Mishap Story Time 13

by | Jan 28, 2025 | Military, National Security | 81 comments

The venerable CH-46 Sea Knight, the mighty Battle Phrog, now replaced by the tilt-rotor MV-22 Osprey

In (at least) Episode 9 of this series, I stated the following:

Always remember, Kids! Even under the best of circumstances, it can all go to shit in an instant.

One of my flight instructors, or my law partner shortly before oral argument in court (possibly both).

For readers of the other episodes in this series,1 it will be evident that this is a recurring theme in the life of a helicopter pilot. I had been back home from Yuma and my testing for the WTI course for perhaps a couple of weeks, when May 10, 1996, arrived. If ever there was a day that typified everything going bad in an instant, Friday, May 10, 1996 was just such a day.

One day shy of five years of commissioned service in the Marine Corps for me. Five years since I went aboard the oldest ship-of-the-line in the U.S. Navy, the USS Constitution, at the Charlestown Navy Yard as a (First Class) Midshipman, pinned on my gold (butter) bars, and then came ashore as a Second Lieutenant – an Officer of Marines.

A lot can happen in five years.

I was 26 (and a half!) years “old” when the phone rang around 3:00 AM on May 10, 1996. The phone next to our bed was a landline that also doubled as our dial-up modem for internet. When it rang, I knew immediately it was not good news; no good news is ever delivered to a base-housing landline at 3:00 AM. I sloppily reached for the handset in its cradle, but I was coming awake fast.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Barn, it’s Hubie.” I recognized the voice of one of my roommates from the Boat – Duane “Hubcap” Hubing. “There’s been a mishap…” I felt my stomach drop. In the military, death notifications usually fall to those closest to the deceased. I instantly assumed that Hubcap was calling to inform me of the death of our mutual best friend, Duane “Opie” Opperman – one of our other two roommates from our 6-month LF6F2 deployment, and recent WTI graduate.

That was the way the puzzle pieces were coming together in my head, so there was a long pause, but the rational part of my brain was telling me that we weren’t flying that night. I mean, I’m the squadron’s QA officer; I know when we’re flying because I’m the primary guy testing the aircraft all day-long to make sure we’ve got birds for the next day or evening’s sorties. Additionally, it only took a moment for me to listen and hear complete silence from the airfield, which was a few hundred yards from my front door. There were no airfield ops tonight at all.

Hubcap jumped into the silence: “It’s not us -”

And now I’m relieved, immediately tinged with guilt, because I know someone else has suffered a tragedy… but it’s not someone close to us. I park those emotions to be dealt with later.

“- I was gonna say…”

“It’s MAG-26… and it’s bad.” Now the puzzle pieces clicked together. Yes, it was MAG-26’s time in the barrell; they had the current detachment training for their LF6F – which meant it was HML/A-167, our sister light-attack squadron… The same Squadron and Group that had just lost Squire Edwards and a LtCol just 6 weeks prior.

“…bad enough that MAG-29 is going to be doing the investigation and the CO picked you as the Cobra rep,” Hubcap continued on.

“Oh, shit.”

“The CO says that you should take time to pack some things because it’s- you should expect to be out there at the crash site all day. You got something to write with?”

“What happened?”

“A Cobra and a -46 had a midair, with pax in back.”

“Oh. Shit. Okay, hold on.”

By now my wife was stirring and she knew what was happening from my end of the conversation. She rolled over and clicked on the light as I hopped out of bed and made for the kitchen to get a pen and paper.

The CO and Hubcap were right; it was going to be a long day.


I got a set of grid coordinates, plotted the location on my Camp Lejeune Special – our name for the unique map that we all used, a homogenization of several other 1:50,000 scale maps that all of the local squadrons used to cover our routine training and flying area. The crash site was inland from Snead’s Ferry Bridge, in the middle of some pretty swampy ground. Flying there would be a snap – even a boat from my house would have been easy – almost direct. But I was driving and would have to make my way on paved roads to get as close as possible and then hike in to the site. I threw a go-bag together of “stuff” that I thought I might need, got dressed while the missus made me a cup of coffee and I filled her in, and then I headed out into the dark. False dawn hadn’t started when I got on the road.

