So the first weeks have gone by, relatively UN-eventfully. Take 25 people from all across the world and put them in a building together, make them work, eat, hang, sleep, and exercise together, and you have the premise for a MTV show. Real World Qatar.
By the way, we arent an "undisclosed location in South West Asia" anymore, I am allowed to tell you all that I am in Qatar.
So, we are sitting around, doing what aircrews do (read: dodging real work). My phone rings, we got a mission. There are call signs for all the missions we do here in the Air-Evac world, and they are probably controlled info, but believe me, they are just like you see on TV. Something that sounds really bad-ass because the pilots like saying it over the radio. So I will make up one for the purposes of literary greatness. "Thunderpig 99" was going from Qatar to Germany with patients, and we are the crew tasked to take them.
In our myriad of regulations, there are very strict rules built in about what we are allowed to do before a mission. We went into "crew rest" meaning we arent allowed to do any official duties, they cant call us, and we are supposed to be eating/sleeping before a mission. Well, I woke up at 6 that morning, all jazzed to go fly, and pack all my stuff for an extended stay in Germany (planes magically break in desirable locations), so I wanted to have enough clean under-oos.
Nobody asked my opinion about when I would like the mission to go. We were slated to be alerted after 9pm, so I tried to take a nap. No such luck. Up all day, get the call at 9. Hit the DFAC for some snacks/sandwiches. Went for our briefing, and we were told the mission was canceled. Before we could stand up, the mission was back on. Then it wasnt. So we decided to wait. About 2 hours later, "THE MISSION IS DEFINATELY ON AND WE ONLY HAVE 15 MINUTES!!! OH MY GOD GET TO THE PLANE!!!"
Yeah right. Go to customs, sit. Go to plane and run all our gear on (>750 lbs) in about 5 minutes. All sweaty and ready to go, pilot saunters down from the flight deck and tells us the ramp has been closed for 3 hours and we cant leave anyway. Its now midnight, got up at 6.
So for all of you that are already afraid of flying, skip this section. Most of you probably assume that a plane is a magical car that is imbued with powers by wizards the government keeps on staff to perform such tasks. Little do you know that the C-17 Globemaster III is a giant tangle of wires, tubes, and dilithum crystals. Things break on it all the time. Same with the civilian planes. The key is to make sure the right combination of things is broken, and you can still fly. In this case, the fuel pump for the number 3 engine was not working. Should be a "hard break" right? (Hard broke: not going to fly. Soft Broke: probably will fly, lets give it a go.) Well, the pilot told her babysitter that she would be back in 2 days, so she was going to make it work. If they overloaded the fuel cells in the outer wings, they could pump fuel into the tank for numbers 1 and 3 as needed, therefore we don't need the pump in 3 right? Sure. Also, the statement "Do we NEED a weather radar to fly? My i-Phone says there isn't any weather in Germany..." was uttered.
Qatari's open the ramp, we load patients, take off. Everyone goes to sleep (patients) and we stare blankly at the wall. Up for 20 hours now. The normal 7 hour flight was extended to 8 (ahem...fuel??) because of head winds. Finally land in Germany (up for 28 hours, starting to get sorta tired...) get rid of our patients, turn in our super secret stuff, guns, get a phone, and go to the hotel. For those of you that havent ever stayed awake for more than a 24 hour period, the next morning, you actually come out of your fog a bit because your brain is used to being up. So we decided to do the only natural thing, go get drunk.
Two schnitzels, a Knudel, and 2 liters of beer later, we were all ready for bed. Slept 12 hours and started our "vacation" in Germany. But that is another story...
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Monday, January 6, 2014
The Tator and the Rockettes
Goooooooood Morrrrrrning North America!
Sorry about a lack of posts this week, connectivity at 38,000 feet is garbage. We will get to that in a minute.
Since we last saw our hero, tons of nothing has happened. We left our quaint military base in Washington state after 4 days of running around, getting issued an extra 200 pounds of green/tan stuff, and trying to fit it all into 5 bags. When I got to the airport, the very kind airport lady told me it needed to be in 4. So I got to be that guy, standing in line, cursing like a drunk sailor, trying to stuff socks/sleeping bags/body armor into a bag the size of a pillow case. Amazingly it fit.
