James Mackler

Holiday Spirit

November 29, 2005

As you know, once Thanksgiving passes everyone starts to think about the winter holidays. It is no different around here. Our neighbors in the CHU next door started to decorate yesterday. They have a life size picture of Santa Clause on their door and lights inside. Not to be outdone, we had a decorating party in our CHU last night.

Frank broke out the oatmeal bars and decorations that his wife sent, we turned on holiday music, and began the festivities. Since we are a multicultural CHU, Adam Sandler's Chanukah song was played more than once. I have to admit it was a fun time. We strung lights around our window and decorated a mini tree. We ate home baked treats and drank Hi-C out of those packets you put in lunch boxes.

As I was going to sleep to the glow of the christmas lights, Frank stayed up to surf the web. Everyone once in a while he'd interrupt with my sleep. "Chanukah starts the evening of the 25th" he'd say. Later, "What is a dreidel"?, then "What are Chanukkah coins?" It was pretty cool that he must have been checking out site about my holiday to learn a little more.

I am attaching a photo of our decorated CHU.

Happy Thanksgiving

November 24, 2005

I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving. Mine was good, all things considered. I flew a 7.2 hour mission that lasted nearly the entire day. I flew with a Pilot-in-Command that I have not flown with before and he was very relaxed about letting me fly the entire mission. I got some great flying done.

We began the day by flying a country music star named Aaron Tippon to our base for a concert. I did not know who he was but I guess he is pretty famous. I got a picture of myself with him in front of the helicopter. It turns out that his son-in-law is a pilot here and that Mr. Tippon is a private helicopter pilot himself.

After flying the performer, we did some more battlefield circulation and then returned to Speicher in time for thanksgiving dinner. The dinner had all of the expected foods - turkey, ham, sweet potatos, stuffing, pie. The food was average, at best, but the thought was nice. I was thankful for returning safe from the mission, having a good day of flying, and having a great group of friends and family here and back home.

I am attaching a photo of me with Aaron Tippon.

Recent Missions

November 19, 2005

I have not been flying very much recently but the missions that I have flown have been pretty interesting. I flew a "hero" mission and a mission with an Apache. These are different from the usual "battlefield circulation" (read bus driving) missions that I usually fly.

A "hero" mission is a mission to pick up the body of a soldier killed in action and transport the corpse to an air force base for the final trip home. I was on the night standby crew a few days ago when we got word that we were needed for a hero mission. A soldier had been injured by a roadside bomb the day before and had passed away. We launched as the second flight in a formation of two ships to get the body. We landed at the pick-up site and got out of the aircraft to pay proper respects to the body as it was loaded on board the lead helicopter. The crews lined up on either side of the cargo door while the chaplain, his assistant, and 2 soldiers from mortuary affairs carefully loaded the flag-drapped body bag. We stood at attention and saluted in the dark. No one discussed the meaning behind behind the mission very much.

The next day we were tasked with flying as the sister ship to an Apache and carrying several officers on board to a meeting at another base. We flew lead. I had to keep our airspeed down because Apaches cannot keep up with Blackhawks, at least not when they are loaded with rockets, missles, and 30 mm ammo for the cannon. It was cool getting to fly with another type of aircraft. I have attached a photo.

Has it been that long?

November 11, 2005

You will all probably be surprised to learn that in addition to being Veterans Day, November 11th marks an important anniversary. I joined the Army on November 11, 2003. It is hard to believe my life could change so much in two years. Today is also a milestone because I received my combat patch today marking more than 30 days in a combat zone. I probably wont sew it on my uniform, however, until I return. Superstition says that it would be bad luck to do so here.

I wont go into a retrospective of the past two years. Most of you are familiar with at least some of the highs and lows. I still have a lot of Army time ahead and am trying to look forward rather than back.

Oh My God! The Internet Was Down!

November 10, 2005

Our satellite link the internet was down for about 3 days this week. Everyone was very upset. Everytime anyone saw someone else the first question they asked was "is the internet back up? I think that our war stories are mostly going to be about the aweful times that the internet went down and the times that the chow hall ran out of ice cream.

I shouldn't make light of the war. As an aviator I am lucky to be stationed at a relatively secure base and stay at least 75 feet above the ugly stuff when I leave the base. Lots of other guys are actually in a war. We regularly hear about and meet guys involved in roadside bombings and ambushes. I really do hope that the worst experience I have here is an internet crisis.

I flew a short one hour mission today just to move some troops from one base to another close by. We shut down at the base and explored for an hour. I was reminded once again of how good we have it. Their facilities were very primitive compared to our ours. Again, aviators have it easy. The flight was a good one. I was with a Pilot in Command who is not an Instructor Pilot. He let me fly the entire mission and made comments and suggestions but mostly just let me enjoy the experience and learn by doing. That is how I learn best and I think I flew well.

I am attaching a photo from the flight and a picture of the cat that has now become the Bravo Company pet. I dont think he has a name yet though.

Too Much of a Good Thing

October 24, 2005

As you all know, I have complaining recently about not getting enough flight time. Ive had missions cancelled for weather and other reasons while everyone around me flew. Well, karma caught up with me yesterday. Here is what happened.

I checked the flight schedule on Saturday night and saw that I was not scheduled to fly at all on Sunday. I knew that I would be transitioning to a night schedule soon so I decided to stay up late. I was doing crunches in the Gym when the commander walked in. "Do you want to fly a mission tomorrow" he asked, adding that the show time would be 0425. "Of course" I replied. His next order was to go to bed immediately so that I could get some rest prior to the flight.

I woke up after about 4 hours of rest and got ready to fly. After a diet pepsi and two double caffiene power gel packets I felt pretty good. I pre-flighted the aircraft as the sun was rising and we took-off as a flight of three aircraft just at sunrise. The mission was essentially personnell transport or, in Army lingo, battlefield circulation. We flew some big wigs in the iraqi government and some high ranking military officials to various bases around the country. A lot of the flying was in the Northwest region of the country. That area, formerly known as Kurdistan, is mountainous and quite pretty.

We had several unexpected mission changes during the day causes us to fly back and forth more times than we had anticipated. The mission that started at sunrise ended several hours after dark. It was a good thing our Pilots in Command had the foresight to bring the night vision goggles. In the end, we logged 10 hours of flight time each. This is an impressive feat. In fact, it is possible that no other crews will beat this record the entire time that we are deployed.

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