Memorial Day 2017

In late May, 2017, I found myself the senior Officer in Operations (flying) on base, so I was the de facto Wing Commander for the long weekend. I sent out the following to the base populace:

 911 AW Airmen,

As we face the upcoming weekend and the beginning of "summer," I want to thank each of you on behalf of the leadership here at the 911th AW for all you have done over the past year to secure our great nation.  Your individual efforts, great and small, have made a difference. 

Memorial Day is a time of remembrance and reflection on sacrifices made by those similar to you; dedicated individuals and family members who put the nation and our way of life ahead of their own personal lives and fortunes.

On Monday, as you look forward to time with family and friends, I invite you to attend a local ceremony commemorating these sacrifices. Hopefully you will look to the sky and see or hear a 911th AW C-130 paying tribute to those comrades-in-arms who have paid the ultimate price on our behalf.  As Abraham Lincoln so eloquently pointed out, we must value their efforts and carry on their legacy for the future of our great nation.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln

November 19, 1863

Thank you for your service.

Where were you on 9/11?

 On September 11, 2001, I was teaching Ground School at the McCormick Elementary School US Airways leased as a training facility. It’s probably 10 minutes from the Pittsburgh Airport by car, which is where I was serving in the Reserves as a C-130 Navigator.

By 2001, I had enough seniority to be teaching International Procedures, which covered pretty much anything and everything associated with flying across the Atlantic Ocean to our European destinations. My students were all seasoned pilots, finally having the seniority to hold positions on the lucrative International routes.

My classes started at 0800, and every 50 minutes or so, I’d give a break. At about 0851, we walked out into the hallway for a restroom break and coffee refills. The school had a main entry way with a security guard sitting at a desk, who provided at least the look of deterrence. He would sit at a desk right in the middle of the hall facing the entrance, with a small b&w TV to fill the hours while he was on duty. As we came out, he waived us over and told us a plane had hit one of the towers of the World Trade Center in New York City.

By the time we huddled around him, news cameras were starting to pick up the story and we could see smoke coming out of one of the buildings. I don’t think any of us knew what we were looking at. One or two planes had hit tall buildings in NYC before, a B-17 ran into the Empire State Building on a foggy night back in the 40s or 50s, and I’d heard that a Cessna hit a building sometime recently, so I figured it was something like that again…. but it was a clear day…. And then we saw the 2nd airplane hit!

It happened so fast, you didn’t understand what you saw until the replays in slow motion, then you saw the jet. It was crazy: as aviators, you just couldn’t wrap your head around the idea that TWO planes hit these buildings by accident.

At some point I think one of the Supervisors came out of the office and herded us back into classrooms. People were getting paid to be trained, and airline pilots aren’t cheap; we had to at least go through the motions so someone wouldn’t complain to the FAA they weren’t getting the required training they were due (it happened!).

From that point on, there wasn’t much training going on. Guys were on their phones trying to get information. People knew dispatchers and were pinging them for the latest. Then at 0937 a plane hit the Pentagon, and from there on there was no doubt we were being attacked.

Suddenly guys heard from the Dispatch Center that there was a plane headed towards Pittsburgh. Speculation was all over the place. It was going to hit the Airport Control Tower. It was going to crash into the Training Center. None of that made sense. Why even bother with Pittsburgh? And then it did crash, south of the city.  What was next?

By then we were hearing that all flights were being forced to land at the first available airport, and that anyone remaining airborne would be shot down. I’m sure some semblance of that was true, but everyone knew that would be a hard, difficult call to execute: shooting down an airliner? Better be right.

At some point I’m sure I called Laura and checked in. Did she know? How was she? Any word about the kids and schools?  I’m pretty sure every community in Western PA thought Flight 93 (as we found out later) was headed at them or their schools.
We all watched and waited, wondering what was next, and then the unthinkable happened: the second tower at the World Trade Center suddenly imploded, slowly collapsing in on itself and came crumbling down. I think everyone who watched that was completely stunned. It’s still a point of conspiracy theorists today: how could two building that size collapse to basically ash?

The rest of the day is still a blur. We were required to stay and “teach.” There was a cafeteria on-site, so I’m pretty sure we grabbed food and ate in front of the TV just trying to make sense of it all.