I knew it was bad before I even saw it; I could smell it. Burning fuel, metal, fiberglass, and alloys, and whatever other toxic chemical compounds make up a helicopter. I saw a couple of cars parked along the side of Snead’s Ferry Road (Highway 172) not too far east of the bridge. I parked as far off the road as I could, got out of my car, and started walking toward the treeline. I had seen a couple of people, shadowy figures in the night, going into the woods, and then flashlights bobbing around in the darkness like fireflies. As I got close, I saw 4’ x 8’ sheets plywood on the ground, forming a makeshift bridge through the woods, which quickly turned into swamp as you moved north toward the crash – and got closer to the New River. Someone got out of a car across the road behind me – I heard the door close – and there was some yelling, and then voices, saying, “This way. Come this way!”

Rough Area of the Crash and Debris Field Circled

I started following the plywood path through the woods, missed a few turns and steps – and found myself hip deep in swamp. I pulled my leg out, turned left, and kept moving toward the sound and the smell. Eventually I found the Forward Air Controller/MEU Air Officer who had been on the ground in a nearby LZ3 when the crash happened.

Fourteen people died Friday when two Marine Corps helicopters collided in darkness and crashed into swampy pine woods during the largest U.S.-British training exercise in history.

There were two survivors. Rescue workers had to wade into chest-deep mud and water to search for bodies, said Maj. Steve Little, Camp Lejeune’s public affairs officer.

“It is waist-high and chest-high mud,” Little said, explaining the difficulty in removing bodies and in taking a small army of reporters to the crash site, which is 600 yards from the nearest road.

Col. J.C. Yannessa, returning from the scene to brief reporters, wore a uniform water-stained to the top of his shirt pocket. He said the terrain was so thick that rescuers had to cut through with chain saws [sic].

By mid-afternoon, crews had retrieved 11 bodies, all extensively burned by a fire that broke out upon impact, said a Pentagon official speaking on condition of anonymity. Dental records will be needed for positive identification of the remains, he said.

“Our hearts go out to the families, the friends, the loved ones of those who lost their lives,” President Clinton said at the White House.

Fisherman David Milbourne heard the crash while pulling shrimp nets.

“It sounded a lot like a 18-wheeler crashing into a wall,” he said.

The crash involved a CH-46 Sea Knight and an AH-1 Cobra from the Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 266 based at New River Marine Corps Air Station. Troops aboard the aircraft were assigned or attached to a battalion landing team of the 2nd Battalion, 8th Regiment of the 2nd Marine Division, whose headquarters are here.

The aircraft were participating in Operation Purple Star, war games involving 38,200 U.S. troops and 15,600 British troops massed off the North Carolina coast this week.

Greensboro News and Record (NC), May 10, 1996

How Does This Happen?

“One of the things I confess I did not fully appreciate until I became president was how dangerous the day-in and day-out, the year-in and year-out work of our military, just training, just doing the defense of our country, is.”

Pres. Bill Clinton

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Pentagon said at least 14 American servicemen were killed and two remained hospitalized in critical condition following a collision between two U.S. Marine Corps helicopters taking part in massive military exercises in North Carolina early Friday morning.

The accident occurred in the middle of a mock invasion of North Carolina. It was the largest United States exercise in decades, involving more than 50,000 troops from the United States and Britain.

When dozens of helicopters are in the air at once, a commander’s biggest worry is a mid-air collision. This sort of training is supposed to help soldiers learn to avoid such an accident. Civilians often underestimate both the value of such exercises and the danger involved. Even President Clinton admitted, “One of the things I confess I did not fully appreciate until I became president was how dangerous the day-in and day-out, the year-in and year-out work of our military, just training, just doing the defense of our country, is.”

Night vision a factor?

Under a typical training scenario, the AH-1 Cobra gunship, with a crew of two, would have flown in first to practice suppressing enemy ground fire. Its maneuver would have cleared the way for the CH-46 Sea Knight, a twin rotor transport helicopter, which in this case was carrying at least 12 Marines, a Navy sailor, and an Army soldier.

It is not yet known why the choppers collided. As Maj. Steve Little of the U.S. Marines said, “The weather was clear. We had a half moon. I do not believe that weather was a factor, although I would not want to speculate or rule out any cause.”

CNN, May 10, 1996

Helicopters Fly by Miracle and Fall Like Safes.

