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Well we made it to Kabul ok and got settled in here in a few tents for the few days we are going to be here. Once we got settled in, we just unpacked and relaxed. Since we were wiped from the flight and had not showered in a few days most guys took showers and crashed…and I was one of them. The next day we had off while we waited for the other people to show up from K-stan. Everyone slept is as best they can, which was not easy because of the jetlag and because of the sunrise at 4AM that was blasting through the tent.
Over the last few days I also called home and talked to Christine and got on the internet with my computer to post these BLOGS and talk with Christine and the boys over Skype. We have talked probably close to two hours over the internet for free….you gotta love technology.
Things went fairly smoothly getting out of Camp Shelby and the US. The trucks showed up on time, the bags were loaded on time, the government vans were turned in without a problem and the barracks were cleared without issue. We thought we would sit in a tent at Camp Shelby for a few hours after weigh in and manifest, but instead we got off of one bus, walked into the tent, got weighed in with our bags, presented our ID cards and orders, and then got on commercial busses to head to the Airport. Of course the 41st BCT Chaplain was there to hand us a goody bag of USO donated stuff that none of us had room for. Some stuff was useful, but most got left on the bus. It was a big bag of stuff and we were already packed full.
On the ride down I was able to make a few phone calls to my parents, my buddy Ron Sneed in Alaska and of course Christine and the boys. I actually talked to them quite a bit and as often as I could. It was a beautiful day in MS and the ride to the military side of Gulfport was uneventful. We sat in a big hanger there for just a couple of hours. There I charged up my iPOD, which was mistakenly forgotten to be charged the night before and made even more calls. I spaced apart the calls as I was waiting on Christine to call me back. While we waited the baggage detail loaded all the bags. After the came back, several guys from the 41st and our team who were on the detail were unanimous in saying NY had the heaviest bags of everyone. I am not sure why ours are so heavy, but they are. Based on carrying a ruck for many years on Active Duty, I estimate mine somewhere between 110-130 pounds alone.
I was able to run into a surprise old friend in Gulfport. Amy Schlesing who was the embedded reporter with the 39th ARK BDE that my soldiers deployed to Iraq with was there along with the Ark. TAG and handful of Colonels to say goodbye to the Ark. Team. She was very surprised to see me, especially since the last time I saw her was at Ft. Sill OK in April of last year when my soldiers were de-mobilizing. I don’t think either of us thought we would see each other again.
The flight into K-stan was a good one. We stopped in Bangor Maine for a 90 minute stop, and were of course greeted by the famous Maine Greeting club. This “club†are patriotic citizens (most of them war vets back to WWII) that want to welcome and thank soldiers going to or coming back from either war. We also got to fest on some Maine lobster roll sandwiches and have two more drinks, which of course I opted for two double-shot crown and cokes rather than beer. I talked to Christine and the boys almost the whole time I was there as it would be the last time for a while. Our next stop was Hohn Germany, near Frankfurt. We spent about 90 minutes there and just relaxed and stretched out. Some guys had some good ole German bratwurst for a breakfast snack, while most just had cakes and coffee. The smokers loved it as they can smoke in the airport in Germany. I was able to make one more quick call home from there thanks to my calling card that was in the USO bag. I called Christine at about 6AM her time to wish her a Happy Mother’s day and to let her know I made it there ok.
Our last leg was 6 ½ hours long and was filled with snacks, food and movies as was the rest of the flight. The flight crews on all three legs were great, talking with soldiers, hearing about personal stories and just being cordial. The last leg brought us into K-stan about 22 hours after we left MS, and we landed into a cool 50s temperature. So that was 10 hours ago and now I am somewhere probably over Tajikistan or maybe Afghanistan by now. The bottom line is 1 year boots on the ground and the clock started when we landed at 2 AM, so that is the way home and glad we are finally here and out of MS. The next entry will hopefully be about my first day on the ground.
I am writing this BLOG entry tens of thousands of miles above Kyrgyzstan on the way to Afghanistan. It was only 6 hours ago that I was posting my entry that we made into theatre. However there was big error in that post and in the email I sent to a lot of people, we were not in Turkmenistan, we were in Kyrgyzstan. That is the kind of error you make after flying half-way around the world to an area that has more countries with similar names than you can shake a stick at. So my apologies to all that I told the wrong thing to. To give you an idea of where I WAS, Kyrgyzstan is bordered by the following countries; Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and China. The China piece was very evident in the faces of the locals working on the base, they all have heavy Chinese influence in their looks, almost Mongolian.
