EOD Memorial

Hope all is well. I’m dropping a quick line to keep you posted on activities here in Baghdad. The weather over the past week has been very moderate relative to temperatures; basically it’s been in the high 80’s to low 90’s. The dust and sand have been kicking up quite a bit and visibility was limited to about 30 meters a couple of days ago. But I’m not complaining, it beats the heat that will be here soon enough. The tempo in the office has been fairly constant, with supporting active IPT’s, (many working daily with CONUS-based laboratories and commands), documenting emerging operational needs from the field, and getting prototypical equipment into the hands of the operators. Busy, fast paced days are the norm.

Last Monday, I had the privilege of attending the EOD Memorial held at the Al Faw Palace. The remainder of my entry this week will be dedicated to the Memorial. Around this time of year, many current and/or former EOD operators and their families and friends will meet, eat dinner and recognize the sacrifices and courage of past EOD operators who gave their lives in performance of duty to our nation. The most significant physical representation of recognizing these sacrifices is the EOD Memorial at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. The Memorial was dedicated on 12 June 1970. The design, consisting of four white cenotaphs, one for each branch of service, commemorates those who have fallen. There are currently 215 men and women whose names are on the memorial. They all were graduates of an approved EOD school and gave their lives on active duty as a result of an EOD mission since the declaration of World War II. Seventeen names will be added to the Memorial this year.

I’ve included two pictures that were taken at the Victory Base Camp, EOD Memorial. The first shows a tribute to the “Fallen EOD Technician”. As their names were called, the senior enlisted member of the respective service placed a pair of dog tags on the tribute. Accordingly, 17 pairs of dog tags were hung. The crest in the background is that of Task Force Troy, the Multi-National Coalition Task Force that is responsible for leading and executing the fight against the counter-insurgency Improvised Explosive Device threat. That is the organization I work for and support.

The second tribute was the empty table that represents the place setting for the EOD operator that will not return to his/her family. It very appropriately represents the sacrifices made when an EOD operator is lost. It is not isolated to the loss of that individual but also the loss felt by the family and friends of the war fighter. Behind the empty place setting is a table that has framed biographies and pictures of the 17 EOD operators that will be added to the EOD Memorial.

After the dinner, Major General Rick Lynch was the honored speaker. There were over 400 members in attendance at the Memorial at Al Faw. MG Lynch currently serves as the Commanding General, Multi-National Division-Center in Baghdad and the 3rd Infantry Division. MG Lynch is one of those individuals with a gift for inspirational speaking. His dialogue is focused while displaying a great knowledge of the English language. At the beginning of his talk, he walked straight over to the Tribute to the Fallen EOD Technician. He stood at attention and in a show of respect to all EOD operators, saluted the memory of the Fallen EOD Technician. He turned and spoke for about 15 minutes, but it felt more like 15 seconds. He highlighted three main points during his talk: 1) We are honored to be in the presence of EOD technicians and deeply respect the heroic work they do on a daily basis, 2) Their (i.e. those fallen) sacrifice was worth-while, it made a difference in defending our country at home and abroad and 3) All EOD technicians honor their memory through their continuation of being heroes in executing their daily missions. The M G was very direct in his remarks and it was very apparent that there wasn’t a war fighting community he had more respect for than the Joint Services EOD community.

Accordingly this entry to the blog is dedicated to the 232 names on the EOD Memorial at Eglin, Air Force Base, Florida. The image of the wall is seen below.

Outside the Wire

It has been a while since I have written. Sorry about that. The time has flown by and the longer I stay here the more the daily tempo of activity seems to increase. My routine duties, if you call anything around here routine, took a backseat about a week and a half ago. TF Troy was requested to provide support for a rapidly identified, high priority mission west of Baghdad and the J8 was directed to support the identified mission needs. Accordingly, with the robust size of TF Troy J8 at 3, two Majors and “moi”, I had the opportunity to personally support the subject mission.

While many of the details of the mission cannot be discussed or outlined in this forum, I will try and give you an overview of some of my generic experiences and insights. It was totally different than providing support in and around Victory Base Camp. Going “outside the wire” presented its own set of expectations and challenges. I do want to emphasize that under the leadership of the J8, Major(s) Stamm and Holifield, neither they nor I, would support a non-trained war fighter to venture outside the wire for a casual purpose. The mission was very specific, very well defined, and my involvement was as a participant, not as a reporter or observer. MAJ Holifield (PhD) the Uniformed Army Scientist that works within the TF Troy J8, led our support for this mission and provided me explicit guidance and direction when required. Such instances included (but were not limited to) logistics involving helicopter transport from Victory Base Camp to the Forward Operating Base and Force Protection TTP (Tactics, Techniques and Procedures) when riding in a convoy or when dismounted & executing the mission. So, while vastly different from Victory Base Camp, my best interests were planned for and well executed by my war fighting colleagues.