There were essentially three separate crash “sites”, plus a debris field over a few hundred yards because of the speeds involved, directions each aircraft were traveling, and how the crash unfolded. This was a night-vision goggle mission with the two AH-1W SuperCobras “sprinting ahead” of the transport helicopter to simulate having “cleared” a Landing Zone. Then the Cobras would circle the LZ at 500’ AGL, with the CH-46 carrying 12 passengers, coming in “behind” the Snakes on a slight delay, perhaps a minute, from the south at 300’ AGL.

Somehow, despite the altitude and time separation baked into the plan, one of the Cobras and the CH-46 wound up occupying the same exact piece of airspace at the exact same moment. The picture just below shows – from the Cobra’s view – the relative position of the aircraft upon impact. The Phrog was traveling north.

The blade of the Cobra struck just in front of where the open door is, traveling aft to the fuel sponson above the gear, igniting it.

The Cobra’s front seat pilot, 1st Lt Joe Fandrey, lived right at the entrance to officer base housing, on LongStaff Street; we lived at 25 Longstaff. He and his young wife had a new baby, as I recall. I can’t say we knew them well, but New River Officer Base Housing circa 1996 was not a big neighborhood. Captain Scott Rice was in the backseat; Scott and Susan Rice also lived in base housing, not far from us. In the instant before impact, at roughly 375 feet above the ground, in the early morning hours, traveling west at roughly 130 mph, the Cobra likely caught a glimpse of the 46 through their night vision goggles (NVG’s), a miracle of modern technology, but with two deadly limitations.

Of Cylons and Toilet Paper Rolls

The ANVS-6s snap onto the front of a pilot’s helmet and then can be rotated down in front of your eyes and it is not an exaggeration to say that it, or “they,” turn night into day. It’s miraculous.

Photons of light enter the optics and those electrons are “excited” by being bounced off of a wafer that magnifies the existing light, producing an instantaneous and accurate image – in shades of green – of events and objects that are otherwise, to the naked eye, encased in complete darkness. For our purposes, it’s what we called “FM.”44 The well-known limitation of them is that they only have a 40º field of view; it’s like looking through a toilet paper roll. Everything outside of that roll, however, is inky black darkness.

In training you learn to keep your head moving constantly, all around, while flying on goggles, like the Cylons in the original “Battlestar Galactica.”

This kind of cylon, with the eye moving back and forth
Not THIS kind of cylon, although…meow.

We set our interior cockpit lights very low on blue or green light, so we can look under the goggles to see the engine gauges, the navigation instruments, and the weapons systems. I didn’t even have 1000 flight hours when I left flying, but I had my “century patch” – 100 hours of NVG flight time. This should not be read as a boast – guys in the Nightstalkers have thousands of NVG hours. I say it instead as a statement of base-level competence and experience with the technology, only to add this: it is very common to have people like me executing extraordinarily complicated missions at nighttime in close proximity to other aircraft with all of operating “blacked out” – no lights on at all – because we have NVGs and normal aircraft lights would “white out” the goggles.

We used to fire 5” rockets, the Zunis, like the ones you see in old Vietnam era war movies or film footage, coming off of F-4 phantoms in diving fire. We could fire them off of the Cobra – and they are very accurate. They fly very straight because they have a big motor, but when firing them at night, right before pressing the button to launch the rockets, I would notify the other pilot and we would both look away – that is, we would turn our heads to the opposite side of the rocket being fired and close our eyes momentarily – so as not to have our night vision ruined from the flames coming off of the motor as it ignited and burned, AND because it would temporarily “white out” the NVGs, making them useless for a bit.

Goggles are designed to work (optimally) in low-light conditions. They’re useless in daytime because when there is a large source of light, it floods the optics and they stop working. The same is true even at night if there is too much light entering the excitation chamber. Parking lots, RV parks, any built-up area constitutes a massive amount of “light noise” for goggles.

The field of view limitation of NVGs has been cited in dozens of mishap investigation reports, probably hundreds. It’s very frequently a causal factor because we do missions on NVGs that are dangerous if done in the full light of day in VFR conditions – with the full capacity of the human eye. Operating tactically around LZs is not like “regular” flying on the airways at a specified heading, direction, and altitude. As you move your head around, you are essentially abandoning what you just saw, but keeping it in your memory, trying to build and update a complete “picture” what’s happening within your own small FOV and around you – the locations of objects on the ground, other aircraft, towers, and, in lighted areas, ‘light obstructions’ that can white out the goggles at inopportune moments.

