Live from Afghanistan, it's Saturday night! Or, t_b_f's on the road!

hang in bud... 92K were at A-Day; you're still in a better place than Tuggabooga...

 

Just got a sa-weet care package from an SJer. A whole box of individually wrapped Java City coffee.

I opened it not 5 minutes after making an idiot of myself trying to make a pot in the big Bunn coffee maker we have. Everyone got a pretty damn good laugh out of it ... myself included.

Thanks, folks. It really means a lot to the guys and gals in the unit.

Everything is still going well over here. The temperature is steadily climbing, but most of the time it's bearable. We've only had one hotter-than-hell day.

The missions are keeping a steady pace, though we've had a couple of slow days lately.

We have a bunch of young pilots, so we're not getting to fly as much as we'd like. We're doing OK, though.

We've all had to learn this new maneuver ... a dust landing. Pretty scary stuff, but the more you practice it, the more comfortable you feel, just like anything else.

It happens insanely fast. Just before touching down (at a speed faster than a normal landing), you have to bring the nose up, which blows dust past your door. When the guys in the back tell you the dust is at your (the pilot's) door, you have to pretty much drop the nose from about six or eight feet. It's scary fast, especially for an inexperienced guy.

Just thought I'd touch base, and keep you guys up to speed. Thanks for the thoughts and prayers ... and care packages.

Later,

TBF

 

TBF -- can you tell us aircraft geeks what's the reason for performing this maneuver?

And again, thanks for your service to us all.

-TV

 

That was me.

Glad you got it.

Java City is the coffee roaster for Corner Bakery -- one of my customers.

They were happy to donate it when I asked. Enjoy.

 

This video is pretty well done.

Helicopters are susceptible to an aerodynamic phenomenon called "effective translational lift," during which occurs when a helicopter "outruns" the downwash created by its rotor system. You begin a dust landing when you're ahead of ETL, which occurs between 16 and 24 knots. When you land at zero forward airspeed, you're obviously below ETL and the dust you create envelops the entire aircraft, so you can basically see only a spot of ground immediately adjacent to the aircraft. Thus, we have to develop a technique to keep the ground in sight and the aircraft moving down and forward, not laterally.

If you lose sight of the ground, you can begin to drift laterally. When you do that, and you're close to the ground, you stand a very good chance of sticking a wheel into the ground and flipping the helicopter. Bad ju ju.

The terrain here is our No. 1 enemy. Forget the Taliban. Dust is the biggest pilot killer in Afghanistan.

 

Jeez, the stuff you deal with everyday.

Thank you so much.

 

Well, the journey is almost complete. Almost four years ago, I started training for what happens tomorrow ... I pull my first actual MEDEVAC duty cycle. We pull 48-hour shifts. We're on back-up (we call it 2nd Up) for the first day, and primary (1st Up) on the second.

We'll show up a little before 0700 and sign for our radios, night vision goggles and other goodies, and take them out to the aircraft. After that, we attend what we call a mission assumption brief, where we learn what's going on in the AO the next couple of days, get fresh intel and weather updates. After that, we go back to the helicopter, pre-flight, crank it up and check it out.

Then, we just wait for the call we all hope doesn't come.

 

3 safe flying. When you are primary are you waiting in helicopter for call or at base? What has been typical work load - how many missions would you be apt to fly in a day?

 

Good luck!

 

We wait for calls inside our CP, which is about 25 meters from our helicopters.

We've had one crew get as many as seven missions, and a couple get none in a day.

 

Bravo Zulu for making it, TBF!

 

Godspeed, TBF.