First Convoy

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originally uploaded by spacemanor.

Went on my first convoy last week. Wasn't too bad. Got to the motor pool couple hours early. The trucks were already staged and loaded the day before. All the civilian semi drivers were there. Most of them looked like "Good ole Boys". thier trucks were outside ready to get in our convoy. They had kind of a pep rally for them cuz they haul a lot of stuff for us, so we can focus more on security. We had breakfast at the shop. and then got the radio, check the truck over, my gunner got his 50. cal muchine gun. then we took off.

We loaded our weapons outside of base, when we started I was looking everywhere up, down, left, right, for IED's, bombs, people, whatever. then after awhile you realize it's all sand. the roads are pretty terrible. Some people go over the potholes, some people go around on the side of the road. I would just go over them. The gunner stands up in the turret, from his torso down is in the cab. A couple times I knocked him all the way in the cab. Once the bridge was out, so they built a bypass through the water. I waited for the semi to get out of the way and we floored it through the creek. Water came all the way over the cab soaked the gunner, that was the best part of the convoy. And we did on the way back too.

Drove through two places the whole way where poeple were. One village that had about ten houses and one small town, saw some little kids waving for MREs, we don't give any away cuz then they would run in front of our trucks. We waved back to show that we were paying attention to them. My gunner waves and points a 50. caliber machine gun at them.

There are some places where alot of IEDs have been placed before and they tell you over the radio, but all you can do is keep driving and try to see them first. We got to our destination finally that night, waited forever to unload the truck, then the convoy comes back in the morning.

We had lumber on our 7 Ton and this guy told us to go unload over by this guard tower, so we drove over there and we entered an Iraqi National Forces camp, my gunner got all upset because the Iraqi couldn't speak English (the Iraqi is making wierd hand signals and so forth)and we were lost. So after a couple of U-turns we went back and asked for directions again where we started. When we got to where we were supposed to be, we waited last in line for like three hours to unload. When we're on a convoy we make stops on the road for security haults and all the Marines get out and look mean and provide security for us and the civilians. The civilians get out of thier trucks, stretch, pee, smoke, and have a good time. I guess they feel safe with us. They say when the Army goes on convoys, they don't even get out of thier trucks. We would see the army drive by and the gun turret would be empty.

OH and I had to go pee in a bottle while driving, that is not easy. It was always when we hitting the worst potholes. Next time I'll drink way less water before I go on the road.

On the road, there's alot of sand, sand as far as you can and sheep. I saw this little kid, like five years old out in the desert, herding sheep all by himself, it would be a pretty place if it wasn't Iraq.