Why did I tell you all of this about NVGs? [Foot stomp.]

A Little Too High, A Little Too Low, and Blinded by the Light (at least).

The pilot of the 46, the senior man, was sitting in the right seat, and the Cobra blade struck just aft of his seat, knocking him unconscious – and into a coma – for several weeks after the crash, IIRC. The kevlar armor he had around his seat probably saved his life.5 There were 6 people on the “right” side of the aircraft, the side closest to us in the picture above – and 6 across the other side, in the drop down mesh seats.

The Cobra went down to the left (from its perspective) almost immediately after the midair and crashed, catching fire. The 46 continued northward, the junior man, a first lieutenant, went for the ground, trying simultaneously to starve the aircraft fire of fuel and hold a burning aircraft together, as it twisted and bucked. As he flared above the trees, the helicopter snapped in half, the aft, passenger compartment, falling to the ground upside down; while the pilot’s compartment crashed through the North Carolina pines to the ground.

We worked all day long, and many nights, interviewed everyone we could, listened to the radio calls, plotted the aircraft tracks, had testing done on everything we could – we even did a “reconstruction” flight (Day, VFR) as a group to test our hypotheses as to what happened. There was no gross negligence, no “Bud Holland” like aspects to any of the crew’s actions, top to bottom.

There were three significant factors – that the Cobra was “a little low” from their 500’ altitude, and the 46 was “a little high” from its 300’ foot altitude, was an obvious combined error turned into a fatal combination, HOWEVER, two other factors were also critical. First, the timing was off despite both aircraft flying their routes “as briefed”. Sometimes, things just don’t work like they do in practice and the Cobra was supposed to at the Zone a full minute ahead of the 46. Had that been true, the Cobra undoubtedly would have had time to get “set up” on altitude, visually acquire the incoming 46, and there is no midair. Instead, the 46 seemed to be a little quicker on its route than practiced, and the Cobra a little slower than usual, and immediately after the Cobras made their first pass over the Zone and turned around – boom. The 46 was there.

Second, the 46 was coming in at a slightly different angle than the last time and, if you look up at the aerial photo, you can see that the LZ sits just north of Courthouse Bay, which has an Exchange, convenience store, some parking lots, and a bunch of big light poles with night-time parking/security lights. If you look across the River, you can also see an RV park. That whole coastline had a bunch of big light poles and bright lights, as well.

After doing some flying over there ourselves, and doing a reenactment flight, it seemed to all of us on the Mishap Board that – combined with the timing issue and being off altitude – the NVG limitation in Field of View and the bright back-lighting made the 46 all but “invisible” as the Cobra came out of its turn. It was just a fatal combination of several individual factors that resulted in 14 people dead.

I’m getting the length warning on this note, so I’ll save the “rest of the story” and my final thoughts on the whole tragedy for comments. My condolences to the families and loved ones of all of those who perished.

Maj Michael Kuszewksi*
Capt Scott Rice
1st Lt Joe Fandrey
1st Lt Arthur Schneider
Cpl Brandon Tucker
Cpl Brian Collins
Cpl Britt Stacey
Cpl Erik Kirkland
LCpl John Condello
LCpl Jackie Chidester
LCpl Jose Elizarraras
LCpl Jorge Malagon
HN Brent Garmon (USN)
SSgt Sean Carroll (US Army)
*posthumously promoted to LtCol

  1. For better context – and better readership stats for my ego – you should probably read the prior pieces at my Substack: AMST IntroAMST 1AMST 2AMST 3AMST 4AMST 5AMST 6AMST 7AMST 8AMST 9AMST 10, and AMST 11. ↩︎
  2. “LF6F” is the abbreviation for “Landing Forces, 6th Fleet.” When a Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) goes on a “Med Float” for 6 months to keep an eye on things in that part of the world, we are part of the “Landing Force” for the 6th Fleet of the U.S. Navy. ↩︎
  3. Landing Zone – essentially a large, open field in the pine forests of North Carolina that aircraft could land in and pick up troops. ↩︎
  4. Anything of sufficient technical complexity beyond lay understanding is, for all intents and purposes, “F***ing Magic.” ↩︎
  5. All helicopter seats either had, or were retrofitted, with these kevlar armor panels, which we all used to mock because they seemed very unlikely to stop any but the smallest of calibers. It did its job here. ↩︎

About The Author

Ozymandias

Ozymandias

Born poor, but raised well. Marine, helo pilot, judge advocate, lawyer, tech startup guy... wannabe writer. Lucky in love, laughing 'til the end.

