Road Trips, Robots and Respirators

The Road Trip

Out here a trip to a nearby camp can be tempting. After finishing my shift from 11:00pm-7:00am I jumped in line to board a bus to a nearby base. The Lieutenant told me we'd be back around noon, so I figured it was worth the ride. I could catch up on some sleep later.

The bus looked a bit clunky and had that distinct rounded edges that most vans here have. About 30 of us piled into the back of this tiny bus which wasn't much longer than your average mammoth SUV (Ford Excursion anyone?). At first glance I thought "No way we'll fit", but somehow you can fold out extra seats into the aisles completely blocking off anyway to get off the bus quickly. Kuwait's Department of Transportation is obviously manned by flame retardant individuals.

So there I was, stuffed in the back, my feet scrunched up to my chin from the wheel below. I had to smile as we wheeled around in this death trap, swerving from left to right to avoid Kuwaiti's unique sense for driving. It didn't matter though, I was going to reach that holy grail, the big PX.

Now, a PX is a Post Exchange, sort of a military K-mart, and collection of mini mall stores. Where else can you buy, baby diapers and extra large ammo pouches for your body armor? Of course we have one of these at the camp I'm at now, but ours is miniscule in comparison.

After an hour of cruising the Kuwait highway we reached the cascade of checkpoints we needed to go through to enter the base. Inbetween some of these were roads turned to slippery mud from the downpour the night before. Our driver sped up and began doing powerslides and churning mud in all directions. Each slide met with a cheer of satisfaction and exhilaration by everyone in the vehicle. I glanced out the window on our final slide and saw a foreign national truck driver in a pink turban walk pidgeon-toed through the sludge.

Upon arrival we rushed into the overcrowded PX building. I headed for the mini food court section and to my right there it was... a Starbucks. I'm convinced that even in the seventh circle of hell there must be a Starbucks somewhere. I wasn't about to pay for coffee, the army has tubs if it everywhere, so I grabbed a bit of food from the pathetic pizza hut immitator.

Around this time I started to get incredibly hot. I was still wearing all of my warm clothes from being on the night shift earlier. There aren't many options for changing so I made my way to the closest rest room. I bounced around like a pinball in that tiny filthy stall trying to get those stubborn long underwear off. More than a couple people stared as I walked out red in the face and drenched in sweat. I think Cosmo Kramer put it best when he said "I'm out there, Jerry, and I'm loving every minute of it!".

I browsed the main PX building and only ended up buying a tooth brush. Yep, a seven hour trip to buy the same toothbrush I could have gotten at my camp. It was worth it.

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto

When I arrived back at our home camp I felt completely drained and flopped onto my cot for some rest. It didn't work out though, I was still somewhat wired from the trip so I decided to just stay up another day. An hour and a caffeine binge later I was feeling jittery and ready for our oncoming night shift.

Not two minutes after we had taken over from the day shift we received a call. The Lieutenant barked over the radio, "Suspicious package at the wash racks". Now, an average night shift is filled with minimal excitement so our driver floored the gas and weaved through the checkpoints with ferocious speed.

Normally I'm a gunner but on this night I was in charge of operating the radio, and in the passenger side seat, so I had a better grasp of what was going on than I usually would. The radio net was abuzz with chatter. They weren't sure where the package came from so they closed off the entire area. We were tasked with blocking a nearby entrance, which gave us a clear view of the package.

While the higher ups discussed what to do and shut down checkpoints close to our area we started to have a trickle of traffic trying to get by us. One was a Sergeant who explained that the box had actually been their for two days before they had reported it. From all the details floating in it sounded like it wasn't going to be anything other than a misplaced package.

It's standard for the Army to treat everything with suspicion. (Or so they say.)A new call crackled over the radio for EOD to examine the package. EOD which stands for Explosive Ordnace Disposal, do just that. They have the dangerous job of checking out possible explosives, and disarming them.

Within a few minutes they were on the scene and sending out their little robot to scope out the dubious package. To my surprise they radioed in for clearance to blow the package up! A call was made to find cover, so we jumped in our up-armored humvee and waited.

As an engineer you have a fair share of training with blowing explosives up. There's always that weird silence right before something is detonated preceded by an abrupt warning that it's about to explode. The blast went off, everyone flinched a bit and then the usual nervous laugh followed.

The all clear was sounded and we stepped out of the humvee and started our speculation on what was going on. Confused people started stepping out of buildings, startled by the explosion.

We peered at the spot where it had exploded and saw a person walking out from way closer than he should have been. He had wide eyes and once informed about what had happened he explained that he had fallen asleep and woke up to an explosion and an empty tent. We all started to chuckle.

Turns out the mysterious package was a misplaced tool box. Rest assured people, you'll never have to face the evil those tools were plotting to unleash on America.

Respirators

After a night of coordinating the annihilation of a box of tools one finds that they're very tired. Finally I was going to get some rest, and even better it was my day off.

I went to sleep and woke up the next day to the most vile scent I've had the pleasure of being subjected to. The tent was a sauna of rotten egg smell. At first I thought someone had brought some awful new food into the tent or someone had... ahem went a little heavy on the infamous baked beans at the chow hall.

Our tent is fortunate enough to be located closest to a nearby oil refinary to which a glorious byproduct known as sulfur is spewed into the air. It was so pungent after collecting in our tent that I dashed out as soon as I could. Outside was even worse, so I began a mad run around the camp looking for refuge. Right before I got to the recreation tent I started to dry heave. This was no good, it was tainted here too. Ah, the chow hall must be aired out. On the way over I saw a clump of smokers gathered around puffing away, impervious to the sulfur. It was hilarious, and I laughed and choked as I walked by.

The chow hall was alright, but it's only open for a set amount of time. There just wasn't anywhere to go so they recommended we stay in our tents. I was particulary sensative to this stuff, as well as a couple of my tent mates. We'd had enough so we threw on our protective gas masks. I ended up wearing it for three hours, but the fresh air was worth it.

From what I could tell, the nearby smokestacks that produced the scent and were normally lit had been extinguished that day. I'm hoping they never have to do that again.


Note: I've posted pictures in the previous post. (That's a lot of P's!).

Also I wanted to thank Ben for the great letter, and Colleen for the card she sent as well as my parents for the care package I received. As much as I love email it's always more fun to receive "snail mail".