and 100 soldiers who were running into the dark distance. So I started listening to a Teaching Company lecture. Thirty-five minutes later I was at the two-mile mark and the other walkers had disappeared into the distance. The trail truck was 20 feet behind me, idling its diesel engine as it followed me at 3mph.

So I started running. In about half a mile I was ahead of the next runner so I did not have to listen to the truck any more. I ran three more miles tried to walk and started running again. I ran another two miles, walked a mile then ran again until two miles to go. I felt good. I caught up to Delta, then walked the last two miles.

Lucklily they handed out medals at the finish line because I had to go to a company meeting. On the way I could either change or have breakfast--no contest.
I had eggs, creamed beef on a biscuit, French Toast sticks, fresh oranges and kiwi slices, coffee, mango juice and pineapple juice. I ate everything.

Before the meeting the commander told me I had a new job. More next post.

Who Fights This War? A Single Mom

Until September 11, 2001, Michelle Delta made family her first priority. On that terrible Tuesday Delta was a 35-year-old single woman living in her own house in Bridgeville, Delaware. In the months that followed, she decided to give up her shop supervisor job and put America at the top of her priority list and, with no military experience at all, joined the Army National Guard in May of 2002. In August she went to basic training. “I was very naive,” Delta said. “Soldiers were heroes. I am not sure what I really expected, but when I got to basic training I was in a holding area with more than 20 girls between 18 and 21 years old. On the other floors of our training area were hundreds of young men the same age. They were kids.” All through basic Delta helped to take care of and watch over the ‘kids.’ In basic Delta received extra responsibility because of her age and rank—her college degree allowed her to join as a Pvt. 1st Class. All of her drill sergeants were younger than her. It was not easy for her to go from living half her life as an independent adult, to getting yelled at “…by a cocky little punk younger than me,” she joked. But she has the kind of personality that galvanizes with hardship. Her father died when she was eighteen leaving two younger siblings with her step-mother. When her step-mother passed in 1994, Delta became legal guardian of the two. “You do what you have to do,” she says. Delta’s life changed from that point. “The kids had problems. You lose your father and mother at an early age and it is tough to move on.” Deltas’ sister was shot five times in 1996 and managed to survive. By the time Delta left for basic, the children were in their early twenties and on their own. Delta trained to be a CH-47 Chinook aircraft mechanic, came home and landed a job as an Army technician for the National Guard. She went from almost 36 years of civilian life to working in uniform full time. In 2005, Delta went to school to be a flight engineer. She was a sergeant and finding that the military is not always an easy place for a woman. “Yes we are all soldiers but we are not always treated equally” she said. “You have to choose your battles wisely”. In 2008 her unit got the alert order for deployment and in January of 2009 moved to Fort Sill, Okla., for pre-deployment training. In one of the quirks that lead to jokes that never stop, Staff Sgt. Michelle Delta is a flight engineer in Delta Company. “The Delta jokes are just part of the deal,” she says with a weak smile. In April, her unit arrived in Iraq with the 28th Combat Aviation Brigade and was station at Contingency Operating Base Adder, Iraq. “We were supposed to be going to Balad, but were redirected when we arrived in Kuwait,” she said. Once the birds and support equipment arrived in, all of the flight operations had to be set up, then the night missions started. “Sometimes we fly five nights in a row and get to be airfield boss on the sixth night. Other times the sandstorms move in and we don’t get off the ground but it gives us a chance to work on our aircraft. We usually work long days and it’s tough on everyone.” Since starting the deployment Delta and her fellow Chinook crew members have prepared the ships for missions, the door gunners mount and arm the three machine guns on each bird and make sure the pilots’ weapons are ready for use. The cockpit crew does the pre-flight inspection. Delta says “We are all a team and each of us has our section of responsibility”. Their day is just beginning when, for most of the other soldiers, the day is winding down. The aircrews sit together the whole length of two or three tables with eight soldiers on each side at the dining facility. They laugh, joke and speculate about where they might be going and whether they will be flying. Weather and last-minute changes cancel some missions. After dinner, they return to the large company headquarters building near the airstrip and wait for the mission. If the mission goes, Delta and her crew will usually fly hundreds of miles in heavy body armor peering through night-vision devices manning their weapons. They will move cargo or passengers to many different locations through-out the night. If the mission is scrubbed they go back to the flight line in the dark, dismount the guns, and tie the bird down for the night. “If the mission is scrubbed and we leave early, it gives us a chance to go back and do laundry,” Delta said. “When we fly, we get back late, do all the post-flight work, daily inspections, and grab a few hours sleep before we are back again.” Delta loves what she is doing but has not decided on whether she will stay in the National Guard as a career or not. “I am 43 now. I will be 56 when I get out, if I stay for 20 (years),” she said. “That’s a long time and this can be a physically demanding job. But I am going back to my technician job for now. I’ll see what the future holds when I get back.”

Thanks and Requests

Amy--The CS Lewis books arrived yesterday--Screwtape Letters and The Four Loves. We start the Four Loves on the first Monday in October. Thanks very much.

Susan--the Propel Powder, razors and SGT Reiner's M&M's arrived the day before yesterday. The M&Ms will be going up to Base Garry Owen the next time one of our guys gets a Blackhawk ride. Many thanks.

Ginny--I got all those amazon notices. I'll be looking for Purgatorio soon as well as dictionaries. Thanks much.

Shiri--I'll also be looking for dictionaries from you. Thanks.

Katie and Darren (and anyone else who wants to send stuff). The Education Center needs:
--a printer/scanner
--20 copies of the ASVAB (aptitude test) Study guide (send one, five, whatever)
http://www.amazon.com/Kaplan-ASVAB-2010-Services-Vocational/dp/1419550675/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253217169&sr=1-1
--one and two-inch three-ring binders, lots, with tab inserts
--10 or more copies of the AFAST (FLIGHT) study guide
http://www.amazon.com/Master-Military-Flight-Aptitude-Tests/dp/0768927935/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253217367&sr=1-1

And I would like TUL Pens, black medium point and other colors also.

Thanks in advance

Neil