81 Comments

  1. UnCivilServant

    Anything of sufficient technical complexity beyond lay understanding

    Define Lay Understanding – I think I missed the installment where that was covered.

    • Ozymandias

      You could excise that term and its a better sentence: anything of sufficient complexity is FM.

      • UnCivilServant

        Fair enough.

        I was reflecting on the variety of specialty knowledge reflected in this audience and got into the weeds of definition.

      • juris imprudent

        I still feel that way about collecting RF input down an antenna, through filters and amps, detecting the signal of interest out of all of that and transforming the analog to digital bits and thence to voice or data.

      • Ownbestenemy

        RF to IF or in my case, RF to IF to video. All amazing how we encode/decode data based on frequency modulation or amplitude modulation. Never mind the digital stuff.

  2. Yusef drives a Kia

    Fucking Magic, how does it work?
    You are the Man Ozy, a sad day for the Corp though,

    • Ozymandias

      Yep. It was decidedly not good.

  3. Sensei

    Thanks Ozy. That’s just an awful story. RIP.

    One of my super nerdy YouTube channels with a focus on Asia, its politics and the semiconductor industry worldwide.

    The Plates & Tubes Behind Night Vision

    • Ownbestenemy

      Seconded on the story on both fronts.

    • Ozymandias

      Thanks, Sensei. Super cool video on NVGs.
      I loved my ANVS-6s, but I know guys who were scarred by the full-face 5s – and the requirement to focus one ocular inside the cockpit and one outside.
      Some dudes got splitting headaches or would get nauseous during flying.
      Crazy shit.

  4. kinnath

    Another amazing story.

  5. kinnath

    The snarky side of me wants to claim we can solve all of these problems with drones and robots.

    But, I know it ain’t true.

    A friend in college was a Vietnam era helicopter pilot. He was a trainer. He filled me fill of humorous stories. But he left these stories out.

    You have my utmost respect.

    • Ozymandias

      Thanks, kinnath. It all kinda seems like it was someone else doing it now looking back.
      …somebody a lot stupider than I am now!

      • kinnath

        I have no stories to equal yours.

        But I look back on my business travel to Moscow in the middle 90s when the Chechens were bombing the trains and trolleys in Moscow, and I am shocked at how stupid I was to do that.

        That’s life I guess. You get less stupid as time goes on, or you perish young.

  6. DEG

    The well-known limitation of them is that they only have a 40º field of view; it’s like looking through a toilet paper roll. Everything outside of that roll, however, is inky black darkness.

    I had a “Oh no” feeling when I read that.

    TOK: I saw on the dedthread you wife got your daughter. This is good news.

    • Ozymandias

      Oh, yeah, it is freaky. I wanted to say more about this but decided it was too much without writing an entirely new article.
      What’s really happening is that your brain is stitching together an approximation of Reality based upon these slices/images you pick up from each area as you look around while traveling through the darkness. It’s liking playing sports like ice hockey where you catch glimpses of the ice, but never the full picture, and you have to build a rough idea of where people are based upon direction of movement, last direction of travel, track the direction of the puck, etc.
      Except you’re in the air, and there are other aircraft, and trees, and wires, lights, etc.

    • The Other Kevin

      Thanks. Both are here safe. Tomorrow we start the rebuild. 🙂

      • juris imprudent

        Let me appropriate Sean’s avatar to express myself.

      • SarumanTheGreat

        Congratulations on the rescue!

  7. Suthenboy

    I am sorry you had to experience that. I am sorry anyone ever has to. Sorrier still for those that lost their lives.

    It leaves a mark.

  8. Tundra

    Not THIS kind of cylon, although…meow.

    Dammit, all the awesomeness in this entire article has fled my feeble brain!

    Thanks, Ozy! I’m shocked and thrilled you are still here.

    • Ozymandias

      My Bruins are getting worked by Buffalo right now. Correction – it’s Tage Thomson 3 – Boston 1 (the rest of Buffalo has chipped in with 1).

      • rhywun

        My Bruins are getting worked by Buffalo right now.

        Sorry not sorry.

