Letters From War—Aeroscouts

By Donald Harward

The two young “warrants” (warrant officers) caught my eye as they walked past my aircraft on their way towards their company area. They looked tired—very tired—and I noticed the green canvas boxes, which held their ANVIS night vision goggles, draped over their shoulders. Their faces were streaked with dirt or dust, and trails of tears led from the corners of their eyes—something that is common here, as our eyes are constantly irritated by all the dirt and dust in the air.

They had been out all night searching for a fight and, from the look of them, they had found one. I noticed how well the digital camouflage pattern of their ACU (army combat uniforms) blended in with the gravel they were walking on. The shorter warrant had his .223-calibre M4 carbine dangling from its short sling, which was attached to a loop near the top right shoulder of his vest. He was still wearing his heavy armour vest while carrying his helmet bag, the night vision goggles, a map case and a scarf. The taller pilot was carrying his rifle in his right hand. His thumb was hooked around the ACOG optic battle sight, and his fingers clutched at the magazine well, holding the weapon firmly. I noticed that a 30 round magazine was still inserted. A full magazine, probably stuffed with the Army’s potent new 77-grain bullets.

Above me, the forward cowling of my machine was pushed forward to the limits as two mechanics busied themselves trying to repair my aircraft. A quick glance at my watch confirmed it; we were late again. We were supposed to have lifted off at 0750 and it was now nearing 0820. Earlier that chilly March morning, having cranked number two and waited for the oil temps to increase slightly, I had been just about to spin it up to operating RPM when I noticed the master caution light was on and a “No 2 Servo” message was illuminated.

From the left seat, Brent was looking at it also and we began to poke around. He flipped up the “Hydraulics” page on his right screen, which gives a nice colour graphic of the system’s status in real time—a cool feature built into sophisticated modern aircraft like the Agusta we were in. Sure enough, the right side hydraulic cylinders were all yellow in colour. Green is good, yellow not so much, and red is no good at all. The system indications showed a pressure of 204 bars and a temperature of 30°C. These were normal, so the problem was neither a lack of pressure nor a high temperature condition—which meant it was probably some pesky little widget malfunctioning.

I never liked the fact that this European aircraft displayed metric data and not imperial. The units of measure had little meaning and I was not accustomed to them. A normal hydraulic pressure gage should read 3,000 PSI, not 204 “Bar”. What the heck is a “bar” anyway? It’s certainly not a unit of measure. A bar is a place you go to tell war stories! It didn’t matter, of course—the darned thing wasn’t green, so even for a backwoods dirt-floor Chinook guy, it meant we weren’t going to turn any jet gas into noise anytime soon.

We were in a limbo status known to every pilot as the “maintenance minute”, which might last a minute…or it might last all day; one never knows which way the winds of fate are going to blow. For me, it wasn’t looking good. We had already called the standby crew to spin up the larger Bell 214ST, which is something of a cross between a Mack truck and an old Huey. It is the largest two-blade-rotor helicopter on earth, and some believe if it were given a good enough anchor point, a Bell 214 could change the planet’s celestial orbit. While I wouldn’t go quite that far, I have certainly seen that truckster gobble up hundreds of boxes of mail. Last Christmas, I watched as enthusiastic soldiers stuffed boxes in every nook and cranny throughout the airframe. The back was full and there were boxes on the dash and under the seats; it was amazing. I thought of drawing a picture of it with boxes stuffed into the engine air inlets, a cargo net between the skids and a luggage rack on top. The 214 carries a lot of junk but it is not as fast as the AW139. I had woken this morning looking forward to two things—getting a good breakfast and then flying with another 139 where we could open our thoroughbreds up and let them run all day. Now all that was out the window—caught up in the great unknown of the “maintenance minute”.