The mission and experience was unpredictable, productive, crazy exciting and at times very frustrating. As I stated, I can not go into details on what we did or where we were but I will try and give you a sense of the experience. While I didn’t expect to provide support in this manner, in hindsight it was a very fulfilling and interesting opportunity. We accomplished our mission objectives and goals with no unanticipated events or results. I really feel I was in the right place, at the right time to have been able to be a part of such an event. Now I’ll transition to a more explicit description of the details of the mission-accordingly, the one word that comes to mind is dirt.

There was dirt everywhere. On Thursday when we went “outside the wire” at the FOB, the winds were blowing 35-40 knots. At times, the sandstorm was so bad that visibility was limited to less than 50 feet. We had one day to accomplish the task so we stayed out, got dirty and completed the mission. We were either in mission prep or outside the FOB conducting the mission for over 10 hours. After the mission, MAJ Holifield recommended we take a picture to have a record of the dirt collected on us, and it is shown below. There was sand and dirt everywhere. I’m using the words sand and dirt interchangeably because the substance has the consistency of very, very fine dirt-almost chalk-like but you’re in the desert so people think of sand. For the first time during my deployment, I worked extensively with Marines. They are very polite but very straightforward, they are very casual in their demeanor regarding what needs to get done but very professional when planning and executing, and they have fun. There is the non-stop ribbing, joking and poking at each other while they do what they need to do. I feel similarly about my experience working alongside them as I do with their US Army counterparts – after working with them, taking into account their average size and capabilities, one decides very quickly that it is a good thing they are on YOUR side. Or better yet, you are on THEIR side.

The convoy out of the FOB was another exciting experience. When we drove from the base it felt like we drove for 5 miles before I saw any evidence of life. No dogs or cats, no running power lines – only the poles where lines were once attached – old tires and rims, light poles fallen on the ground, thousands of torn plastic bags, and general trash you would find at a dump (but no food trash, just junk). When we finally got to the edge of a village or house, it was littered with the same amount of trash, everywhere. Most of the buildings didn’t have roofs (they weren’t bombed or anything, they just weren’t completed structures), and the ones that did have a roof often times had a generator in the front yard with an extension cord running from it into the house. I didn’t see any lights on while we passed. It was around 0800 so it was daylight and I was traveling in the back of a 7 ton “personnel carrying” covered truck so visibility from my vantage point wasn’t the best. A picture of the 7-ton truck is shown below with two HMMWV’s. We were part of an 8 vehicle convoy and our truck was approximately in the middle. As we progressed along the route people, mostly children, lined the road. The children were jumping up and down, waving, and shouting something as the trucks passed. I asked after we arrived at the site what they were shouting, and I was told they were hollering for chocolate. The Marines often throw out candy to the children.

The transport to and from the VBC and FOB was interesting and frustrating, again very characteristic of a wartime environment. We traveled via helo both ways, both times flights were either canceled, delayed or both. I really felt fortunate to get to the FOB and back at VBC when we did. Both ways, going out or returning, I thought we were going to stay at the locale another night.

I guess I’ll sign off. But before I do, I wanted to highlight the details of another fallen hero who died in support of our country and OIF. Please remember, routinely, just like we all see in the daily editions of USA Today, our soldiers are paying the ultimate price for the freedom we enjoy in our everyday life. So in every effort, those engaged in moving technology from the laboratory to the war fighter need to feel a sense of urgency and a sense of personal purpose. Tech. Sgt. Anthony L. Capra, 31, of Hanford, Calif., died Wednesday, 9 April 2008 near an area called Golden Hills, about 6 miles west of Balad Air Base, of wounds sustained when he encountered an improvised explosive device.

He was an explosive ordnance technician and assigned to Detachment 63 of the 688th Armament Systems Squadron in Indian Head, Md. Before he was stationed at Indian Head, Capra was assigned to Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., and the 96th Civil Engineer Squadron Explosive Ordnance Flight. “It’s a huge hit to the Eglin EOD flight because we knew Tony personally,” Capt Shane Frith, EOD flight commander, said in an Air Force statement. “We won’t be able to forget his character and the way he represented the EOD community. The impact is tremendous on the local troops here.” In May 2006, Capra was among seven airmen from the flight presented Bronze Stars for their service in Iraq. Capra was assigned to the 688th in the fall of 2007. The squadron oversees the acquisition of bomb disposal gear and other combat support equipment for the Air Force. Capra’s other decorations include the Air Force Commendation Medal presented in 2006 and Air Force Achievement Medal presented in May 2002.

VT Tribute