I called over to the Squadron to see if they knew anything, but they were just as clueless as the rest of us. All flying was cancelled, and anybody who was out on the road was stuck until it was deemed safe to fly again. But no one knew when that might be. A big question was who or what was on the flights still coming from overseas. As it happened, anyone outside the US had to land before they got to the US, or turn around and head back to Europe. That’s how all the aircraft stacked up in Gander, St. Johns, Stephensville, and Halifax, and ended up staying there for a week or more.

When I got home, I think Laura texted me that she was at Chris & Dave Seaman’s house, a few blocks away from ours in Zelienople. They had just brought home their new adopted daughter Carly. I remember going over to see them and sharing this surreal moment where such happiness at this new addition to their family was overwashed by such a crazy, tragic blow to our nation and psyche.

In the days that followed, the news was 24/7 on the attack. The FBI started figuring out who was who, how it had happened, where they came from, what the plot was, etc. The toll from the attack started to sink in: how many had died, both in the planes and in the buildings, and of course the tragic loss of so many first responders who had rushed to help.

No one seemed to know what the mechanism was for turning flying back on. I kept bugging people on base that we should be up and flying and showing that things were going to go back to normal, and on the next Thursday (about 8 days after the attack), the FAA let us take a pair of planes out for a training ride. It was VERY eerie being pretty much the only ones in the sky.

Almost immediately, Operation Nobel Eagle started. It was basically an all-out defense of the Continental United States. Fighters were up 24 hours a day over New York City and Washington, D.C. There was a thought someone would sneak a dirty bomb into the country, or use chemicals like Sarin gas, so response teams were put on alert all over the country.

In mid October, I flew out to McChord AFB, in Tacoma, Washington, and sat alert for a month to support a quick response decon team; ready to take them any place on the west coast that might be attacked. Between our days on alert, we practiced it a couple times, and it was pretty ugly, but we could have responded fairly quickly if such an attack had happened.

Of course everyone’s world changed after that. Airline travel became a royal pain. At first it shut down, and then slowly returned; by then the various second and third order effects became evident: hotels and restaurants were all effected by the travel industry. Anti-terrorism measures doubled and tripled in pretty much all aspects of our lives. Laws were changed. The Department of Homeland Security was set up, consolidating a host of other departments, with huge reach into every sector of our lives.

Simply put, 9/11 was a watershed moment for the entire country. It  was the beginning of the busiest 14 years of my life, and included six more trips to Southwest Asia (2003, 2004, 2005, 2008, 2010, 2015) as we took up the Global War on Terror.

Some people get kicked out of bars, Others get kicked out of countries

An adventure is never an adventure when it's happening. Challenging experiences need time to ferment, and an adventure is simply physical and emotional discomfort recollected in tranquility.

~ Tim Cahill

It wasn't the best of times, nor was it the worst, but the past several days have certainly been memorable.

On January 30, 2010, I was deported twice in 24 hours from the same country.

It all began two days prior. My crew returned from a typical Operation Iraqi Freedom mission: Al Udeid - Kirkuk- Al Taqadum-Balad-Baghdad-Ali Al Salem-Al Udeid. 7.4 hours of flying, dropping off and picking up various cargo and  personnel around the AOR. After every flight we had to immigrate into Qatar, going through customs, dropping of documentation saying we had emigrated out from Qatar, thus being authorized to come back. Everything felt like it went like clockwork: we showed our ID cards, along with the customs documentation and flight orders, the guy behind the glass kinda glanced at us, and then waived us through. We grabbed our gear and went back to our rooms to chill for the next mission, a day and a half later.

On 30 January, we reported to the Squadron bright and early, got our tactics brief and flight plans; helmet, body armor, and professional gear; and armed up with pistols and extra clips. Then onto the crew bus and then to customs and immigration to check out before heading to the plane. That’s when the fun started.

As we came up to the counter, we handed over our flight orders will all our names on it, with the mission we were on. The Qatari took the paper, typed into his computer, looked up at us, then reached for the phone. That’s when I grabbed the pilot, Captain Lance Hupp, and told him, “I think we’re in trouble.” Lance looked at me and asked what I was talking about.