Flew to St.Paul. If I needed to make a "de-Motivational calendar" I would take a picture of Minnesota from the air. Frozen solid. It was 12 degrees there, but we didn't mind, we were walking 3 miles through the airport to find out our plane was delayed. Eventually we went to Norfolk (read: Nah-fuk) Virginia. Checked into Navy billeting there and ordered pizza at 11pm. We had to get back to the passenger terminal by 7 to catch our flight. On a side note, the very nice (if prying) Ethopian man driving the cab did seem to know more about our flight than we did. He told us that the plane leaves at night. We thanked him for his concern, and smiled to ourselves knowing that he didn't know what he was talking about.
When we got to the passenger terminal, we were told the plane was delayed till 2. Went and had the worst omelet known to man:
Me: Ma'am, what is this? I ordered a western omlet.
Ham-beast: no you didnt. Its a spanish omlet.
Me: Yes I did, it had peppers and onions. What IS this??
Ham-beast: Its spanish.
Me: Why?
Ham-beast: Because of the sauce.
Me: Diced tomatoes from a can and celery is Spanish?
Ham-beast: You want me to...make you something else?
Me: I know better than that.....
So we went back to the terminal with full stomachs, and a strange urge for bull fighting and Tapas. When we got there, we spread out and took a nap.
At about 1030, there was an announcement, we would be getting box lunches (read: box nasty) at 1130. For the UN-initiated, a box-nasty is the remnants from food drops on third world countries that they will not eat, and send back over the fence onto military compounds via catapult. So we had that going for us.
At 1230, I went to ask about our supposed mystery lunches. "we lost them" said a young naval person that got into her uniform via shoe horn and a whole tub of Crisco. "and the plane has been delayed again, till 1600." My suspicions were of course that she had stuffed all the contents of the boxes into herself in an hour, but I wasn't exactly disappointed. At 1330, they announced they would be opening the "kitchen" at the airport to feed us. One VERY sad sandwich later, we were fed.
Finally, the plane arrived and vomited out 100 marines. We sat and watched them consume every scrap of edible materiel from the USO. After about 2 more hours we got on the plane.
There is a saying in the military: "it pays to be first." This was never more true than when getting on a military rotator. Being in the first 12 or so to get onto the plane put me up front in "business" class, with the better seats. That being said, we still had about 14 hours of flying ahead of us and no one was going to be comfortable. The flight was relatively uneventful. They played 4 of the worst movies of all time, something about a car with Selena Gomez in it. I suppose that if I had no talent at anything I would have a chance in Hollywood as well. Alas, my skills at bull-shit probably put me out of the rankings.
In Germany, we got off the plane for about 4 hours. Had a beer, wurst, roll, kraut and a nap. Learned that marines are REALLY comfortable with each other.
I don't even think that guy was sleeping.
We got back on the plane and went to Jordan. Mannas is HUGE from the air. Lights went on for miles and miles. Unfortunately we couldnt get off the plane there, so we just sat. And sat, for 3 hours or so. Got back in the air and arrived in Qatar in the wee hours of the morning. Customs, in processing, and chow, then sleep for a few hours.
Yesterday, we had 3 briefings about various things, but all of them included the phrase "don't piss in water bottles." Apparently, if you don't do very well on the ASVAB, you can serve your country by digging through trash looking for sensitive materiel that idiots like me throw away. God Bless the USA, and public education.
Took a nap, ate at the DFAC (Dining FACility) and went to the gym. It looked like a Nickleback concert in there. There were 700 dudes crammed into a relatively small gym, all of whom were sleeveless, covered in tattoos, wearing "Beats Headphones," and doing arm curls or bench press. Interestingly, my buddy "Perk" and I were able to exercise our legs relatively unmolested. One phenomena I was able to witness was two crowds of sweaty sleeveless dudes gathered around two machines. I initially thought they must have been where the "Monster" drinks were being dispensed. In fact, it was where the two girls in the gym were. It looked like 20 guys performing a Rockettes routine, just with their arms. Never have I seen more guys trying to desperately impress 2 people. Remember people, Herpes is forever.
Sorry about a lack of posts this week, connectivity at 38,000 feet is garbage. We will get to that in a minute.
