It's a long way there... and back again

Today was one of those missions that is hard to categorize. It started with a two-hour delay, because we were suddenly tasked with an aeromedical evacuation mission. Our stops were Kandahar and Bagram, Afghanistan, and on the last leg, we were supposed to pick up a patient in Bagram and bring him back to our base for transport or treatment..(they never really give us much details on these things...)

So while they assembled an alert Aeromedical Evac team to fly with us, we waited. Then we went to the airplane, loaded all their gear, and found out after it was all on, that their mission was scrubbed (the patient either died or was transported by other means [hopefully the latter]) and they no longer needed the aeromeds. So..... we sat and waited some more while they offloaded all their equipment and stuff.. and believe me, when the aeromeds travel, they travel heavy... which, if you're a patient, you'd appreciate.

We finally took off, and in spite of all the delays for loading and unloading equipment, we were actually 15 minutes earlier than scheduled (AFTER the two-hour slip). Not bad.

The flight over to and through Pakistan was pretty uneventful, but as we entered Afghanistan, we encountered thunderstorms and seriously wondered if we'd be able to get through to our destination. Fortunately, fate was in our favor once again, and as we flew north, the skies pretty much parted right when we needed them too, and we slid right between thunderstorm cells, easily making it into our first stop at Kandahar.

We downloaded some passengers, uploaded a couple more, including the world's best behaved police dog, and headed north to Bagram. Our cargo included one of the Aero-medical crews we've flown with previously. They had been lucky enough to get selected for re-positioning up to Bagram for a couple of weeks supporting C-17 operations that have shifted out of Germany due to the Volcanic ash issues affecting Northern Europe. Hopefully they will be back to our base before we depart for home as we've developed a good working bond with these guys and will miss flying with them.

The approach and landing into Bagram was pretty uneventful, despite the worsening weather which produced low visibility and even lower ceilings, not that that is a bad thing... Remember bad weather usually means better cover for our approaches and landings. If it's raining, so much the better. Guys with missiles probably don't feel like standing outside in a downpour waiting for airplanes to fly by... (at least we hope not!)

We downloaded our cargo, and as the heavens opened, providing a nice steady downpour, our load team uploaded a jet engine for transport back to base.

The flight home was actually very smooth. No weather at all enroute, just a nice, steady headwind that turned our 4-1/2 hour trip into a 5+hour excursion.

All in all, a good, uneventful mission with few surprises and little to report. Hope we get a whole bunch more over the next couple of weeks!

Djibouti Call

"Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water."

~ W. C. Fields

Finally got the chance to spice things up a bit: the schedule came out and our mission was to Djibouti, Djibouti! (So nice you have to say it twice!) AFRICA!

For those of us geographically challenged, Djibouti is a small country located just above the Horn of Africa tucked in between Eritrea, Ethiopia and whatever's left of Somalia. The capitol of Djibouti is the town named Djibouti, so when you're saying your going to Djibouti, I guess that could mean different things to different people. For us, it simply meant a breath of fresh air -- someplace different.

An added treat was the inclusion of two of our support personnel getting a chance to ride along on a non-combat mission to see some of the world other than just the base we fly in and out of. Becky Jackanic, who works in Flight Records, and William McDuffie, an Intel analyst, both joined us for the day, and you have never seen such grins of anticipation as we started on our way!

The flight itself was pretty long: 5-1/2 hours each way, but it covered some interesting territory: we flew across Saudi Arabia to Riyadh and then on to Jeddah, then down the middle of the Red Sea until sliding past Yemen and into Djibouti. Saudi is home to some really interesting geological formations, especially in the east, and one of my favorite places to drone over. Sand dunes, dramatic escarpments, ancient lava floes and volcanoes dot the landscape and provide spectacular evidence of the earth's formative processes we don't normally get to see at home.

The city of Djibouti itself lies on a peninsula that divides the Gulf of Aden from the Gulf of Tadjoura. It supposedly supports a population of over 400,000 people, but it doesn't look like it is much bigger than an typical city in the US of 50,000 or so. That being said, flying over it as we approached the airport, you could look down and see how densely packed the houses were, and how antiquated the roads and thoroughfares were that wound through them. It struck me that if you were trying to find the one spot to disappear to, the last place on earth anyone would ever look for you, this would be ideal!

The landing is complicated somewhat by controllers who speak a version of English that is enhanced with French and East African variances... so communication is mostly a series of negotiations for clarification. We touch down and suddenly find ourselves directed onto one of the narrowest taxi ways I've seen: bushes sliding beneath our wings as we creep by, headed for the main ramp.

Our cargo today is one pallet of grenades, and several other pallets of various items ranging from empty O2 tanks to toilet paper, all bound for some Marines stationed nearby. The first thing that strikes you as you get off the plane is how HOT it is... not just hot, but AFRICA hot... hot and humid. The co-pilot described it feeling like there's a magnifying glass over your head... It wasn't long before we were soaked; literally wilting in our flight suits.

We downloaded our cargo and uploaded a prop being returned up-range for repair, then headed over to the terminal for both a bathroom break and a photo op. The restrooms, both in the tower and in the terminal were so primitive, McDuff declared afterwards he would never criticize the latrine set-ups we live with again. "Squalid" doesn't quite describe the condition of the facilities we encountered, and I was reminded once again of the difference between the "first" and "third" worlds.

The people we encountered however were exceptionally friendly and helpful, and one offered to take our picture recording our visit. As we posed for the picture, a group of people, many dressed in bright colored robes and other traditional garb, walked out of the terminal behind us and headed for their plane. It was a nice accent on a fun day.