      • Ozymandias

        The B’s are a wimpy shell of their glory years.

      • rhywun

        At least you have glory years to look back on.

      • rhywun

        @Raven

        I don’t live in Rangers territory anymore. I was a fan of convenience for a while but I support the team(s) I grew up with now.

      • Tundra

        Avs got prison-raped by the Islanders.

  9. robodruid

    So i got two copies of the fork in the road letter.

    Going to get interesting.

      • robodruid

        If you say you will resign, you may get to stay WFH until Sep 30th. With lots of wiggle room.
        https://www.opm.gov/fork

        all very humane of course.
        Its a mass email sent to everyone.

        Interesting times.

      • UnCivilServant

        Ah.

        I hadn’t heard it called that in the outsider’s perspective.

      • kinnath

        Short window.

        Aggressive play by the administration.

    • juris imprudent

      As TOK said this afternoon, it is obvious Trump has learned. To tie back to Ozy’s reference – he’s back and this time he has a plan (and unlike BSG – we can see what the plan is developing into).

      • Brochettaward

        Experience combined with the reality that he might actually win.

        I don’t think even he believed he’d beat Hillary in 2016.

      • robodruid

        Oh I agree. And cut spending.
        But civilian jobs on military bases are not covered by this??????
        Feels like shooting from the hip, we will see.

      • dbleagle

        Civilian jobs on military bases ARE covered by this. I work on a base and when the email arrived today a whole bunch of work stopped, and discussions began.

    • rhywun

      “Resign”

      Not worth the 30% or so pay cut that moving to a more expensive city and commuting would require.

      But my POV is colored by the fact that I was hired during the plague.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Yeah knew something was coming with the ‘test’ emails from OPM. Seems focused on folks that are freaking out about WFH being yanked.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Early retirement or buyouts in the private sector that I have been around have always worked the opposite of what they were intended to do.

      The best workers who have options to get another job somewhere else take the money and run. The company loses on some of its best workers. The ones who stay are the slugs who know that their current job is their only hope.

      I’m not sure why the govt would be that much different?

      Don’t get me wrong, this is great news. We should be firing a ton of govt drones. I’m just a bit worried that the 3 or 4 actual productive workers will leave because they can get another job.

      • slumbrew

        “Brightsizing”

      • rhywun

        The ones who stay are the slugs who know that their current job is their only hope.

        Wasn’t gonna say it but that is my thought too.

      • trshmnstr

        Sort of like how the people who are good at their jobs and happy to stay in them get laid off because their salary doesn’t match the role, but the blowhards always seem to miss the cut because they’re always hopping between roles and are new to the job when layoffs come around?

  10. SarumanTheGreat

    “pretty swampy ground”

    I’ve had to slog my way through terrain like that while performing botanical surveys in the Delmarva. Not fun at all. There were times when forward progress was a hundred yards in half an hour. The hellbrier was the worst (a woody vine whose stems are covered with innumerable needle-like spines). I avoided stands of that whenever i could.

    Clinton was right; most civilians don’t appreciate much less understand how hard and dangerous training for combat situations is. Including myself.

    • Pope Jimbo

      During Team Spirit ’88 (South Korea), we showed up early in the spring and a lot of our squadron area was simple mud. We strung our concertina wire across it but only staked it where we had somewhat solid ground to pound the stakes into.

      A week or so later, someone from some group came around inspecting things and noticed that not all our concertina was staked down. We were told to get out there and stake it down properly. Our protests that the wire was over pure mud were ignored and we were told to hop to it.

      So after a long argument amongst us junior enlisted folks about the intricacies of rank (we were all E-4’s, so we had to argue about time in rank, time in service, etc) the short straws were distributed. Me and two other guys got to slog through waist deep mid to hang some stakes on the concertina wire.

      The last laugh, though was when our Sgt Major passed by while we were doing this and saw some of the other E4’s giving us shit. After we got back “ashore”, he pointed out that there was really nothing holding those stakes securely to the wire. So he sent the next set of shitbirds (who had just been giving us a hard time) out to tie the stakes to the wire.

      The life of a junior enlisted puke!

      * By the time we were leaving, the mud had dried solid as concreted. After trying to get out the first stake, we borrowed an acetylene torch from a neighboring squadron and cut off the rest of the stakes before any staff NCO’s could get any bright ideas.

  11. slumbrew

    Thanks, as always, for this series, Ozzy.

