Princess Anna

We got to give Princess Anna a ride while she was visiting (I'm the one in the left seat) I don't know much about her but apparently she is second in line to the throne of England. It was a pretty fun mission.

Stuck in Asadabad

We got stuck in Asadabad for about 3 hours waiting on General Eikenberry (pretty much the guy in charge around these parts) so we checked out one of the enemy tanks secured earlier on in the war, and then gooffed off the rest of the time.

Stopover in Jalalabad

We did a mission over to Jalalabad and had some time on the ground. We hung out with our apache buddies and messed around with some of thier rockets, and then we had a few hours to wait until takeoff so we pulled out the hamocks. Another month and I'm coming home to be with Marla and hopefully get to be there when the baby is born. I should be on a plane on the 9th of December which will put me on the ground on the 11th or 12th. I will come back here on th 25th or 26th just in time to start packing things up and head home (yes I brought it up that I would make the sacrifice to just stay in the States but I was rejected ")

Nice view

After a mission we took a route up a really cool valley,(don't mind the bug splatters) and landed on a small LZ on top of a mountain. We had a little time so we got out and stretched our legs a little bit. Not a bad day's work ")

Halfway through

I'm about halfway through this rotation, and three weeks of that I get to spend coming home on leave. I got to go to a firing range put on buy the Germans were you can qualify in thier weapons. I made expert all the way around (of course, Dad taught me well). Dust landings and tak-offs are one of the dangers around here that we train for and deal with on a day to day basis, we brown out often and have to react quickly.

Another day

Just another day, going on four months now. I got to play with a SAW (a very cool gun) We flew to the northwest up a pretty tight valley to a place called Bamian. The red ruins are a remnant of when Gangis Khan was there. And that evening was a nice sunset.

Old towers

Every mission starts off with a preflight to make sure everything is in proper order (too many aircraft have had to emergency land because a tool was left some where and broke something important). These two towers where built by Alexander the great around 300bc when he invaded Afghanistan.

More helicopter shots

More helicopter and landscape shots. Some of the areas around here remind me of home. I was bored one day, so I made a chair. It's amazing what we can do around here with a lot of time a couple of hand tools and scrap wood.

Another day in paradise

This was one of our typical missions up in the Pech valley, that's me in the front....I love flying doors off, it makes it a little easier to keep cool with the 40 lbs of body armor and survival equipment. (You would think that for $7,000,000 the helicopter would come with air conditioning.)

Cool stuff

B-1 Bomber......pretty cool. And that's a $100,000 piece of plywood, cause that's how much it cost the Army when it flew up into the rotor system when one of my buddies landed at a small base out in the middle of nowhere. It busted the tips of three blades and ruined the last, so they painted it and put the tail number of the aircraft it damaged on it and hung it up on the wall. We think it was a new weapon designed by Al-Queda........It's a Taliboard.

Sunset on the flightline

Not as good as New Mexico sunsets, but it'll do.

First mission

The Army has finally recieved something back for all the money it has spent on my training. I finally got to fly a real mission........It felt like I was back in the Nam.

Local area flight

For my local area flight we flew up to an 8500 ft. mountain top. It was a nice view from up there.














Behind him is a 2000 ft drop.

Home sweet home

These are before and after pictures of my cubicle, my "Crib" if you will. I had to scavange for wood and screws to build all of my furniture.

Long trip

It was about a ten hour flight in a C-17 with a layover in Mildenhal England. There wasn't much space between us and a 7 ton helicopter.