troop letter: dirt sailor

August 27, 2008

Salaam Aleikum my friends,

It has been a very busy five weeks since I last wrote an update.  If you will recall, we had just put the CNO and the MCPON and all their strap hangers on a plane to Singapore and Hawaii and I was just back from 125F+ Qatar-no worries, it was a wet heat!  Since that time, I have made two trips downrange and a pass through Bagram Air Field to honor three more fallen warriors-two United States Marine Corps Officers and an HM3-hospital corpsman third class.

My first trip downrange was out to the ARSIC-C-Afghan Regional Security Integration Command-Central 201st Corps.  This is on the eastern fringes of Kabul and it is Camp Blackhorse.  I have about 30 sailors and officers mentoring the Afghan security forces, both army and police.  Met with them at a Captain’s call and recognized a few sailors for outstanding work and contributions to the mission.  From there, I continued east on a two hour and twenty minute convoy through the Tagab Pass and valley region toward Jalalabad.  I had reached my ass pain limit on that ride.  Beautiful mountain scenery and the route follows the Kabul river.  Very furtile green acreage and vast amounts of tree cover in this area.  Jalalabad is a modern looking city, by that I mean buildings up to 4 stories, paved streets and cement sidewalks-still very dirty.  Arrived at FOB-forward operating base Hughie at dusk.  Got my quarters and settled in after chow.  Met with about twenty sailors and a few US Air Force who were in my training class at FT Riley-they didn’t want to be left out, I guess the Army is getting to them!  After a quick 18 hours there, popped over to FOB Fenty, AKA JAF-Jalalabad Air Field to catch a flight to BAF-Bagram Air Field to attend the Chief’s pinning ceremony.  The night I arrived was when we had the fallen warrior ramp ceremony.  The Chief’s pinning is a nearly 100 year old Navy tradition of pinning on the Anchors to the newly promoted from first class petty officer to Chief Petty Officer.  It was an impressive ceremony-the only thing that would have made it better for those being pinned, was if their families, friends and shipmates could have attended.  I teared up as letters from parents and spouses from home were read-that was tough.

My second downrange mission was to the garrison that I helped build and start up on my first tour-Camp Clark in Nader Shah Kwot, Afghanistan.  It is located about 40KM from the eastern border with Pakistan.  This helo ride for a change was in daylight and on an H-60 Blackhawk.  Most of my movement takes place on CH-47D Chinooks and at night.  What an awesome ride-Walt Disney has nothing on this.  We were flying just above NOE-nap of the earth, definitely terrain feature flying though.  When you fly through a pass and the 10,000 ft+ mountain tops are above your rotor arc, and you are 50 above the ground, that is cool.  The pilots up front were doing a little ‘yanking and banking’, took me back to my SAR-search and rescue days in Brunswick, ME.  It was funny to watch the geep run into a circular grouping as we flew over them.  Some of the terrain reminded me of the badlands of South Dakota.  Many colored sand, dirt and rock strata.  Incredibly mountainous and arid, very hostile and barren, I wonder what the geep are actually eating-everything is brown and barren.  We had a fuel stop and crew rest at PRT-provincial reconstruction team Gardez.  I grabbed some lunch and then waited for the crew to return.  On our short hop to pick up some pax-passengers at FOB Thunder-in Gardez, the crew chief asked if I wanted to fly with the cargo doors open-I said, Hell Yes!  I was like a kid on vacation calling for a window seat!  Strapped in and hanging out the door in a 30 degree bank to my side, it was like I was suspended in mid air-to cool!

Arrived at Camp Clark in the early afternoon.  WOW, this garrison is all built up.  When I left JUN06, there were maybe 5 buildings up, now there are over 50 on the ANA side.  The US side has expanded to twice + it’s original footprint.  There were less than 50 personnel and now there are over 200 with an additional 100+ coming in next year.  Construction continues.  This is also the first garrison to have the rock perimeter wall completely surrounding the garrison perimeter.  Most garrison’s have just one side of the base with a rock wall and the other three sides are chain link and concertina wire.  One of the sub contrators had an inground pool built-I plan on taking a dip before I leave.  My team has been able to keep up the chlorine and cleaning of it.

Well folks, my fun meter is pegged right now-see you in a future ds sentinel update.

yours in service,

dirt sailor