I said, “I’ve done this a hundred times. They never pick up the phone. The guy just picked up the phone.” Lance just laughed.

Sure enough, about two minutes later a door in the back opened, and this big fat two star Qatari something or other (probably a Major in their rank structure), came waddling out and did the double glance between us and the computer and the paperwork. Then HE picked up the phone. Next thing we knew, the American liasons who are go-betweens between us and the Qataris, shows up and begins wringing their hands.

Apparently on the document we turned in two days prior, the guy who took it from us filed it without stamping it as processed. So in their eyes, we were trying to leave the country after not officially being allowed into it.

Long story cut short, after lots of conversations, some young Qatari prince guy with big sunglasses showed up and said he would smooth it all out, all we had to do was go out on  our mission, and immigrate in properly when we returned. Seemed legit. I know people who overstay Visas in the US go up to Canada for a couple days and then re-enter the country, re-starting their clocks.

So, we headed out and flew a rather benign OIF mission: Al Udeid-Tal Afar-Talill-Al Udeid.

It all went pretty smoothly. We even stopped off in Tallil to get pizza. They had some contractor who had set up shop right off the flight line that was “famous” among the crews as a place to get a quick, delicious pizza pie when we were out on the road. While there, I got on the SatCom back to our Ops and verified we were cleared back ok. LtCol Ed Tarquenio, our DO, got on the chat himself and swore everything was settled and we were cleared back, no problem! So we headed the two hours back to Qatar.

Of course nothing in the military goes the way it’s supposed to. We landed, got all our stuff off the plane, loaded up the crew van and headed back to process into the country. Not so fast. When we presented our paperwork and credentials this time, the phone got picked up, the rear door opened, our favorite Major and his lackey henchmen suddenly appeared and we were informed that while our previous transgressions had been wiped clean, we were now “BLACK LISTED” from Qatar for a multiple of unspecified reasons and we must leave on the first plane out.

Now to me, this was total BS. I told the US liason guys who came out to usher us quietly out of the country that I wasn’t going anywhere until my Commanders were aware of what was going on. That kind of threw them for a loop. They protested that we had no choice, and I basically said, “I don’t care, I’m a LtCol in the US Air Force and I am not going anywhere until my leadership tells me to, and if you don’t like it, either point a gun at us or call a General and get them involved.” They were speechless, but they went off and called back to our Ops and someone eventually came over.

In the end, the Qataris won out and we were ushered into the departure terminal and told to pick our destination. They wanted us to leave on the first plane out, but it turned to be headed to Camp Bastion in Afghanistan. I said, I am NOT going to go live in a tent on an Army FOB (Forward Operating Base) if I don’t have to, what else you got?

They said, we have a plane leaving for Rota NAS, Portugal. Everybody’s eyes got big at that idea. Then I pointed out that if we went to Rota, we’d never get back. We’d barely been there 2 weeks, is that what everyone wanted? The third options was Kuwait City. That seemed doable. Worst case they would put us back on Ali Al Salem AB, where we all had been a couple times before. It was an hour away be C-17, so getting back didn’t seem too far fetched.

Two hours later we walked out onto the back of an empty C-17 and flew a quick hour up to Kuwait International airport. They lowered the ramp, and we grabbed our helmets and meager overnight bags, and walked off the plane and out onto the tarmac. They pulled up the ramp and taxiied away. We stood there a few minutes wondering what next, until suddenly some guy pulled up in a van and he said he was there to give us a ride to a hotel. Eddie T had made a phone call and got us rooms at the Raddison Blu down on the waterfront.

So we shrugged, climbed in, and were whisked away. No in processing, no military, no civilians, no customs, nothing, Just out the back gate and down to the hotel. Very bizarre.

Sometimes it’s just better to stay quiet, nod your head, and sign where they tell you to. We checked in to a fabulous 5 star hotel, pool, gym, free breakfasts, and huge rooms on the top floor. It was awesome! Our job was to sit tight and wait until the folks back in Qatar sorted things out, one way or the other, so we did… It was glorious. And we were content for about two days… then we got bored.

