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We had a little storm this morning with some hail and rain. It lasted about 45minutes.

I hear it rained later in the day here and there. Nothing nearly as large as the ‘great flood’ from months back.

It feels really weird. I mentioned it, and the HVAC guy here broke out one of his tools and got an actual hunidity and temperature reading. 58deg F at 75% humidity. That’s pretty weird.

The lightning part of the storm was pretty cool though. The lightning only went from cloud to cloud. I guess that is pretty normal for this part of the world. Nice light show.

‘he is not too small…he actually comes above my boobs now’

This was in response to a question of whether a child was big enough to take a shower. Classic

~SKi~

In an effort to “Do Something” I went on the Passport tour today. Basically it’s a field trip to some of the other work centers on Balad AFB. (LSA Anaconda) Most of the places we went were classified secret, so I can’t tell you too much about it

We started our journey at the UAV shop. There were three types of predators two that were there, and one type that was being sent over. Got a few pictures with those. Learned a lot of neat stuff about them that you would never think about.

Next stop was the F16’s. A kee kee. That’s about all there is to it. No, it’s not the baddest plane in our arsenal - but it is a bad MF. Everyone seemed scared to get close to it. They let us write a message on the bombs hanging off the wings. Of course, I asked to get inside

We talked to the pilots and got to play with some of their gear then went to lunch. After lunch we headed over to the fire department. More of a show and tell, a guy got in his gear.. that was a lot of crap - and then to think about them being in it while in full MOPP (chemical suit) gear! Damn.

Next on the list was the EOD - the guys that make things go boom. Their job is to roll out to whee there is a reported IED (Improvised Explosive Device) and either take it apart with their robot or blow it up. Sometimes both things happen at the same time!

Also got to play with some neat toys down in their armory. And we got to see the rocket shell from the mortar that landed that place I was telling you about the other day! By far the coolest place on the trip.

We ended up at the Air Traffic Control tower - which I frequent anyway, so it wasn’t that much of a deal for me. But to hear in detail the things they do, it became apparent that there is a lot more happening there than meets the eye.

~SKi~

A mortar landed pretty close today. Right in the middle of the housing area. Not the first time this has happened. Just the first time it has happened while I was there. Pretty surreal. I actually heard this one come in. Within 3 seconds it went like this:

I was laying in bed trying to fall asleep. I heard two booms which were two mortars landing a bit off in the distance. That is not too uncommon. The first one seemed a little further away than the other.

As I started to regain full consciousness - in a matter of 2 seconds - I heard a whizz, like the sound you hear when a rocket or missile leaves a plane in a movie. Much less than a second later the klaxon went of followed immediately by the INCOMING INCOMING INCOMING computerized voice over the Giant Voice (1).

During the second utterance of the word INCOMING I heard a very close and very loud boom, the window in my pod shook and I found myself checking out the pattern on the underside of my mattress. Nice tulip model in white on a blue background.

I lay there thinking “So now what… I really doubt this bed will provide adequate protection against a direct hit” which is about the only thing that would really expose me to shrapnel while in my pod - thanks to the fortress around the pods. “So I might as well get up… OK…. I’m getting up now…”

About 5 minutes later - after the All Clear over the Giant Voice - I got up. I went out to smoke a cigarette (I hear cigarettes can kill you) along with about 60 other people that I have never seen in the smoke pit before. Most were talking about the mortar and it’s proximity, I just hung out in the shadows and observed.

That was the closest one for me by far. I have some pictures if you are interested. I will not be putting them on GallerSKi any time soon, so if you want to see the results of that one email me and I’ll hook you up.

~SKi~

(1) Giant Voice is the term coined for the Public Address (PA) system used on Air Force bases. Here, there is a proximity sensor covering the base that is connected to the Giant Voice. When something enters the proximity of any given sector, the Giant Voice in that sector alarms to let everyone know it’s time to put their head between their legs.
The Command Post also uses the Giant Voice to make announcements like “Type 0- blood needed at the Air Force Theater Hospital” (AFTH - Think MASH).

It has been a week since my last entry. There has actually been a lot to talk about, but I could not figure a way to talk about those things without possibly divulging sensitive information that if vied by certain sources could be quite harmful for those of us stationed here. I may have already said too much >8^O

I have tried to limit my posts to information that was publicly available and general thoughts . While some of the recent events are quite substantial, and it’s killing me to share them with you, they may just have to wait until some considerable time has passed. Perhaps until my return.

FYI, the times and dates of my posts and the contents therein may not necessarily be the actual time and dates for the subject matter within the blog. I realize that this may be ‘moo” to you, but my journalistic side (read: OCD) compels me to inform you of this deliberate inconsistency.

In the mean time, please enjoy (or laugh at, mock, or generally make fun of) the new pictures I have posted in the gallery :)

~SKi~