The Final Countdown

First - if you can read that title without the most baddass synthesizer line in rock history imediately kicking off in your head, then you're dead to me.

Second - today is our final day of training at NIACT. My platoon is gearing up for our convoy later this morning. There are two patrols going out before mine, but since Alfa Company runs by the cluster we all had to get up at 0-dark-thirty to eat breakfast together in a classroom and see the first group off. We're stocking up on ammo, cleaning weapons, and doing other important tasks (obviously internet nerdery falls high on my list of pre-combat prep work) prior to our mission brief and rock drill a few hours from now. What's a rock drill, you ask? Regardez, s'il vous plait.



A rock drill is a really low tech power point presentation. It consists of drawing up a map in the dirt, grabbing any visual aids available (hence the "rock"), and rehearsing a miniature mission plan prior to heading out. Above is our fearless convoy commander doing an initial rock drill yesterday when we received our first intel brief. We're expecting an ambush and mutiple IED's. Given the fact that I'm the 240 gunner in the convoy commander's vehicle and the idea is to test all hands to make sure we can jump into any position in the convoy if someone else goes down, we're all assuming our truck is going to get hit hard on the actual mission and both of us will probably die to create a little chaos. Sweet. O for 1.

Another high point of the last few days was Urban Ops. We learned some basic house-to-house fighting tactics yesterday. Though short but sweet once again, it was useful information and fun to put into motion. We formed an all JAG entry team for the practical exercise and received the highest marks of the day from our drill instructor.

Received out transportation brief at the end of the day. I will be leaving the US this week, although we'll have a few down days to enjoy the sucking void that is Camp McCrady before our flight. Local folks are taking leave and getting out to see friends and family. Those of us who are tourists will continue to sit around in a foul squad bay and be served meals by a grown man who wears a superman hat and refers to everyone he talks to as "cuz." Perhaps if I get motivated I'll take the half hour shuttle drive into civilization and buy more crap I probably won't need. We'll be in Kuwait a lot longer than we'd been told previously. At least a week - I was expecting 3 days. Sounds like there will be some good down time before we head into bat country though. I will do my best to keep in touch.

Show and tell time.



Kicking in doors with my new boss.



JAG team about to handle the truth.



El Duderino doing his thing.



240 rounds - the red tips are tracers.



HEAT trainer. It's a HMMWV roll-over simulator. We all piled in with our full kit on and got flipped to practice getting out of the vehicle in case we turn over in a ditch (very common, often fatal) or get turtled by an IED. This was very valuable stuff - it's amazingly disorienting to roll over in the thing and extremely tough to get around wearing so much heavy, restricting gear. Just finding my seatbelt latch was a task when hanging upside down from the ceiling, which used to be floor. Then of course there's the graceful drop onto your head, and it's on to awkwardly groping for the door handle, hoping your door isn't the one smashed shut. After a few tries I got an effective routine down and if I can remember it at the moment of truth I am sure it will come in handy.

Heading out soon - happy trails.