Our first challenge is we didn’t have any clothes except our flight suits and some official Air Force PT gear. Not really conducive to staying low profile. So we got someone to drive us to a local shopping mall where we bought shirts, pullovers (January in Kuwait is in the 50s), and long pants, underwear, some toiletries, etc. With that we could roam outside the confines of the hotel.

As the days drug on, we got bolder, and then we found that an intel guy from  our unit was a civilian corporate pilot currently living in Kuwait City, and the game was afoot! He knew the good restaurants to go to, where the open markets were, even where we could go golfing! (Who knew Kuwait had a golf course!?)

Meanwhile, we were calling back checking in on what was happening and it might have slipped out we were having a pretty nice time. The Squadron Commander and his staff weren’t happy, but we were like, “If you want us to stop exploring, get your stuff together and bring us back to the base!”  We had done nothing wrong and the whole situation was a total farce.

Mission to Sarajevo

 The Balkan conflict of the 90s was a real mess. When Tito died in 1980, Yugoslavia started falling apart. It was a country that had been used to being ruled autocratically since the Second World War. They sputtered on for about 10-12 more years, but after the Berlin Wall fell, there was no “umph” left in dictatorial rule, so it dissolved in spring of 1992 into Croatia, North Macedonia (Macedonia is a state in Greece where Alexander the Great is supposedly from, so there is NO WAY they are giving up their name), Slovenia, Montenegro and Serbia.

Simplified: as is typical in old, well established areas that have been forced to live together against their will for decades, a lot of old animosities simmer, and they boiled over when Bosnia (Muslim) attempted to separate itself from Serbia (Orthodox). The US got involved as part of a NATO peacekeeping force when the killing in Bosnia got too severe, and the city of Sarajevo was surrounded and in the process of being starved out.

I think I flew to Rhein-Main AFB in Germany sometime in September. For the next two to three weeks, as part of a NATO humanitarian relief effort called Operation Provide Promise, we flew plane loads of relief supplies pretty much every other day. My missions were all airland, but later guys were doing high altitude airdrops of MREs (Meals Ready to Eat), where large refrigerator boxes would be pushed out of the plane and then fall apart, raining plastic packages the size of bread loaves containing basic meals down on people’s heads all across Bosnia.

We would load up in Germany, fly over Austria, down the Italian coast, then across Croatia into Bosnia. All high level. We flew high because the Serbs were using anti-aircraft guns mounted up in the hills overlooking  citites and towns to shoot down into them, and we didn’t want them to start aiming them up at us.

About 50 miles out we would start talking to the French air traffic controllers who were controlling the air traffic in and out of the Sarajevo airport. We all had slot times we had to make +/- a minute or so. Once we were cleared in we would press into about 25 miles, over the top of a pretty significant valley, slow down, drop flaps to provide drag, and then pretty much drop out of the sky in a very significant manner. I would call out distance to go and required altitude to remain on glide slope to the airport. All to attempt to stay above any groundfire that someone on the hillsides might decide to aim our direction. 

Then we had to make sure we landed within the first 2/3s of the runway, because the Serbs were firing those anti-aircraft weapons (cannons) across the runway into the apartment buildings across from them. If you were too fast and felt you couldn’t land and stop in time, you were to abort the landing, and try again, climbing out as fast and as steep as you could. It was quite a rush.

We would taxi into the parking ramp, turn and back up to the main building, drop our ramp, using the airplane as protection for people unloading in the back…small comfort for us sitting ducks up in the cockpit. Passengers would rush off, cargo would be pushed off on to awaiting forklifts, new passengers waiting to get out would rush on, we would close up and taxi out, taking off pretty much empty from mid-field. I started timing our total time on the ground after about the 2nd mission. I think by the end, we got it down to something like 5 minutes. It got to be a well-oiled, choreographed operation.

We would fly out to the city of Split, in Croatia, about 45 minutes away, upload any passengers or cargo awaiting there, head back to Sarajevo, do the same ordeal, then take off again and head back to Germany to make it a day. Fun times. The next day or the day after, at the latest, we do it again.

