Then they gave us a copy of their PowerPoint presentation. Here it is:
•What we do well: Rapidly deploy small tailored teams
•What we do best: Provide highly effective units cross trained in many specialties, successfully operate as teams many times our size
•How we work best: Call us with your Air Mobility requirements, and we will send the right team to accomplish the mission
Then the colonel ran off to go supervise some other aspect of Hydra and another colonel took over. "We have 1,000 people and 22 aircraft taking part in the emergency deployment exercise this week. There is also air-drop training, night-vision training, in-air refueling exercises, etc -- all taking place in a real-life environment. We will be performing over 300 missions this week."
Apparently the scenario for this exercise is an imaginary 8.0 earthquake and tsunami. "We are emphasizing humanitarian relief in this operation. We are a 911 force and can 'get out of town' in 12 hours." Or less.
Then the presenter talked about Rapid Port Opening again. Oh. That's like starting an airfield from scratch. And the PowerPoint presentation listed what we were going to do today. "8:45 am: Continental breakfast". I'm there.
"We are trained to defend ourselves while we set up a base if necessary but usually it is the Army or Marines that seize a base first and we only go in after it is semi-permissive. We remain there for a maximum of 45 days and then we turn the airbase over to either the regular military or to a humanitarian relief organization such as FEMA. When the Pakistan earthquake hit, we helped the Pakistanis get online in the areas that were devastated."
Then we got back on the bus and drove around the flightline a lot. Where's the continental breakfast!
Then we got on a plane. "We're going to Schoonover next." Apparently Schoonover is a dirt landing strip out in the middle of nowhere. "This will be a low-level flight. It's going to be bumpy. Let us know if you need a motion-sickness bag." Good grief. Did I pack my homeopathic remedy for stress prevention? No? Oh crap.
But we went up. And we came down. And it WAS bumpy. And I survived.
There originally had been 20 or 30 of us reporters signed up for this junket but somehow only four of us showed up. Chickened out, did they? Ha!
Once on the ground, it became obvious that we were on the GROUND. This here was the dirt landing strip they had told us about. "Where the freak are we?" I asked.
"Schoonover is part of Fort Hunter-Leggett, located between King City and San Luis Obispo." It looked like a Boy Scout camp, lots of tents. "With a 12-hour's notice, we can deploy any place in the world. Our mission here is to bring cargo in -- this is a humanitarian operation. This whole base was constructed right now. Everything you see came in by air." Even those earth-movers and that 18-wheeler? "Yes." Maybe they flew in the continental breakfast too? It's 10:15 am already -- but I still have hope.
So. Out here in the middle of nowhere, they already got a FedEx-type operation set up for cargo transfer. We stepped into a tent. It was air-conditioned! Cargo-tracking computers were already set up. "This is our Rapid Port Opening Element." Where were these guys when I had to pack up and move all by myself with only a Berkeley Bowl Marketplace shopping cart to help me last week!
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