    And, oy, the Bs tonight…

  12. Pope Jimbo

    Thanks for these stories Ozzy. Brings back memories of my time in the Suck.

    Watching how Air Traffic Control works from the inside has done nothing to make me a more relaxed flier. Watching all the air traffic in an area, it is amazing there are not more collisions.

    Our barracks were filled with the techs who fixed the gear and the actual ATC guys. The ATC guys were strange. When you watched them work, they all had amazing ability to concentrate and keep things in their brains. Outside of work, they were walking clusterfucks. Seemed like they were always screwing things up.

  13. Ozymandias

    Thanks to everyone for coming around. A tragic event to have been involved with.
    Just unimaginable carnage – a lot of the junior enlisted firefighters who got there once there was daylight – were a bit stricken by the end.
    They had to cut through the belly of the 46 with a metal saw because the helicopter had broken in half and then dropped into the mud upside down. The Cobra burst into flames – the two engines each run about 400-800 deg C.
    Bad deal all around.

    • ron73440

      Christ, what a horrific incident.

      As much as I loved having Cobra support in Iraq, and I enjoyed being the EKMS manager for II MAW in Afghanistan I never really thought about how dangerous of a job flying the Cobras and Harriers were.

      I also had Ospreys, drones, and CH-53’s.

    • ron73440

      I don’t always catch these articles live, but thank you for writing them.

      As a retired Marine, I really understood some of the stories about deployment causing hardships for the families.

  14. dbleagle

    The Clinton quote is correct. I read the reports daily and each of the Services* is losing ~3 dead each day. Generally, a suicide, each, per day, other COD a day, and training and operations mishaps on the regular.

    That doesn’t include the daily non-fatal incidents that remove people from the Services each and every day.

    Thanks for writing these Ozy. They sometimes bring up uncomfortable memories, but it is important that the memories don’t die before I do.

    *Not you Space Force.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Yeah, go figure that a bunch of young men who have been trained to be aggressive will get in more accidents than the gen pop.

      Check out the auto insurance rates for young enlisted guys. Given how much my rates for an old guy who has never had an accident are, I can’t even begin to imagine how high Pvt. Gomer’s rates are.

  15. Gustave Lytton

    I started with PVS7B’s. Horrible lack of depth of vision, binocular eye caps with a single image intensifier tube. It was almost worse than naked vision trying to move through forested hills. PVS14 was better as a monocle, but still took some getting used walking with it.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Like Fritos Corn Chips corn chips day? Now that’s a travesty but if it includes Doritos I’m all for it.

    • Gender Traitor

      Good morning, Sean, Stinky, STG, U, and OBE!

      Yesterday at about 4:45 p.m., I looked at my Vacation balance and realized that if I didn’t take some time off before this week’s payroll was processed and posted on Thursday, I would max out on Vacation time and have a few hours shaved off this pay period’s accrual.

      So I’m taking today off! 😁

      • UnCivilServant

        When I say “taking today off” and “4:45” I initially thought “oh no, something went wrong in the wee hours of the morning.” Thankfully, the full read corrected my misconception.

        I could take tha last half hour of today off. I should probably mention it to my supervisor that I’m running over in hours.

      • UnCivilServant

        I forgot to ask – any plans? Visiting with 🐱🐱‍👤 and knitting🧦?

      • Gender Traitor

        Not too many plans – maybe a little (VERY little!) house cleaning. Going out to lunch, probably Panera for some of their for-a-limited-time-only stuff, and maybe out to dinner, too, at a local chain we haven’t visited for a while. (They have a cheese steak salad I really like!)

        Other than that, as much indolence and sloth as I can cram into the day.

      • UnCivilServant

        sounds like a plan to me 😜.

      • Gender Traitor

        I usually save knitting for when we’re watching sportsball so that I feel as if I’m not being a total couch potato. Don’t watch basketball, and unless we happen to find a St. Louis Blues game we can watch, no hockey either.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      I did plenty of stupid shit at that age, drukenly jumping off a hotel balcony (repeatedely) into a pool the week after graduating from high school comes to mind, but thank god I didn’t draw a bad hand and cash in my chips. RIP.

    • SarumanTheGreat

      I recall diving headfirst into the shallow end of a pool during a 4th of July celebration, timing the jump to a fireworks explosion. The impact momentarily paralyzed me and scared the hell out of me. Needless to say I never did that again.