In 1995 I went back again for a couple weeks because it was no longer a NATO relief operation, it was a military operation called Operation Joint Endeavor. For us, the only thing that changed was that it was designated combat missions and we were flying out of Ramstein AB instead of Frankfurt. Had a couple flights down into the Mediterranean, and the beer was still good.

OJE - Sigonella - Souda Bay - Naples

 Wednesday

Today was our longest day. I guess it was to make up for how easy yesterday was supposed to be. We also figured out that instead of four days. This is a five-day trip – the schedule is written screwy, and if you analyze what they have us doing, we decided we couldn’t/wouldn’t get everything done. They talked us into going on Thursday. We called the European office center and sure enough five days!

Today’s mission was to haul cargo and passengers to Souda Bay, Crete, return to Sigonella, and then go up to Naples to spend the night.

Nothing is easy flying in the Med. No one has radar coverage down there; they only know where you are by the time you report over a point and when you estimate you’ll be at your next point, so they will not let you go anywhere straight – you have to fly established Airways even if it means going miles out of your way to get on there. We had to fly halfway up the shoe of Italy before we could head down to the southeast towards Crete.

Souda Bay is in the northwest corner of Crete – looks like an airfield carved out of the moon and transplanted into the poorest section of Central America. Really backwards. I guess the Navy has P3 operations out of there – but what a hole to live in. Hopefully the living areas are better than the airfield itself. Souda was cold and rainy, so we didn’t spend much time on the ground.

Going back in to Sigonella, the Italian controller went spastic on us – we had 6000 rounds of 9 mm ammo, and he refused us permission to land. We went into the holding pattern for about 10 minutes while the Navy worked out the wrinkles and then we landed. We taxied over to the hot cargo ramp to offload the ammo. That’s when the Pax got their first clue they had been sitting next to high explosives the past 2 1/2 hours. Raised a few eyebrows!

After a long cappuccino break, we headed up to Naples again – our takeoff delayed by Rome, being unable to accept us into their flow for another hour!

Once again, we took off late in the afternoon, and flew into Naples just after the sun went down. Beautiful city with all its lights reflecting on the water, though the sky was a bit hazy from either pollution or a temperature inversion.

We stayed again at the Jolly Hotel, but this time decided to eat in the hotel restaurant. What a huge mistake – the serving team was openly hostile to our showing up, and took so long to service and provide our bills that I, for one, was ready for breakfast.

Dinner did provide one true highlight of the trip…

One of the guys knew that a girl he worked with back home was going to be in Naples visiting her fiancé.

Apparently, the fiancé would be out of town this night, so he was really looking forward to hooking up for a wild night. The anticipation had built up all day, reaching its’ peak when we got to the hotel.

So, while all the rest of us went upstairs to suffer through dinner, he called this girl and gave her directions to our hotel (he had found the address in a brochure of all the Jolly Hotels he picked up from the front counter). Then he proceeded to wait … and wait … and wait.

It took about two hours before the light went on in the big head where the blood circulation was slowly returning. With sickening trepidation, he checked the address he had given this girl who was certain to provide him a “sure-fire good time all night long.” To his horror, he discovered the address he had given her was to the Jolly Hotel in Milan, not Naples - only 600 miles off!

He practically lunged for the phone to call her and hopefully salvage something for the evening, but to no avail – the ‘sure thing’ was still out driving around the streets of Naples searching for a non-existent street. Completely chagrined, he left a message and waited.  About 45 minutes later he got a steamed phone call. She was NOT a happy camper! The evening was ruined, and he was miserable when he found us at the hotel bar.

It was classic! Naturally, we thought it was hilarious, and everyone on the crew just rubbed it in – salt in the wounds of a whipped dog! We offered to chip in and pay for a couple of porn flicks to tide him through his tragedy, but he could not be consoled: even though we would be back to Naples Thursday night, her boyfriend would be too!

Operation Joint Endeavor Begins

 6 March 1996

Once again, I’m out on the road – refreshing myself one more time why I don’t want to do this flying thing as a full-time profession. The Bosnians sat down in Dayton last fall and hammered out a peace agreement. We (United States) sent in 20,000 troops to act as peacekeepers, and I volunteered to fly a rotation (two weeks) of supplies into the AOR (area of responsibility) when the Reserves and the Guard spell the Active Duty. I don’t know why I set certain expectations of these trips - they never end up being anything like they are advertised.

