Thursday, September 21, 2006

Fool me once....

When I last left, I was in Bagram Air Base waiting on a Helo ride to a small base called Wazi Kwah. Having waited for this specific flight before, I was skeptical as to the reality of this flight actually occurring. My trust in the military air transit program has been diverted from trust to distrust. When I go for a flight now I am only 30% sure that the flight is going to leave, 20% sure it will leave on time, and 50% sure that I will be having coffee in Bagram the next day with the other Sub guy here, Matt. As you see I have 100% confidence that something will happen.

As I go out to the "steel beach" to wait for the helo, we all gather and climb into a duece and a half truck to take us to the chopper. I am not sure how many people have been in a duece and a half, but they DO NOT make it easy to get into. I am an average sized guy, about 5 Ft 10 inches tall, and I have some minor to major difficulty in getting on. To make it easier the truck's tailgate has a foot stirrup to get up in the bed of the truck. Sadly that stirrup is about six to eight inches higher than it is comfortable to raise your foot. So securing your footing while getting in is, simply, not feasible. So this NAVY LT goes to get in the back of this vehicle. . . step one is to hand my M-16 to a guy already in the truck. . . step two is to raise my foot up. . . step three is to use my hand to raise my foot so that is rests against the stirrup. . .and finally step four is to be pulled to the bed by grabbing the arm of a guy already in the truck. An alternate step four is to take a "running leap" into the stirrup and then to the bed of the truck, but this can lead to injury of both your leg and your ego. As you can see, getting into the bed of the truck is highly dependent on another person already being in the truck. . . I will never be the first guy in the truck, of that I am sure.

The Steel Beach is an area of the runway, at Bagram, built and left by the Russians during their occupation of Afghanistan. Put simply, it is interconnected sections of steel forming about a half of a mile of the runway. It is so damaged and dented that only the helos can use that part of the runway. It is also a torturous place to wait for a delayed helicopter to take off, as the morning sun beats down on all those in the vicinity. We get our bags out of the back of the duece and a half and jump out of the bed of the truck, which is another trick of the trade that the NAVY really doesn't have a lot of skill with (at least not this NAVY LT). After jumping a story off of the truck, I land with no skill on the ribbed steel grating and nearly topple due to the additional weight added by my body armor. We are told that they are not yet sure which helo will be taking us, so they drop us off in the middle of steel beach and we wait. I will admit that the best way to keep the enemy guessing is to keep yourselves guessing as well, but I like things that are planned, especially if I have already been waiting two hours. So I wait. . . and wait. . . and wait. Finally they come out and tell us the helo. Murphy's Laws are fully functional in Afghanistan, as it turns out our bird was on the end of the pad, and we had to haul all of our bags and boxes with us down to it.

I get to Wazi Kwah without trouble, and begin to do my work. I finish within a matter of hours and must now wait for the next bird out. I am staying in a concrete building which has no internally separated rooms, in short a concrete open bay barrack. Directly out the back door of my concrete building were "the tubes." The tubes are literally 8 inch PVC pipes that have been dug into the ground. . . these tubes each had a mesh screen, and served their soul purpose of being temporary urinals. At least I did not have to walk far at night. Next to them was a sight that brought back memories of my conversation with my operations officer. As I told her that I would be going out to these remote operating bases, she replied to me that there were other considerations and I could not just go there at a whim. "For example," she said "There are places that still burn their own poo."

Directly behind a group of individual buildings to the right of the tubes, I saw some tubs burning with flames high, and I took a picture for her of "burning poo."

The very next day the base CO tells me that there is a bird leaving and going to Salerno, but I probably don't want to go there. His assumption is wrong, so he tells me that the bird will be there is eight minutes, how long will it take me to pack. While I was about to explain to him my proficiency at packing, but figured it would be easier just to tell him that I only needed five minutes. It really only took three.

Five minutes later I was at the LZ, waiting for the sound of a chopper inbound. So I waited. . . and waited. . .and waited. It is amazing how every noise can sound like an inbound chopper when that is what you are waiting for. So I waited. Finally the report comes back that the bird has been cancelled, and I went back to the open bay concrete building that I was staying in.

The next day the base CO came to me again, and told me that there was a flight headed to Salerno, it was leaving in twenty minutes. I thought to myself "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me" So I leisurely packed up my bags and walked out to the LZ again. Waiting, like a fool, for a helo to show up. After a little while, I went back to the CO and asked him the status of the bird. His reply was that the bird was late, but it was coming. So I waited. . . and I waited. . . and I waited. I finally went up to get some lunch and sat out in front of the DFAC to read my book. I got through another chapter of Vince Flynn's "Memorial Day" when the sound of an incoming chopper grew and grew until I was sure that the bird was actually coming.

I put my book away and stuffed my bottle of Gatorade in my right cargo pocket. Picking up my M-16 I went out to the road an began the long walk to the LZ. On my left, one of the refuelers started up his Polaris ATV and told me to jump onto the back and hold on. So I jump on the back rack of the ATV with the grace and skill of any good Sub LT, and hold on to the rack with my left hand, my M-16 digging into my back. I tell him, "I'm good" and we headed down the rocky road. As we sped away from my pickup point is when I came to the realization that it probably was not a good idea, but what the hell, I was already there.

As we arrive at the LZ, the ATV drops me off and grabs my bags while I put on my body armor, and then jump back onto the same rack. Then the ATV driver speeds over to the awaiting cargo door of the Chinook helicopter. I dismount the ATV again and wait as the Chinook continues to pour people and gear out of its cargo hold, emptying enough certainly to make room for me and the Local National Interpreter (Terp) that was going with me. With the generous amount of room left, I took my seat, buckled in and took off.

That ride was by far the bumpiest helo trip so far. I am not sure if there was a new pilot or if the winds were just that bad, but there were a few times when it felt like I was on a roller coaster, only I was sitting sideways vice forward in anticipation when we went over the first large drop. Even the tailgunner, legs dangling out the cargo door of the massive two propeller'd helicopter raised his arms in excitement as gravity (or the helicopter) caught back up to us.

The next to last stop prior to reaching Salerno, a familiar face in orange sunglasses got onboard the helo. Unbeknownst to me, he sat down just a few feet from where I was, and it was not until after the bird took flight again that I recognized Coupe, one of the Navy guys that I went through all of my training with. Talking was difficult amidst the noise of the helicopters turbine so we yelled our greetings and quickly told each other where we had been.

As we neared Salerno the air grew more humid and the vegetation on the ground grew more frequently green, telling signs that we were just a few minutes out. Coupe and I got off the bird and I went to my office where many faces were surprised to see me, thinking that I would still be a few weeks out. And I would be if it were not for that fortuitous flight from Wazi Kwah to Salerno, saving me time and money by letting me bypass Bagram.

1 Comments:

Blogger Joe said...

Tony,

I'm so glad to hear from you. I am thinking that Octoberfest sounds great. Come one Lindsey, can Tony come out and play?

Joe

8:11 PM  

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