Chaotic To Say The Least

I guess I need to start off from where I left off with the last post and then continue into the events of the last few days. The RVTT, Reconfigurable Vehicle Tactical Trainer, was a pretty good simulation that we were able to use while here in Kuwait. Its main benefit is the emphasis it puts on communication because all 4 vehicles that are part of the convoy are separated into different rooms. You go through the simulator as an entire patrol with 5 guys in a HMMWV in 4 isolated rooms to stress communication as well as command and control. It just helped us practice as a group. It was nice to be in the A/C but the mile walk there and back in our full gear sucked really bad. The heat makes carrying all of that weight so much worse especially when your sweat is dripping down into your eyes under your helmet.

Yesterday we went through an MRAP egress trainer which was awesome. MRAPs are the new vehicles that the Army brought over here to Iraq because they are supposed to handle the roads and IED explosions better than HMMWVs even though they are all really just as good as one another. Anyways, the egress trainer is a machine we go through to practice rollover drills and how to get out of the vehicle if it flips over or onto its side. It was like a contained roller coaster that you need to get out of upside down. It made me really want to go to Six Flags and at the same time reminded me that I shouldnt have eaten right before especially when we were suspended upside down just by the wait belt! After that we spent all afternoon down in the motor pool getting the guns ready to roll out to the range and making sure that all our equipment was set and ready to go for today.

Calibration and firing today could be its own post all in itself. Today was a complete disaster and a total wast of time. First off there was a whole timeline for how the day was supposed to play out put out yesterday, it had us getting up at 0300 this morning in order to load the vehicles up onto 18 wheelers because in order to fire live artillery in Kuwait we had to go over 2 hours away. The 18 wheelers were supposed to show up at 0400, they didnt get here until 0800. 4 hours late and I guess everyone in the middle east blames tardiness on "In Shalah" or "God Willing" but to me thats crap when they come late like that. That was really aggravating because we got off to a late start. My mood got a lot better when on the way out to the range driving in the bus we past 2 goat herders with huge herds as well as a ton of camels. I got a lot of pictures of camels and they were pretty neat to see just wandering the desert. It is a whole different world out here I dont know how the Bedouins survive out in the desert and in the heat with just camels all over the place. Then when we got to the firing point there were so many camels it was like ants on an ant hill. They were everywhere and myself and 4 other lieutenants had to try and go talk to all these herders to get them to move their camels off the impact area. Those communications didnt go well at all it was like we were trying to play pictionary with someone who had no idea what we were saying at all. It was pretty funny actually, we must have seemed so stupid. Then we took his picture with his main camel and that came out awesome! I cant wait till I can post my pictures up and everyone can see. The rest of the day was just very long and boring and tiring and tedious. We only shot 40 rounds and it took forever. After about an 18 hour day I am ready to take a shower and get some sleep.

Thank you to everyone that is following this and making comments. I love reading them and getting a chance to see who is following along and keeping up with this experience. Like I said I will try to get pictures up as soon as I can get Internet on my personal computer. Sending my best to everyone back home!