Malkin - Former Abe Lincoln combat engineer Brian O'Kelley passed on the following e-mail he received from a current combat engineer, Master Chief Fire Controlman David Kirk, who is helping with the tsunami effort:
Dude,
You should see this mess. We are sailing 3 miles off the coast in a field of floating debris. Roofs, trees, dressers, millions of coconuts and so many dead bodies in the water all around us. We creep thru the water as to not stir them up too bad. They are bleached white, bloated, faces have no expressions..... They secured the weather decks to shield the crew from the visual trauma. We retrieve Helicopters every night and head for deeper water and kick up speed to make sure nothing is stuck in our intakes.
In the morning, we go back in and launch the Helicopters and refuel them at regular periods. We have Shore parties of 100 volunteers a day. 1,300 volunteered but they expect to only use 300 and just rotate them around because of the pills and various shots required. Basically, we deployed with double the number of Helicopters just because. Turns out it was a good call. We use 12 Helicopters daily.
They fly the Shore detail to the airport in the morning. The working party unloads the cargo from the relief planes, load that cargo onto the Helo's and they fly the stuff to villages and outer most areas needing help. Work all day and everybody returns at night. The village we are sailing near had 50,000 residents of which only 1,000 are left. All the roads were washed out so our Helo's are the only way in. Dan Rather flew onboard and stayed the night. It's good to have a mission. Adds purpose to being away from home. |