Anyway, it was literally less than 2 minutes after I posted that BLOG entry, while shutting down my machine that the Embedded reporter with the 41st walked up to me and said “Hey Troy you guys realize you are leaving at 10 AM.†I was pretty surprised he was the one that told me, but he said he overheard it at the LNO office and he knew our team along with Virginia and Arkansas were the priority to get into country first. So The CDR and I walked over to the PAX terminal and found that they wanted our bags lined up outside to be palletized in one hour. So after waking up the guys from their <2 hour nap we were moving bags again and getting ready to go. We are on a C17 with 4 pallets of bags and approx. 85 people. Mostly the three above-mentioned teams, but also a few from the 41st ADVON and what looks to be civilian contractors flying into country. We also learned that we will spend no time at the airfield we are flying into and we be in Kabul before nightfall. I am thinking that is where I will have access again to post this entry.
The lack of sleep has been catching up with me though. After manifesting this morning, we were all sitting on the “boardwalk†and I could feel my mind and body wanting to shut down. From all of my traveling I know the easiest and fastest way to whip jetlag is to eat and sleep on the local clock. This means no sleeping today, which will force me to sleep tonight. I caught a few 5-10 min power naps on the bus waiting to leave the FOB, and waiting to get on the plane. That will carry me through, as I am sure the adrenalin from moving up-armored and armed in a few hours during a couple hour convoy will surely keep me awake.
So here we are just 30 hours after we left Mississippi and we are crossing into the airspace of Afghanistan. When you absolutely, positively have to be in a war overnight, the Army will get you there.
Just a quick post to let all know that the team has made it to Turkmenistan. We got in about 2:30 AM our time. We are 11 hours ahead of EST. The flight time was about 22 hours total.
The weather is cool and nice here. I found the local 24 hour internet/java cafe. Access is not fast, but it is cheap. Not sure how long we will be here, but probably not long (<24 hours).
I will definetly write more about the flight and the stops later. I only slept 2 hours on the entire flight, but am not tired right now. Maybe becuase it is only 6:40 PM back home. I had a good breakfast this morning in the 24 hour chow hall so I am just doing some internet traffic and then trying to head to bed.
I have made a few videos with my Mustek Adventure DV3 video camera on this mission. I have uploaded these videos to my site for downloading and viewing. They are ZIPed up, so once you download them you will have to unzip them. After they are unzipped they can be viewed by just double-clicking on them. The link to these videos are;
1. 9mm firing
2. How to Aim a 9mm
3. Corner Entry Practice
4. SFC S demo
5. SFC S Teaching
I would also like to say that even though we validated, it was minus one team member. My very good friend and former Commander, CPT Michael Batt suffered a FREAK accident in the barracks one night and blew out his knee.
He is in Ft. Benning right now getting ready for ligament replacement surgery for his left knee. He will probably spend about a year in REHAB before he is back to 100%, but the Army will fix him,,,as they have the technology (Six Million Dollar Man theme in background). He will be missed on this mission for not only his contribution, but also for his companionship. I look forward to seeing him when I get back next year with his new DYNAMO-knee.
The training is done and now we are in a holding pattern. The last bit of training wrapped up last week with a MBITER radio class we had. It was another of those “oh crap†last minute classes we had to have. We went through our final Soldier Readiness Checks on Thursday and then the CDR and I went to a validation meeting on Friday to validate our team. The validation locked in the team ready to go. During that meeting we got a call about our supposed flight that was supposed to happen yesterday. In that meeting we found out that the old AF Murphy Law came into effect.
Our C17 that was supposed to pick us up on Monday all the way into A-stan was diverted to Hood to pick up some needed cargo. So now our pallets of tuff-boxes and B-bags are going on it, but we are not leaving country until this weekend. This is the third itinerary since last week, but this one locked in and is a better option than other ones we had.
So we had a few days off….Christine flew down here (with no kids) and we are enjoyed a few days together before I leave. Since our flight changed she stayed an extra day and we had a great time. We realized that in 15 years of marriage that these 6 days are the longest we have ever had together with just us. We spent a lot of quality time together and tried to make the most of it. Regardless if we were sitting in the car driving to Pensacola Beach or sitting on our balcony in rocking chairs outside our suite at the Point Clear, AL Marriot Resort and Spa we enjoyed being together and were very thankful for it. I had never expected to have these final days off, so it was a bonus to have it off and have her here. I really missed the boys and would have loved to see them, but that was in the “too hard boxâ€.
No idea where we are going in country, but it really does not matter as it all looks the same. I am going to try and do some more blog entries over the next few days before we leave, reflecting on some of the training here that I did not get time to talk about because of the op-tempo.