With our picture taken, we loaded up and headed back north. We flew up the Red Sea just as the sun set in the west, bands of clouds reflecting golds and reds against the heavens. After that, just a clear black sky blanketed by a million stars and a long, quiet, reflective flight into the night.

A day in the life of our 379 EAES lifesavers

(This is a repost of a blog entry by our Wing Commander, Brigadier General Steve Wilson, who flew with my crew yesterday. His description of our day really catches the intensity of this critical mission of mercy, and is well worth repeating. You can find the original blog post at: http://379aew.dodlive.mil/2010/04/15/a-day-in-the-life-of-our-379-eaes-lifesavers/)

Crazy night…big thunderstorm ~3 a.m. with 50+ mph winds and lots of lightning. Made for a restless night.

I was alerted for my air-evac sortie at 7:30 a.m. We all showed up just before 8 a.m. I met Lt. Col. Juliette Robinson…she’s the head AE nurse and would be my seeing-eye-officer to walk me through the mission and show me what our 379th Expeditionary Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron does. Juliette is a seasoned pro…before this deployment, she spent six months in Kandahar, Afghanistan, with the U.S. Army, Afghan National Army and Canadian forces. Our AE crew today consisted of two exceptional nurses, Capt. Danette Butler and Capt. Vickey Shelton, along with three amazing medical technicians: SMSgt Justin King, TSgt Michael Park and SrA Crystal Tucker. This whole crew is from the Oklahoma Air National Guard, and they are exceptional at their job. We got our intel brief and followed that with a thorough brief on each patient’s specific condition and needs. We were also lucky to have on our crew today the Combined Forces Special Operations Component Command flight surgeon, COL Rusty Farr. Talk about experience…Rusty has served for more than 42 years!

The AE community is really close knit…when you are around them it’s like family…more on that later.

Today was a “Mercy” mission…planned for six stops in Iraq to pick up ~17 patients…one urgent, one battle injury, two on litters and the rest ambulatory…the injuries ran the gamut from head injuries to broken bones to psychological issues. We’d be stopping at Basrah, Tallil, al Kut, Baghdad, al Asad and Balad before returning home.

We got out to the C-130 about 9:30 a.m…there is a lot of AE-specific gear to load…the AE support team turns a normal C-130 into a flying hospital capable of taking care of the most seriously injured patients. Even though it was before 10 a.m., it was really hot and humid due to the previous night’s thunderstorm…so before we finished loading the AE gear, the whole AE crew was dripping wet with sweat. We are flying with an Air Force Reserve Command crew out of Pittsburgh, Pa. The aircraft commander is Capt. Lance Hupp. His co-pilot is 1Lt. Chris Farley. The navigator is Lt. Col. Bryan Branby. [The Flight Engineer is TSgt Vince Barnes and] The two sterling loadmasters are MSgt Dave Robbins and MSgt Dave Caldwell. It’s a great crew…with lots of experience. They’ve been flying four times per week all over the AOR for the last three months. Also joining our merry crowd today is a two-person Fly Away Security Team (FAST)…just after 10:30, our 15-person ops, AE and security team starts our mission. It’s been three hours since we were first alerted.

A little more than an hour after takeoff, we make our first stop at Basrah. We picked up one litter patient. On all the stops except one, we did Engine Running Onloads (EROs)…in short, we taxi in…the ramp is dropped…the plane stops…the ambulance shows up…and we load patients behind four running turboprop engines. It’s noisy and very windy. As soon as the patients are on board with the paperwork, we taxi to the runway, close the ramp and takeoff. At Basrah, the total time from landing, taxi in, patient on-load to takeoff was 15 minutes. The crew told me their best time was six minutes. Twenty minutes after wheels up from Basrah, we’re at Tallil. We repeat the process…adding four patients. Twenty minutes later, we’re at al Kut and add another patient. Forty-five minutes later we’re at Baghdad. Here we add nine patients…one on a litter, six ambulatory with two escorts.

At Baghdad, we had some excitement. We shut down the engines to load up some gas…a few minutes later a mortar round was fired at the airfield. We heard the nearby blast and then the sirens started wailing and the loudspeakers told people to take cover. We ended up waiting a little while until the all-clear sounded and then took off for al Asad to pick up three more patients. At the end of the day, we had five more people than planned, to include an extra litter patient.

We landed at Balad…all the ambulances and buses were waiting and we were met by AE and hospital folks who would now care for these patients. Most of the patients will spend the night before heading on to Landstuhl, Germany.

I mentioned family. If you didn’t know better, you’d have thought when we landed at Balad that we were at a family reunion. Everyone high-fived each other and there were lots of hugs going around. ”See you next time. We’ve got it from here.” We spent less than an hour on the ground at Balad and departed just after sunset.

We loaded everyone back on the C-130 (plus an extra 16 passengers) and headed home. It took just less than three hours to get back home. When we landed, we unloaded all the AE gear and headed back through immigrations and customs to the squadron. I left the AE gang just before 11 p.m….for me it was a long 16-hour day…the AE folks were all ecstatic because the day had gone so smooth and quick that it was two hours shorter than normal.

The impression I was left with was “family.” The AE squadron is small and tight knit. They treat every patient like one of their family. How you feeling? Are you feeling any pain? Do you need some water? They have a really positive attitude…they kid and cut up with each other almost non-stop. They get the mission done and take extraordinary care of all our wounded warriors. I sure am glad they are on our team!