Since we last saw our hero, tons of nothing has happened. We left our quaint military base in Washington state after 4 days of running around, getting issued an extra 200 pounds of green/tan stuff, and trying to fit it all into 5 bags. When I got to the airport, the very kind airport lady told me it needed to be in 4. So I got to be that guy, standing in line, cursing like a drunk sailor, trying to stuff socks/sleeping bags/body armor into a bag the size of a pillow case. Amazingly it fit.
Flew to St.Paul. If I needed to make a "de-Motivational calendar" I would take a picture of Minnesota from the air. Frozen solid. It was 12 degrees there, but we didn't mind, we were walking 3 miles through the airport to find out our plane was delayed. Eventually we went to Norfolk (read: Nah-fuk) Virginia. Checked into Navy billeting there and ordered pizza at 11pm. We had to get back to the passenger terminal by 7 to catch our flight. On a side note, the very nice (if prying) Ethopian man driving the cab did seem to know more about our flight than we did. He told us that the plane leaves at night. We thanked him for his concern, and smiled to ourselves knowing that he didn't know what he was talking about.
When we got to the passenger terminal, we were told the plane was delayed till 2. Went and had the worst omelet known to man:
Me: Ma'am, what is this? I ordered a western omlet.
Ham-beast: no you didnt. Its a spanish omlet.
Me: Yes I did, it had peppers and onions. What IS this??
Ham-beast: Its spanish.
Me: Why?
Ham-beast: Because of the sauce.
Me: Diced tomatoes from a can and celery is Spanish?
Ham-beast: You want me to...make you something else?
Me: I know better than that.....
So we went back to the terminal with full stomachs, and a strange urge for bull fighting and Tapas. When we got there, we spread out and took a nap.
At 1230, I went to ask about our supposed mystery lunches. "we lost them" said a young naval person that got into her uniform via shoe horn and a whole tub of Crisco. "and the plane has been delayed again, till 1600." My suspicions were of course that she had stuffed all the contents of the boxes into herself in an hour, but I wasn't exactly disappointed. At 1330, they announced they would be opening the "kitchen" at the airport to feed us. One VERY sad sandwich later, we were fed.
Finally, the plane arrived and vomited out 100 marines. We sat and watched them consume every scrap of edible materiel from the USO. After about 2 more hours we got on the plane.
There is a saying in the military: "it pays to be first." This was never more true than when getting on a military rotator. Being in the first 12 or so to get onto the plane put me up front in "business" class, with the better seats. That being said, we still had about 14 hours of flying ahead of us and no one was going to be comfortable. The flight was relatively uneventful. They played 4 of the worst movies of all time, something about a car with Selena Gomez in it. I suppose that if I had no talent at anything I would have a chance in Hollywood as well. Alas, my skills at bull-shit probably put me out of the rankings.
In Germany, we got off the plane for about 4 hours. Had a beer, wurst, roll, kraut and a nap. Learned that marines are REALLY comfortable with each other.
We got back on the plane and went to Jordan. Mannas is HUGE from the air. Lights went on for miles and miles. Unfortunately we couldnt get off the plane there, so we just sat. And sat, for 3 hours or so. Got back in the air and arrived in Qatar in the wee hours of the morning. Customs, in processing, and chow, then sleep for a few hours.
Yesterday, we had 3 briefings about various things, but all of them included the phrase "don't piss in water bottles." Apparently, if you don't do very well on the ASVAB, you can serve your country by digging through trash looking for sensitive materiel that idiots like me throw away. God Bless the USA, and public education.
Took a nap, ate at the DFAC (Dining FACility) and went to the gym. It looked like a Nickleback concert in there. There were 700 dudes crammed into a relatively small gym, all of whom were sleeveless, covered in tattoos, wearing "Beats Headphones," and doing arm curls or bench press. Interestingly, my buddy "Perk" and I were able to exercise our legs relatively unmolested. One phenomena I was able to witness was two crowds of sweaty sleeveless dudes gathered around two machines. I initially thought they must have been where the "Monster" drinks were being dispensed. In fact, it was where the two girls in the gym were. It looked like 20 guys performing a Rockettes routine, just with their arms. Never have I seen more guys trying to desperately impress 2 people. Remember people, Herpes is forever.
Friday, January 3, 2014
On the road again
Well, 400 lbs of crap can actually fit into 4 bags if you are holding up the line. No cavity searches yet, no hassles. St. Paul Minnesota has a beautiful airport.
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