Sirens blaring. It’s dark in the tent. Almost automatically my hand reaches down under the right side of my cot and pulls out my gas mask. It’s open, and over my head. Without even thinking, I cover the exhausts and blow hard to clear the mask. My palm is over the intake and inhale, there’s no air as I can feel the mask collapse and seal around my face with the vacuum. By this time, someone has turned the lights on and as I am suiting up in my chemical gear I can see all of my tentmates doing the same – with one exception. Our ‘Ninja’ has lost it; he’s running up and down the aisle in the center of the tent yelling:
“I don’t know how to put my mask on!”
“We’re all going to die.”
He’s ignored for the moment as I finish suiting up. It’s amazing how short a time it takes from a deep sleep, and over the next few weeks we’ll all get even faster. Suited up now, several of us grab our panicked compatriot, hold him down and get him into his mask and as much of his suit as we can. I grab my helmet and radio and head for the door. Through the first tent flap and a quick left turn after the second, up the steps and jump into our sandbag shelter – where I immediately, and rather forcefully encounter whoever it was that had jumped in just before. I slid over into a corner, all the time hearing the sirens and the recorded message, which went something like this:
“Air raid, air raid. MOPP 4, MOPP 4. All personnel don protective equipment.”
The commotion of suiting up in the tent gives way to silence in the bunker. The sirens have gone quiet and we’re just left with our thoughts. ‘What is going on? Did the Iraqi’s slip a bomber through the air defenses?’ I can’t remember if the QEAF’s Mirages scrambled that night, but even if they did it could be a difficult intercept. I pulled out my shortwave radio and slipped the ear-piece beneath the seal of my mask. Turning the unit on quickly brought news from the BBC in London that word had been received that a SCUD had been fired from Iraq that was headed towards the Saudi capital of Riyadh. It was a relief to know that even though Iraq was firing ballistic missiles, they weren’t directly at us.
Twenty minutes later we were given the “All Clear” signal and we were able to remove our gear. It was then, sometime after four in the morning of the seventeenth of January 1991 (since there was no use in trying to go back to sleep) that through radio and television I learned that the war had in fact started and the aircraft from the first airstrikes were returning to their bases, all while I was asleep. The news was good, although there was no official confirmation, CNN reported that most, if not all of our aircraft were accounted for.
When we walked into the hangar that morning, it was a different place. The people, the aircraft and the tools were the same; but there was an entirely different ‘feeling’, a different attitude from the day before. It’s difficult to describe the change, there was a feeling of ‘seriousness’, yet also excitement. We’d been in the desert for almost five months and were finally to start what we came here for. The previous night President Bush had said:
"The liberation of Kuwait has begun. In conjunction with the forces of our coalition
partners, the United States has moved under the code name Operation Desert Storm."
All of our aircraft were to be flying missions, so we wouldn’t be getting another inspection soon. My main ‘mission’ was now decontamination and crash recovery. I picked up the ‘brick’ (radio) and out behind the hangar checked out the Decon truck and our equipment, hoping that none of it would be used. We had quick meeting with our team, making sure that we all knew where to find each other if we were called. I then headed back to the hangar.
When our pilots started stepping to the jets, everyone came out to the flightline - and I mean everybody, Americans, Canadians, French and Qataris up and down the ramp in the hundreds, if not thousands. I didn't want to watch from the hangar, so I went out and was a fireguard for one of the launching acft (probably the only time I volunteered to fireguard...) Pride. Determination. It was kind of a weird moment, I guess we were watching history happening.
We'd already been in the desert for over five months, preparing and waiting (and waiting, and waiting...) and it was an incredible sight to be standing on the flightline watching each aircraft, loaded down with bombs to be dropped for a real purpose, thunder one-by-one down Doha's runway, climbing to the north.
Our F-16's had launched out several hours before, and were due back within the hour. We were suiting up in our chem gear, ready to inspect the acft on their return, hoping that we wouldn't find signs of chemical weapons residue. Everyone was quiet as we waited, wondering how the mission was going as we sat in the back of our truck 'Decon 1', listening to reports on the war from the BBC on my little shortwave radio...
The first day of the war had gone well by all accounts, the Allies had lost six aircraft, which considering the resistance and the heavy anti-aircraft defenses was less than most expected. The Iraqi's were taking a beating from all sides, both in Kuwait and in Iraq itself. Thousands of sorties had delivered thousands of tons of weapons on a wide range of targets. Things were looking good, although we all knew that we were only at the beginning of what had the potential to be a long hard fight.
For us in Doha with the Lucky Devils, our pilots and aircraft came back without a scratch from their first missions. I did have a nervous moment at Decon when our first aircraft came back - one of the guys 'swabbed' the wing and carried the 'stick' up to me. There was a blue-gray haze where it had been wiped across the wing, which was, theoretically at least, a possible positive indication. Could it be chemicals? Damn, it couldn't be. I'd just talked to the Ops guys and nothing at all had been reported anywhere in the theater. I swabbed the acft myself in all of the places where residue could/should hide. Everyone on the team looked at me - it was my call. After a moment I said, "No, it's clean. Send them home." I've second-guessed that decision a million times since then - although I swabbed an acft that didn't even fly that day and got the same result after we got back to the hangar. But what if I'd gotten it wrong...
It had been a long day, in and out of chem gear who knows how many times, for decon inspections and for the intermittent SCUD launches. In theory the SCUD's couldn't reach us in Qatar (according to Intel) but later we'd find that to be not quite true. Between the war at work, and watching the war on TV, I was tired, and tomorrow would come soon enough so I called it a day. Our first day at war. But before I crawled into my sleeping bag I placed my old steel helmet and gas mask just under the side of my cot where I could reach it the instant the sirens went off again. And again.
Over the next few weeks we'd have plenty of chances to practice suiting up in the middle of the night. Before I fell asleep I said a little prayer for the guys that we'd lost that day, and hoped that tomorrow would go as well.
These are 'unedited' chapters that I'm posting as I write. Some day I'll work them all in together...