      Agree it’s sad, when you’re young you think you’re both immortal and invulnerable.

  16. UnCivilServant

    Arrrg! I overslept!

    At least I’m only 10 minutes behind schedule. See you lot when I reach the office.

  17. Ownbestenemy

    Employees sue FedGov for using new fandangled voodoo magic of being able to communicate instantly to employees.

    https://x.com/growing_daniel/status/1884379603965198361

    Why didn’t I think of that over past 15 years when I received an email from OPM. Always late to an idea.

  18. Stinky Wizzleteats

    “Diddy’s assistant recalls sickening moment he was ordered to have sex to prove his ‘loyalty’, bombshell doc reveals”
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-14334961/diddy-assistant-phillip-pine-sex-loyalty-documentary-URL.html

    From the article: A message sent to Pines read: ‘Lorazepam – give him (3), Zolpidem – give him (2), Cialis – give him (3) 5mg, Clonazepam – give him (5).’

    A party full of zombies, Cialis would definitely be required…it honestly doesn’t sound like fun at all.

    • UnCivilServant

      Fun? The purpose of these parties was compliance and compromat.

      Besides, fun and parties are basically oil and water, you’ll only rarely ever get an emulsion, and even then it wants to separate.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        It’s interesting how much abuse people will put up with to be part of an in group. I’ve been upset about being fucked at work but I’ve never actually been fucked at work and the prison style homosexual powerplay sex a lot of these guys were coerced into? Well I don’t need my job that bad but proximity to fame is a hell of a motivator apparently.

      • UnCivilServant

        I don’t understand it.

      • Ownbestenemy

        We are stones toss away from slightly more sophisticated apes.

      • rhywun

        prison style homosexual powerplay sex a lot of these guys were coerced into

        Was there?

        Not this guy – apparently no homo goings-on in this story.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Not in this particular story, no, but it looks like it was a fairly standard practice among ostensibly straight members of his crew.

  19. cavalier973

    I finally started reading this commentary from yesterday morning.
    The cockles of my heart are fanning themselves, but my brain keeps looking over from its newspaper and saying, “Hyperbole.”

    It came in two parts (so far). Yesterday, Trump’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) unleashed a two-page memo upon the entire federal government. It was nothing less than a multi-trillion-dollar, whole-of-government spending freeze, excepting only a small handful of essential items like Medicare, emergency relief, payrolls, and Social Security. Like that, Trump shut down the government.
    You can be sure that nothing like this has ever happened before. It has completely flipped the script. Instead of Trump trying vainly to wrestle control over a vast bureaucracy, now the bureaucrats must come to Trump for permission to do anything.

    https://open.substack.com/pub/coffeeandcovid/p/baptism-of-fire-tuesday-january-28?r=d0r3d&utm_medium=ios

    • cavalier973

      Between the OMB memo and the State Department stop-work order, the Trump Administration is forcing a total reset on federal spending, and collecting all spending into a centralized database where an agency like DOGE can have any hope of overseeing it.
      It also means the Administration is forcing a total reset on federal policy, since spending is policy.

      • cavalier973

        Until now, government spending has operated on autopilot. Government money printer go brrrrrrr. Money flowed freely through an opaque, closed-top strainer, without transparency or direct executive oversight, and bureaucracies, NGOs, and foreign governments knew they would always get paid regardless of who was in the White House.
        Trump just ended that assumption. This moment will forever be remembered as a turning point in American governance.

      • R.J.

        Fantastic is what it is. I am
        wondering what he does next to keep sob stories out of the paper. His strategy is well thought out.

  20. Tres Cool

    “prison-style homosexual power play sex”

    For them its just learned behavior.

    suh’ fam
    whats goody

    • Gender Traitor

      Good morning, homey! It’s a balmy 39 degrees here in SW OH, headed for a forecast high of 44!

  21. Necron 99

    Sorry I missed this from yesterday. Just wanted to say my MOS in the Army was 35E, Special Electronic Device Repair. I worked on NVG goggles along with NVG rifle scopes, NVG spotting scopes, thermal viewers, chemical alarms, and survey equipment.

    Also, my dad was an Army Cobra pilot, 235th Armed Helicopter Co., in Can Tho Vietnam 68-69, DFC, retired CW4 in 1978.