For Memorial Day: A Real Hero

Memorial Day is a day for remembering those who gave their lives for the citizens of the United States, and honoring them. 

I came across an article in The Daily recently that honored Sgt. Julia Brigloe. She has been nominated for the Distinguished Flying Cross to recognize extraordinary achievement for an aerial flight. Her job was to hang on a helo hook outside a hovering Black Hawk helicopter and bring wounded soldiers to safety, and to extract a soldier who was killed in action. Though she lived to tell the tale, she calls to mind the thousands who did not.

An excerpt:

After Bringloe safely rejoined her crewmates, they took a few hours of sleepless rest. The toughest flight was yet to come. A call came in for a supply drop and medevac for a group of soldiers dug into a ridge nearly 10,000 feet above sea level. At that altitude, the Black Hawk’s rotor blades would find little purchase in the thin air.

Perhaps worse, dense clouds veiled the ridge. The crew nearly called off the mission before finding a tiny fissure in the gray and punching through. A patch of rocky ground was just visible in the landing zone. But soon after Bringloe hit the ground to get the patient — a soldier who’d been shot in the shoulder — the mist thickened.

“All of the sudden, Kenny looks out the window and says, ‘I’m losing my references,” Sabiston said. “My crew chief looked down and he could only see the cable going into a cloud.”

At the end of the wire, Bringloe looked up and saw the hoist cable similarly vanish into the wet gray above. Some helicopters under some circumstances can fly in clouds, using only instruments to guide them. The crew of Dust Off 73 may be the first ever to do so inadvertently, in combat, while dangling two people from a rescue hoist.

Clipped onto the hook, Bringloe wrapped her patient in a full-body bear hug and said, “Hang on!”

The pilots climbed about 800 feet per minute, Sabiston said, picking up speed and flying blind, watching only the instruments on a console beside their control sticks.

“It’s like driving a car a hundred miles an hour and all you can look at is your speedometer,” Sabiston said. “We had to make sure we didn’t slide into a mountain sideways.” 

The stories of the missions she flew read like an adventure book, and even so, she gives the credit for her survival to the crew of the helicopter.

The full story by Erik German is at The Daily, accessible through this Facebook link.

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“They hover as a cloud of witnesses above this Nation."  —Henry Ward Beecher

Stuff from My InBox: Half Man, Half Boy

The average age of the military man is 19 years. He is a short haired, tight-muscled kid who, under normal circumstances is considered by society as half man, half boy. Not yet dry behind the ears, not old enough to buy a beer, but old enough to die for his country. He never really cared much for work and he would rather wax his own car than wash his father's, but he has never collected unemployment either.

He's a recent High School graduate He was probably an average student, pursued some form of sport activities, drives a ten year old jalopy, and has a steady girlfriend that either broke up with him when he left, or swears to be waiting when he returns from half a world away. He listens to rock and roll or hip-hop or rap or jazz or swing and a 155mm howitzer.   He is 10 or 15 pounds lighter now than when he was at home because he is working or fighting from before dawn to well after dusk. He has trouble spelling, thus letter writing is a pain for him, but he can field strip a rifle in 30 seconds and reassemble it in less time in the dark. He can recite to you the nomenclature of a machine gun or grenade launcher and use either one effectively if he must.  He digs foxholes and latrines and can apply first aid like a professional.  He can march until he is told to stop, or stop until he is told to march.  He obeys orders instantly and without hesitation, but he is not without spirit or individual dignity. He is self-sufficient.. .  He has two sets of fatigues: he washes one and wears the other. He keeps his canteens full and his feet dry.  He sometimes forgets to brush his teeth, but never to clean his rifle. He can cook his own meals, mend his own clothes, and fix his own hurts.  If you're thirsty, he'll share his water with you; if you are hungry, his food. He'll even split his ammunition with you in the midst of battle when you run low.  He has learned to use his hands like weapons and weapons like they were his hands.  He can save your life—or take it, because that is his job.  He will often do twice the work of a civilian, draw half the pay, and still find ironic humor in it all.   He has seen more suffering and death than he should have in his short lifetime.

He has wept in public and in private, for friends who have fallen in combat and is unashamed.  He feels every note of the National Anthem vibrate through his body while at rigid attention, while tempering the burning desire to 'square-away' those around him who haven't bothered to stand, remove their hat, or even stop talking.  In an odd twist, day in and day out, far from home, he defends their right to be disrespectful.  Just as did his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, he is paying the price for our freedom. Beardless or not, he is not a boy. He is the American Fighting Man that has kept this country free for over 200 years.

He has asked nothing in return, except our friendship and understanding.  Remember him, always, for he has earned our respect and admiration with his blood.  And now we even have women over there in danger, doing their part in this tradition of going to War when our nation calls us to do so.  As you go to bed tonight, remember this shot...A short lull, a little shade and a picture of loved ones in their helmets.