The mechanics were cursing and pulling on things. The work went on and on, and my hopes of flying up in the mountains today started to wane. Parts were flying and the pages of the aircraft’s logbook looked like an exploded JC Penny catalog. As the two warrants walked further away, someone dropped something heavy from above. I started as it smacked into the aluminium matting we were parked on. The taller warrant ducked in response to the bang and turned to look. Yep; he had been in the crapola all right. Once you get that “set” in your nerves, it’s a hard thing to lose.

I started thinking about the warrant officer’s startled move. He was nearing the end of his one-year combat deployment with the 82^nd Airborne Division. Known as the “All Americans”, the 82^nd made its name in northern France in the early hours of D-Day. The fearless men of the 82^nd had borne their division into the culture of warriors in the US Army and countless warriors since then had continued the tradition. The 82^nd has served in every conflict our nation has been involved in since WWII and its men were known as the “go to” guys in a tough fight. I had served with them many times during my military career, and now they were finishing their third combat deployment in Afghanistan. That warrant would soon be back at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and I wondered if he had a family eagerly awaiting his return. His quick reactions told of a keen sense that had probably kept him alive during the past twelve months. I wondered if his reactions were going to help his reintegration into normal American society or hinder it. I didn’t even know him, but I had a deep sense of respect for him and his friend. Soon, they would be replaced by the 101^st Airborne Division (pronounced, “one-oh-first”) from Fort Campbell—another tough-as-leather fighting unit.

Watching that soldier made me think of other soldiers who reacted similarly to loud noises, flashes, quick movement and the like. The guy with the worst case of jumpy nerves I knew was a friend and former commander, Russ Carmody. I have mentioned him before and I respect him enormously, but I have to chuckle when I think about what I used to do to him. We all knew that loud noises like gunfire made him jumpy; everyone had witnessed it many times. One time, he was attending a graduation in the US and was standing in a group of other soldiers. When a gun fired as a part of the ceremony, he flung himself completely prone on the ground and covered his head—at about the speed of light. A person can’t actually fall as fast as Russ did; he must have developed a form of powered flight downwards. Literally in the blink of an eye, that man went from standing to prone. Yep, he was good!

As a result, my fellow pilots goaded me into to playing a series of jokes on the then Major. All I had to do was create some loud noises, once with a big pot and once with a series of balloons, which I popped. All got the same reaction: Russ would execute his “powered down” manoeuvre and disappear under a desk or a bunk in a flash. He was a big guy and sometimes, I had to run to escape getting pounded by his flailing fists afterwards. He was a great guy, as well as a man of many nicknames. If you read my “Nicknames” article, you already know that earning a nickname is a matter of considerable circumstance. Russ was variously called “Rusty”, “Salamander Man” and “Alonzo, the Human Torpedo”, among others. No, please, don’t ask!

However, Russ wasn’t the only with extreme reactions. I remember the time I was driving my buddy’s Z28 Camaro soon after returning from one conflict or another. I was cruising one of the back roads of southern Alabama en route to Fort Rucker, the home of US Army aviation. I can’t recall which course I was attending there, but it was something that necessitated pulling me out of my unit to get some additional higher education. I had the Camaro’s top down and was just rowing through the gears when I saw them. A set of wires had somehow escaped my scan and I was about to hit them. I slammed on the brakes and veered to avoid flying into them. Flying? Yeah…about that! As the car’s nose came around in a hair-raising slide down the road, I realised—too late for me and my buddy’s Z-car—that I was not flying, but driving! The wires were supposed to be up there! I guess that when you get that “edge” thing going, it tends to be there always, even when you are supposed to be enjoying a nice country drive.

Those young warrant officer pilots were scouts—whose mission is particularly “hairy”. While I was cranking my ill-fated 139 that morning, I saw and heard their helicopters arriving. Behind my aircraft were several concrete revetments where their small OH-58D “Deltas” (simply called “Deltas” in local Army speak) were parked. They had come hovering up the taxiway in a dusty cloud of rotor wash and passed behind me to my left before hovering carefully into their concrete enclosures, which were designed to take indirect fire and minimise blast damage. Following their cool down and shutdown, they had collected their things and were done for the day.

