And we're off!



Addressing the families who
came out to say goodbye


After six months of anticipation, the day finally arrived.  I got to spend a few days with friends and family, and had a great time getting in last visits and fun things - golf, beer, cornhole, and home-cooked meals.



Getting ready to head out



After an 0400 wake up, I (and my small entourage of supportive family) headed to the 911th Pittsburgh Air Reserve base to say our goodbyes and board a C-130 bound for Fort Bliss, TX.

The flight was good, except for some bad weather in Missouri where we stopped to get the other half of our team.  A 2 hr flight turned into 4 hrs while the flight crew circled MO waiting to land.  We finally ran too low on fuel and stopped at Scott AFB, IL to refuel and wait out the storm.  After picking up the rest of our team, we finally made it to TX about 8 hrs later than planned.  Not bad for the Air Force.



Boarding the plane for the 3rd time



We have a pretty large team of 200 going through Combat Skills Training, so feeding, bedding down, and transporting that many people is a slow process.  We left Ft Bliss today to come out to Camp McGregor, which is actually in New Mexico.  Its basically a huge compound in the middle of nowhere that trains soldiers, airmen, and sailors the basic skills needed to go to war.  We're training Army style, so we're organized as a Battalion, with five companies of about 40 people each.  Those companies are broken into two Platoons of 20 people. I'm a Platoon leader and its going great so far, I have a really motivated and solid group of folks.  We have death-by-powerpoint for the first couple days, then a massive equipment issue before our real training begins later this week.  So no real fun stories to share yet, except that I saw a huge tarantula today, apparently its mating season and they're out.  It was massive and I'm not lookng forward to coming across any more of those guys.

911 CES

The Massive Tarantula

That's about all for now, we have an early wake up for PT at 0500, and so it begins..


  

Ready, Go!

It's official.  I've been gifted an all-expenses paid summer, fall, and winter vacation to the desert lands of Afghanistan, courtesy of the US Air Force. They may even throw in some combat pay and free gear.  Who's the winner now!


I will be assigned to the 577th EPBS, Expeditionary Prime BEEF Squadron, stationed in Bagram, Afghanistan, about 30 mi north of Kabul.  Our primary mission is to provide engineering and light construction support to the Army and Marine outposts in our region.  There will be about 100 people in my squadron, and we'll be gone for a 179 day deployment.


We'll be first heading at the end of July to Ft Bliss for Arrrrrmy training.  Combat Skills Training (CST), which will train our squadron how to defend ourselves and hold our own while outside the wire.  It's a thirty day course and we'll learn everything from convoy basics, close quarter combat, weapons training, medevac procedures, and cultural awareness and interaction training.  We're considered JET airmen, which means its a Joint Expeditionary Tasking where we'll be embedded with the Army for part of the time, so we have to learn how to play like them.  A little different from your typical Air Force deployment, but we'll likely learn and see alot more than your average airmen. Plus we get the opportunity to have a direct impact on the quality of life of our Army and Marine counterparts who are out there living in austere conditions, fighting the fight on a daily basis.  Cool mission.


More to come later.  Right now I'm in deployment "spin up" mode, trying to train and convince myself that I will be able to fully prepare myself to be an effective Air Force engineer down range in a few months.  All while attempting to comprehend but not fully absorb the upcoming void of being apart from my husband, family, friends.  Let the games begin!