I called up daily for about two weeks prior, asking what had changed and what I needed to do, if anything, to get ready. Nothing. I saw on the “board” I had a 1300L showtime for a 1600 takeoff. That sounded like it sucked but they have quiet hours in Germany and you can’t land between 2200 and 0600. The trip over takes 12 hours, so you’re limited when you can take off in order to land at an acceptable time. I wasn’t looking forward to that much time in the airplane, but I was excited to go over and participate.

 Naturally, when I showed up things had changed (what else is new?) I double parked my car to unload my bags; when I walked through the door to the squadron, Darius Pierzadeh, the SOF (Supervisor of Flying), told me I was late for a briefing! (What’s this?? An unscheduled briefing? Imagine that)

The briefing was a bunch of people from finance and Intel, giving us all the things we “needed to know” before we deployed. Basically, we wasted an hour of our mission planning time learning not to have unprotected sex, and that we would get paid while we were gone. (THAT part was important!)

We eventually ended up at the airplane, did our preflight and checks, started engines and taxied out for takeoff. On the way out, the local news organizations were out in force, filming their local boys going off to war. I didn’t make it on camera, but Daryl Hartman and Dale Hoth both got their 15 seconds of fame.

So, we taxied out, did the enhanced alignment, and started our takeoff. Right after lift off (on time), the pilot, Conrad Witalis, called for gear retraction. The left main gear indicated it had stayed down.

After a quick conference, we recycled the gear (probably not the best idea) down and back up, but had no success. So we called back to Pitt Ops, told them to fuel the Spare, and flew a box pattern back to an uneventful landing.

The Bag drag took about an hour, including downloading and uploading pallets to the new airplane. There were some considerable discussions of stopping along the way and spending the night somewhere on the East Coast, or perhaps going to Keflavik in Iceland. In the end, we decided to be mission hackers; get off if we could by 1800 and proceed as planned: fly up to St. Johns, Newfoundland for refueling, and then head east into the night towards Germany. it was a decision I’d like to do over.

The trip up to St. Johns was pretty uneventful. Four hours watching the US pass beneath us and turn into Canada. We’re heading north east, so it got dark pretty quickly. By the time we landed and taxied in, I felt like I had put in a long day and we weren’t even halfway done yet!

Someone had prepositioned a Youngstown plane up at St. John’s with a maintenance kit. They were to sit there till all the planes pass through, then press on across themselves. Our two-hour delay really helped their crew duty day too. In fact, as soon as we touched down and reported no major problems, they were on the radio asking for clearance to takeoff.

Unfortunately, they didn’t wait till we refueled and started up again. The unique thing about machinery is that things do not normally break during use. Somethings do and it can be catastrophic. Usually, especially with airplanes, it’s when you shake things back to life after a shutdown that things shear and break. This was no exception. We gassed and started things up to takeoff and immediately ran into trouble – The flaps went asymmetrical - one went up and the other stayed locked down – not a good thing to try and takeoff with! As with most mechanical things on the airplane, I’m pretty clueless – they didn’t give us any training on how planes fly – reserve that for pilots and flight engineers – I just concentrate on what happens once the airplane is in the air. The more I fly, the more I wish I knew more, but it works out – with three “experts” on board things generally get figured out pretty quickly and accurately.

Anyway, it wasn’t looking pretty. It was late, and we were fast approaching the end of our crew duty day (Max time you are allowed to operate airplanes in a single day: the time from show at the Squadron until you land and taxi in at your destination) – taking off later than about 25 minutes hence would mean we would still be flying well after the 1200Z drop dead time for our 18-hour crew duty day. We started shutting things down and resigning ourselves that we were going to spend the night in St. Johns when the maintenance Crew Chief called up to say, “Try it again!” He had literally banged on the side of some piece of equipment and got it to come un-lodged.

The Pilot cycled the flaps and they worked! We debate the wisdom of pressing on, but decided that if they stuck down on takeoff, we’d just come back to St. John’s called it a night. If they wouldn’t come down for landing, we’d land flaps-up; either way, there was no reason not to try it at least once… so we decide to press on. And we did.

