Chickens

There’s not a whole lot going on at this point. Just a lot of rushing around like the proverbial chickens looking for all kinds of equipment for a deployment that’s still quite a bit of time away. I think I have finally figured out what the difference between “The Big Green” and My last unit really is. These guys panic at the drop of a hat. “We’re going to deploy in two years from now. Oh my God! We better start getting ready now.” Its completely unbelievable. Sometimes I just have to sit back and watch them pull out their hair. (Of course, some are already bald.)

If they could just sit back a minute, calm down, and do a little bit of backwards planning, everything will work out. Not magically, of course, it takes a little bit of work. But it doesn’t seem like they can bring all of their manpower to bear on a task. As an example, I’m running a phase on a Chinook right now. (A major maintenance cycle performed every so many flight hours.) I have more than enough troops to get the job done, but, true to Army form, they steal time from me. Ranges, duty, classes and numerous other things all worked to take around 39 days of work from me, out of a total of around 170, for the entire team. (I get one day per soldier, per 10 hour day. So, for a 14 man team, I get 14 days of work per day.) That’s a big chunk. I can understand the ranges, you have to stay qualified on weapons, but couldn’t my phase guys wait until the range that’s going on after the phase. (There is one.) Or, what about a safety stand down day? Everyone gets to go to safety classes, and then gets the afternoon off. Except for the phase team, we go back to work. So, we only get half a day then, don’t start any major projects. My favorite is the Brigade run that we just had to be a part of. Give me a break, like the Brigade Commander is going to notice that my team isn’t there, and is getting one of his aircraft back in the air for him. Jack-asses!

I’m trying to help out where I can. Trying to get the personnel trained up for the actual movement part. After all, I’m the only person in the company that’s done what needs to be done to move a Chinook more recently than five years ago. And one of three in the entire Battalion, and one of those is a First Sergeant. I have my work cut out for me. Just don’t have much support, and that is the worst part. But, I’ll continue plugging away at it.

I’ve finally seen a brand new CH-47F. (Southern accent here)
They shore do look pretty. But it’s a shame that the other Chinook unit on post is getting them first. We were supposed to, but because Boeing couldn’t get us enough aircraft in time for the next deployment, we got the other unit’s Delta models. (A little background here.) The other BN constantly bragged about how fast they were able to do phase maintenance, at around one week. Where my unit was taking about three. Well, apparently, they weren’t really doing anything. The airplane I got is a piece of crap. It looks like they went exactly by the book, and did not look at anything else. Sorry, but I refuse to do that. And to top it off, their maintenance practices leave a lot to be desired. I am suppressed that they had any aircraft that were able to fly. I know that until we have had a chance to conduct a phase on each and every one of the birds, I won’t fly on them unless I’m ordered too. Anyway, the reason I started this paragraph, I’ve seen the new F model. And even got a pic, but I haven't put it in my computer yet, I'll post it next time.




See ya’ll later.