Well, we lost another one today. Same road, same deal. Makes me mad… another good person gone… He was from a different battalion from last week, but it was the same situation. Why this has to keep happening, I don’t know… but at least he just laughed at me a few nights ago for the following…
Night-Vision Goggles, NVGs, have to be the biggest practical joke the Army has devised to pull on its soldiers. Sure, they come in handy if you are out at night and looking around for people sneaking through the farms and fields and skirting around the piles of cow poop that litter the fields among the half-mutated tomatos that seem to be the only thing that grows around here, but for driving, they are not nearly as useful.
The other evening we decided it would be fun to go bothering some nice people who happen to be related to a very not nice person. We decided that two in the morning would be a delightful time to pop in for some tea, so we piled into our trucks and I pulled out my NVGs and got to driving. Well, they decided to take a route I’ve never taken before. Okay, fine… thin dirt roads that run right next to canals with sharp turns out of nowhere. And oh yeah my vision is limited to a circle of green and black like a horrible video game from 1986. But that’s cool… onward…
So we are driving, and first thing is first I round the sharp corner to make an immediate u-turn to get onto the correct little dirt path and as I turn I notice that the truck in front of me is stopped… at a very peculiar angle. Apparently there was a really deep and really big hole in the road right next to the place we were supposed to be driving on and he didn’t know it. The problem that comes with NVGs is that there is NO depth perception on them, because everything is either green, a slightly lighter green, or almost black. So he was driving along and all of a sudden the front end of his truck was kissing the ground of a very large hole. So we got it towed out, had a good laugh, and he skirted the hole on the next attempt. He got a 15 on the running rating scale (that we haven’t figured out what it goes up to yet, but a 15 is rated as “really funny.” And did I mention it was the commander’s vehicle? He thought it was funnier than anyone else)…
So we continue driving and get to our first staging area for our little adventure with no further incident. At this point one of the HUGE Samoan guys that was running the show at that point wanders to my truck and says, “Hey can you move to the side so I can get these two trucks around you to stage for the next part of the op?” “Sure! The canal is on the left, so I’ll pull to the right.” “Okay. Hey, watch that little drop there.” Little drop… or something. To me, first of all, it looked like a flat field that I wouldn’t pull into anyway because fields are horrible to drive on and there looked to be fresh tomato plants in it. My gunner didn’t say anything about it, neither did the Air Force guy in my front seat, because both of them were also wearing NVGs, and so neither one had depth perception either.
But I didn’t try to drive into the field anyway. I pulled to the side of the road… and then as the gunner from the truck describes it, something of a natural disaster happened as the entire road from under my front right tire fell about ten feet into the field that I thought was right off the road. I felt the car dip, so I stopped and tried to back up, but since the truck, which is several tons, was resting on it’s front axle and about two inches from rolling over, it was best to leave it where it was. So I told everyone else they should probably get out, and my gunner jumps down and walks over and all I hear is him go, “AUGH! YOU ALMOST KILLED ME! AHHHH!” and start laughing hysterically (keep in mind that this is my platoon leader, who was down for a visit). One of my friends, another big Samoan guy, wandered over and said, “Yeah, everyone but the driver should get out. And don’t move forward. At all.”
So then comes the next funny part. My Air Force guy, who really wasn’t paying any attention at all, opened his door and, still wearing his NVGs, thought the ground was maybe two feet down, so he goes to hop down. His hop was about ten feet, and was much more of a tumble than a hop. If we had been recording it, we would have won a prize. He was picking prickers out of the back of his shirt the rest of the night. All I knew was that he disappeared… he landed somewhat on his head, which as far as I know did no damage anyway. I asked him later what was down there and all he said was, “Apparently a lot of thorns.” I found that rather entertaining…
So the nice Samoan gentlemen towed me backwards without incident. That was when all the drivers wandered up to the lead vehicle where the guy running the mission mentioned that maybe we should find a wider part of the road to do the vehicle passing… Good idea, my friend… good idea…
Aside from bumping another vehicle as I tried to pass him on ANOTHER too narrow road (it was a better option than the canal that was STILL to the left), the rest of the mission went pretty well. People do get cranky when they are woken at 0200 to tell us where the bad men with beards are, but in a country where everyone hates you anyway, what difference does that make?
So it was pretty fun. I only got an 8 on the funny scale, because the ground fell out from under the wheel so there wasn’t much I could do, but nevertheless. My platoon leader, now back up further north where he belongs, is more than happy to tell everyone about how I almost killed him. I told him to watch out and practice his rollover drills, because next time he comes out he’s going back out with me…
So ha ha, Army… thanks for the NVG. Very clever. Very very clever… the jokesters…
Great. Red alert. You know what that means… bladder is full. Just a few more months… As long as this week is the last memorial service I have to go to, we will be fine. I will have kidney stones by then, but we will be fine…
My heart to my patrol guys and their fallen soldier… thanks for the tow, thanks for being great…