Take off was uneventful. The thing I didn’t like about leaving St. Johns is that after takeoff, you’re immediately out over the water and heading east. I REALLY enjoy having about an hour or so after takeoff to evaluate my navigation systems. Take some fixes and get a nice warm feeling that it will stay tight until you reach the English coast, six hours away! We (Aldo Filoni, the other Pittsburgh navigator) took a handheld GPS with us to back up the SCNS, so it wasn’t too disconcerting, but I still like the warm fuzzies of an hour of land under my feet, just in case. (Age old adage: Nobody cares about the Nav until you get lost!)

The trip across seemed to go on forever. I’m pretty sure no one slept in that morning, so we were pretty beat up by the time we left Newfoundland. There wasn’t much to do going across, but make position reports every 10° of longitude, which was about every hour. I took one celestial shot about halfway across to check the accuracy of the SCNS and GPS – one more check to verify their information – plus ensure the airplane had a good system. Everything was where it was supposed to be so I decided that since I had five satellite telling me I was where I thought I was, I could relax. I concentrated on periodic updates of the SCNS off the GPS and trying to stay awake.

Coffee was flowing pretty heavily. I had stopped at 7-ELEVEN on the way to the base and found some vanilla flavored Folgers instant. Conrad Witalis, our young Aircraft Commander, brought some French Vanilla International Moments Instant Coffee, and Dale Hoth, the Flight Engineer, brought a small French press and some Starbucks – we were awash in Java and needed every bit of it.

The Youngstown airplane was about 45 minutes ahead of us, flying a course just south of ours. We had them on the air-to-air TACAN and for the most part they stayed about 200 miles ahead of us. The sun came up about 0430 Z which was about halfway across the pond. It was very pretty being that high and seeing the horizon turn into a red glow and then explode as the sun lifted itself out of the clouds in the distance.

As we crossed the English coast, the clouds below broke up enough to see the shore and some of the countryside. We coasted in in just south of Wales and flew south of London and over to Dover. By the time we crossed by London the clouds had closed up, and we were unable to see anything below us. I had the radar so I knew where we were, but it was not the same as seeing it firsthand.

Once we got into Belgium, the deck broke up, and we began to make out the landscape below, until we got to Germany, where it was 1400 local and clear & a million, which was good because we were all dead tired, and a tricky weather approach would have been an extreme challenge.

Upon final approach, we realized that we were number two behind the Youngstown airplane that had taken off in such a hurry 45 minutes in front of us! Evidently, they had taken a detour through France, encountered some bigger headwinds than we did and lost all 45 minutes!

Just to make the flight that much more of a challenge - right before we landed, Tower made us do a 360⁰ turn to make way for a “Priority IFOR mission!” so we did, and then landed at long last… Only 19 hours after showtime at Pittsburgh! Total flying time (including the first takeoff), 12.4 hours!

Taxiing in was a nightmare – the base is a lot smaller than I envisioned it to be – basically one main runway, one ramp where the 37th AS (Active Duty) park their C 130s, and a small ramp in front of Base Ops for transient traffic.

We got to park in a fighter dispersal area that you have to see to believe – the taxiway is wide enough for a fighter, but is surrounded by trees. The trees are supposed to be cut back to provide 10 whole feet of clearance for C130s! It was a scary thing to taxi back into the woods, hoping you didn’t hit anything! The ramp basically looks like this:

The thing is, the base is built for fighters; yet the fighters are gone, and now they are trying to park C130s in an area that is totally unacceptable (well maybe not totally – we ARE making it work…)

Upon arrival at my hotel room (we’re staying in VOQ’s since the 50th Airlift Squadron out of Little Rock is still here), I ran into Gary Poore, a Nav from Dobbins I met last time I was here in Germany doing this. I changed clothes went over to his room had a beer, then went with him over to the 50th dorm where they were putting on a kegger.

While I was there, I ran into Burt Minor a Nav I flew with in Buffs at Griffiss. He is a contemporary of Dave Re, so a few years behind me. He is flying with Chicago right now, getting ready for that unit to shut down. Small world.

Called Laura to say I was safe and sound.