The scouts’ mission is to scout out the enemy. So how do they do that, exactly? Well, that’s where the “hairy” part comes into play. They fly low around areas of suspected enemy activity and try to get the bad guys to shoot at them! That’s right—they seek and draw fire! They travel together and array themselves in such a manner as to be mutually supporting. If one is engaged by enemy fire, the number two aircraft is seconds away from placing deadly fire onto the shooter. If everything works out well, the engaged crew escapes the initial volley using rapid manoeuvres—putting their training into practice—while their wingman weighs in on the shooter/s and assists him/them to exit human existence. Unfortunately, for a brave few—too many more than a few—those first rounds occasionally find their mark. The results from such scenarios are somewhat different, although from what I have seen and heard, the end result for the enemy is generally always the same. When we have a downed bird, the fight sometimes grows into a pretty big deal.

One thing I have noticed when talking to these guys—these Aeroscouts—is that they look directly into your eyes when talking—although they won’t talk about the flying unless they are comfortable with you as a fellow pilot. They don’t smile as much as other pilots over in this theatre. They live a hard life both on and off the battlefield. Their commander told me proudly that his pilots had accounted for many kills over here and were fearless in battle. I’d have to agree.

I know a little about pushing a fight. I have done it a few times myself. When you really need to know if the guys in that truck over there are going to shoot at you or not, you might as well do it on your terms and not theirs. After all, you’re there to fight, so why waste perfectly good daylight? When I was flying the Huey gunship, we would “bump” on potential targets. When a gunner called out a potential target or we spied something suspicious, we carried out a manoeuvre we called a “bump” to give our guys a good shot. This involves flying straight at the target, then pulling slightly away from it to the side, although the position of your wingman and the terrain might sometimes call for an opposite turn. A little offset allows the gunner an early shot if action starts before you are in the manoeuvre. When you are in the “right” spot, you pull aft stick, pitch the nose up and bleed airspeed. As the speed comes back and you reach the optimal range to the target, you start rolling towards it. This forces you to fly the aircraft while literally looking over your shoulder. If flown correctly, the manoeuvre looks like you are flying an arch over a point in the ground. Then, with fine adjustments to the pedals, you can literally “walk” the fire onto the target. Although it means the aircraft is slowing all the time, making it increasingly vulnerable, it gives the gunner an easy shot. Essentially, you are betting your life on the ability of the guy on the trigger behind you to get Mr. Bad Guy before he gets you.

With a section of two aircraft, the moment number two calls “In”, you turn out and away in a diving turning manoeuvre to set up to cover his pull off. Hell, if he missed also, something was going wrong, but that’s how it’s done. On some nights when I was number two, when bumping into the fight, all I could see in front of me was a shower of bullets, with their tracer elements bouncing up in front of the aircraft’s nose. It is a beautiful sight—until you realise what all those little things are. However, in all the times I have done it, the only damage my aircraft ever received was from our own brass flying back and striking the tail rotor blades. But that is another story, for another time.

Anyway, the people down in the Helmand Valley know what it means for the whop-whop helicopter to pop up over them. The next sound is likely to be the BRRRRRRRRRRRRR of the mini gun—followed by the fat lady singing “game over”! So if you pull a bump over a suspicious anything, they are thinking: OK, two seconds to paradise. Which makes it into a “use it or lose it” deal for them and, if they are bad guys, they sometimes feel obliged to open fire—thank you very much! Most times, though, we’d just cut some fun holes in the sky and nothing would happen.

Today’s Aeroscouts also employ the bump, although they do it head on, as they have direct-fire, cockpit-aimed weapons. However, the folks in their little valley know what that means also. Yes, ma’am, the Aeroscouts are a different breed, indeed. If they were infantry, they would be Rangers. If they were shooters, they would be snipers. What they are, in their company of aerial warriors, is a mixture of Southern-fried patriotism and steely-eyed killers. With the eyes of eagles and the hearts of saints, they shoulder the safety of a nation; they are—simply—the best.