No S***, There I Was...

We had just performed a jump, moving from one tactical area to another. We has secured the area, and our area had a great overwatch position of the Armored Cavalry Squadron that we supported.

I had set up my copt and my other gear and was just getting ready to sit down and eat an MRE (probably a Menu #4, Corned Beef Hash (with Tobasco Sauce), when It Happened.

We heard a series of small booms, three or four of them. We got up and looked down into the area where the tanks were, and saw the smoke of the artillery attack. Immediately we jumped, grabbed our gear and ran to our helicopter. The pilots were going to perform an abbreviated takeoff procedure: battery on, flip a few more switches, then we hear the pilots yell, "CLEAR," to let us know the Auxiliary Power Unit was starting and to get out of the way of the exhaust - flame has been known to blow out during an APU start. So they yell and flip the APU START switch, so these gifted pilots of Army Aviation can get this bird out of the area and save my sorry ass.

Nothing.

"CLEAR - WE ARE STARTING AGAIN!"

Nothing.

The crew chief, Wes, immediately jumps on the top of the helicopter, and using his handy dandy screwdriver, rips off the APU housing and starts making adjustments.

In the meantime, I am taking a cover position to make sure nothing is coming at me or my crewmates. In the distance, I see an BRDM reconnaissance vehicle on the move, with the gunner shooting all kinds of people . I yell to Wes, "Whatever you do, oyu bett hurry!! I got a BRDM moving toward us!"

Wes, in the meantime, is furiously re-attaching fuel lines and other stuff. He yells to the pilots, "Try it now!"

"CLEAR!"

Nothing.

At this point the BRDM is about 30 meters away. I begin firing at the BRDM Gunner, hoping to get a lucky kill so they might not approach us any closer. Again I yell at them to hurry up. When I look back, Wes the Crew Chief is jumping up and down on the top of helicopter, screaming at the tops of his lung a 45 second stream of obscenities that would make the Sergeant Major of any unit proud.

At this point, the BRDM stops about 1o meters away and the gunner rips a three-second burst from his RPK light machine gun.


The Observer-controller gets out of his Hummer (the original one) and tells us all that we are dead, and to lie down for about 20 minutes, then drives away.

So, I stand up, go over to my helicopter, and ask Wes what happened that made me get shot by this stupid Russky soldier.

"The APU died." Gonna take three days to get a new one."

"Shit," says I, "I wanted to really get some flying done this trip, too"

Such was the experience of my first foray into combat at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin. I got shot because my helicopter broke.

So, I went back, ate my Corned Beef Hash and took a nap. Screw laying down and playing dead.