The first leg of the mission took us to Sigonella, Sicily a naval air station situated near the town of Catania on the island of Sicily. I've flown in and out of this base many times in my career, but this was the first time in a Herk. What a difference!! In the C-5 they usually parked you almost up to the cargo building, which meant when you left you had to do a push back tow just like the airlines do when your backing out of the gate. Which meant they had to have a tug big enough to push us and a tow bar with extra shear pins because they didn't exactly know what they were doing. If they cranked the wheel to hard and over extended the nose gear you'd be stuck there. Or they'd get going and do something odd and if you stopped the aircraft with the brakes they'd shear the pin on the tow bar. To be fair it only happened to me once, but it was still a pain in the ass. Also, taking off heavy out of Sig you usually did a 62.5 degree flap setting with all the bleed air turned off to extract as much power from the C-5s turbofan engines as you could muster. In a Herk they could park you up against the building with your nose touching it and it wouldn't matter. Upspeed all four engines and throw the props into reverse and back out of there like your backing out of your driveway for a Sunday drive. As for getting out of there fully loaded in a Herk it's no sweat because the runway is long enough. There's a difference between a fully loaded Herk at 155,000 lbs and a mostly loaded C-5 at about 635,000 lbs (I think that's what I took off out of there with last time, but don't quote me).
Getting loaded there is fun because the loadmasters deal with the Italians at ATOC and the Italians even drive the K-loader and do the loading. Which was eventful because they told Shawn, our senior loadmaster, that they had a pallet 45" tall that could go on the ramp. Shawn said, "if it's 45" that should be no problem!" Then out of nowhere the K-loader shows up with a P-3 Orion propeller assembly on it! 45" it was not; not unless I shrunk several inches in heighth! The Italians were unfazed. They knew what they were bringing out, but they wanted us to give it a go. That was an interesting lesson I learned that it fit! Shawn put it on and closed the ramp while we watched the clearance on the propeller blades and hoped for the best!!
That actually wasn't the most eventful thing to take place at Sig on that Saturday morning. Yours truly was starving and since the talking heads (Air Mobility Directorate AMD) wanted us to leave on time we had two hours to wait. So we went to Big Al's pizzeria on base. After a 15 minute walk with the sun beating down on us, we arrived in the air conditioning and I could smell the heavenly aroma of authentic Italian pizza!!!!!! So I get in line immediately and order a large tomato and cheese pizza (alla Margherita) and proceed to salivate patiently. My ticket number was 65. We waited and each number was called. 62, 63, 64......69...Say What? The nav gets up and gets his very large pizza and sits down and proceeds to eat. I didn't know it, but he ordered the same thing I did only 5 minutes later.
I went up to the counter because I saw no more delicious pie coming out of the oven and inquired about the good ole' number 65, which comes before 69. They couldn't figure it out. Big Al sent his gal out to inspect the nav's pizza. When he saw her coming he realized he had my pizza, but was wondering what her intentions were. I'm watching her approach him and I see her opening his pizza box and I thought, "what the hell, she's going to snatch his pizza and give me a pie minus two slices?" Then Big Al calls her back and he starts making one, but by this time we have to go. So I ask for my muola back and she just keeps apologizing. Finally she was able to understand what I wanted and gave me my money back. Then I ordered a half a chicken and fries 'cause it was quick. While I waited the nav offered me a slice and when I tasted it I knew instantly how badly I'd been screwed. No chicken was going to make up for the loss of that delicious pie!!!! Sure enough, I busted out the greasy chicken on climbout and the fries were like rubber!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Damn it Al hire some competent people because your daughter's an idiot!!!
Off to Incirlik AB, Turkey after my pizza debacle! We took off again and with our precious, important cargo of household goods aviated toward Turkey. The cargo wasn't anything important, unless your the family who is waiting on these goods to start your life at your new station. I know as a kid experiencing this, having a few familiar items such as books and toys made the move a little easier so I'll live knowing some family got their pots and pans upon their arrival at Incirlik. The flight was uneventful. The controllers route you off your filed flight plan and threaten you if you don't make contact with them right away. That is truly uneventful when your flying in Greek and Turkish airspace.
We arrived in the evening and I was stunned by what I saw on approach. A quiet little air base with nothing going on. I can't express to you what it was like five years ago. It was a hub of activity for Iraq and Afghanistan. They had a tent city, fighters populated one side of the base flying missions 24/7. Billeting was hit and miss; sometimes you got your own room and sometimes they stacked you together. This time there were no fighters and very little airlift assets on the field. In spite of this they managed to park us as far away from the hub as possible so support sucked and you had to pack a lunch for the bus ride to billeting.
I would have taken pictures of the base, but getting caught would have allowed me to personally live the movie Midnight Express about the guy who lands in a Turkish prison. The Turks are the ultimate bureaucrats!!! They are very strict about everything. The air base is actually Turkish and no American flags are visible anywhere. I don't have a problem with that it's their country, but I have a serious problem with how they treat us given we also provide a presence that warns others not to frack with them.
With their bureaucratic nature in mind, we went into the terminal and processed through their passport police. You must have an original set of orders identifying you as a NATO member with authorization to transit Turkey. That, a military id card, and a set of crew orders gets you a stamp on your NATO orders allowing you into Turkey. Lose it and all hell will break loose!!! What's funny is they have now allowed you to enter their country, but that really only means you can go to billeting and maybe the chow hall. If you want to go downtown you need to pass bureaucratic hurdle #2: getting a pass. That involves going to pass and id and if your lucky the Turks behind the desk will grant you a pass after they run you through the grinder for a while. The maintenance guy who met our plane told us that it's been taking almost two hours sometimes for crews to get a pass to go offbase. Imagine, Turkey losing out on lots of income due to a pissing match. Oh well. It's their country and they have the right to lose as much money as they want. If your Turkish and want to spend your money in America come on in.
The crew went to the bowling alley for a snack and some cold beers. Me and Shawn stayed in our flightsuits because if we changed it would have been lights out (It was already 11:30 at night). After a Heiniken and some onion rings I called it a night. One thing about being on the road is that you have a difficult time eating healthy. Since you eat when you can you get pizza, wings, whatever is available, wherever it's available. I must say those onion rings were tasty after a 12 hour day!!!
After a six and a half hour flight the next day we arrived back home to a cold and rainy Germany. I took advantage of a lull in the weather and ran six miles on my favorite woody path. Then it was movie night with crew #3 (crew #2 is doing the duty in Djibouti). That is the part I like the most. The camaradirie of the group. We're all seperated from our loved ones going through similar experiences and we have a lot of fun when we're off duty (unless we're getting punched in the mouth).
I hope all of you have gotten the link to my pictures. Unfortunately I have to caption them in Picasa, which I had already done in my pictures folders so maybe I will do that this week. Anyhow I will post them in their own folders by trip now so you have an idea of where they are.
Hopefully tomorrow will bring a trip to the American and German cemeteries at Luxemborg!!!!!!
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