The End, At Last!

So this is it huh? This is the feeling of almost leaving Camp Atterbury. It feels AMAZING! I actually wake up with a smile on my face haha. So we've pretty much did it all. Mounted Patrol, a high number of Key Leader Engagements, Site Surveys, Humvee Rollover, shooting a bunch of weapons, combatives, there is too much to name but it was quite an interesting 3 months. I'm looking forward to 7 days of leave to spend it with the family and then return here to depart to Afghanistan. It's time to do some work ladies and gentlemen and I'm excited. Excited to have new experiences, excited to get some awesome photos, excited to concentrate on saving money and getting in crazy shape.  

Well in my last post I told you I'd show you all some photos of us going bowling. Well I won't lie, I got carried away bowling that at a point I actually forgot I had a camera but hey, the point of it was for us to have fun. Well I did. After all, that is the best attitude to have. To make the best out of everything. Well here you go.



Lt. Leonard and his turkeys (3 strikes in a row)

 

I think it was a gutter ball

 

Senior Master Sergeant Simmons getting her game on. Whatttt!

 So the Army has this thing called Modern Army Combative Program. Basically it's grappling the army way. There are several levels of it and you move up as you master the previous level. Well this is new to the Air Force and so we all went through Level 1 along with some other  Army folks. Talk about watching some people struggle. This is new to many folks so it's understandable



Lt. Gutzman learning some new moves.




SrA Chevis resting???




SSgt Montjoy and Lt. Palmore getting their sweat on. Lt was
definitely trying to avoid the photo.




SSgt Wish performing a move on SSgt Giles (pronounced Ji-l-z)

I have many other photos I'd like to post but they are of Key Leader Engagements and I don't want anyone that is not in uniform being really mad at me for not asking for their permission to put their photo on my blog so I will avoid that but I'll briefly explain what we've done. We have been in an exercise the past 10 days where we are meeting with key leaders of our province and talking with them about the problems they have in the province and how we can help them. Basically, it's a lot of hour-long meetings with a lot of talking.

We were able to go into a simulated village though and perform it as we would downrange.  We had our security, we had our key leader engagement and we also had a medical evacuation (MEDEVAC) portion in the convoy as we were leaving the village. At the scene of the MEDEVAC, we had to perform our live saving skills to save lives. We did well of course and continued our mission. Well enough typing...



SGT Klazinski patrols down the road during a KLE




Lt. Stuart greets some locals




A soldier guards the local village during a KLE




SFC Steidl and Capt Anderson on the job




SSG Winkowski guards the village during a KLE




Spc Bruno in the turret




CLS is performed on a patient




Taking a patient out of an unstable house




SFC Steidl delivering the litter for the patient




PRT Zabul work together to accomplish the mission successfully




Cpl Bregel and Spc Dolan carry the patient out of the house

 Well folks, this pretty much concludes my post for today. As you can see we are now actively wearing our new multicam uniforms. They look pretty sick I think. It's nice to have some photos where our uniform matches our protective gear since we've been mismatching this whole time. BUT, there is good reasoning for that. Thanks for reading and make sure you follow this blog to get updates. I might be posting some stuff while I'm on leave but it'll be more on the personal side if I do and maybe some photos with us getting ready to leave the post officially. After all, this is my blog so I can do that. Also, once I get in country I will provide you all with the link to our facebook PRT. This way you can also follow that and see what we've been up to. 3 months of training is reallllly long but we did train alot. There are many ways to say this but I believe it goes something like this....

"The more we sweat in peace, the less we bleed in war"

Catching Up...

This is totally my fault. It's been far too long since I've updated the blog but we've slept in the field for 3 days and did some other training. You want to know what's the best par t about it though? We are ALMOST done with training. I'm sure 99% of the people at Camp Atterbury are extremely happy about this. It's time to get work done downrange soon. I strongly believe we are all ready and have the skills and knowledge to get done what needs to be done.

Here I'd like to mention thanks for those that are following me and that are keeping up with my blog. After hearing one of the LT's tell me "My family says thank you for the blog because it keeps them updated on what I'm doing", that just motivated me to continue this little side project I got going on. Again, what I write on this blog does not reflect nor speaks for our PRT. This blog is simply something I am personally doing on my own time for y'all. I know many people like to go on here for the photos of their loved ones so here goes some photos. I will still write throughout my posts though. =)

So these next set of photos were taking during one of our classes. I won't give out the name of the class because I don't know if it violates anything so I won't post it BUT nonetheless, we had fun during the training and learned alot. Thank you crazy sky for giving me an interesting background. Can't complain!



PRT Zabul transitions to the next training area




SMSgt Simmons hustles to SSG Winkowski during a training exercise




Had to get that Red, White, and Blue in the mirror




Check on Learning




Corporal Bregel looks back at his team during an exercise




One of the happiest people our PRT has.




Trooping it!




This vehicle is a Beast!




Spc Carabia cleaning his weapon

 Clean, Clean, Clean is something we do all the time, whether is our personal areas, the latrines (bathrooms) or our weapons. Yes, we clean our weapons all the time.

So I bet most of you have seen the movie Hurt Locker, you know that movie where lots of the things he does is NOT what really happens. Yea, that movie. Well we got to play with that robot that's in the movie. Might not be the same exact one but it basically does the same thing.



PRT Zabul gets familiar with the basics of the iRobot




Soldiers practive their iRobot skills




Anddd a close up

 So did 24 hour ops of mounted patrol. Another long day but what's new right? I'll show you most of what we do during a training day. Basically it's shoot and rest, shoot and rest, shoot and rest... You get the idea. We also play a little. You'll see some soldiers acting like fools on here. Got to stay motivated ya know.



We sometimes stare at this for hours.




And that's the shadow of our turret




I really have no caption for this one.




Spc Wedderburn ready to engage during an exercise




The colors that never bleed




Spc Fox watches his sector of fire




Interesting shot I think




Rolling on out




Spc Regina takes a nap. And we do ALOT of this throughout the day
I mean ALOT!!!




and... SSgt Bibb does alot of this!




I wasn't lying. We sleep wherever!




This is definitely not the best NVG photo I can take. I will show you
at the end of the blog why I say this.




Oo 1st squad. Y'all are some characters.

We then went out for 3 days for STX. It's an exercise where we went about an hour away to simulate a scenario. It basically just felt like a really long day. Perhaps, it was because I kept my boots on the whole time but it is what it is. The first night I slept in a basement of an abandoned insane asylum alongside to 3 other dudes, I mean Soldiers and Airmen. HA! Not to mention, It was on Friday the 13th. What an interesting night it was. None of us were afraid though. OK I'm lying. We had Spc. Perez that was scared of the entire place. I guess he hates spooky places lol. The second night I slept sitting up in a leaking Humvee. I woke up soooo many times throughout the night due to leaking water and a sore body. It SUCKED! Then when I woke up without going back to sleep I has a puddle on my elbow from leaking water and frozen toes. This results to me saying... Freedom isn't Free. Here are some photos of the exercise.




A detail show showing American Forces and Afghanistan
culture uniting to accomplish our mission




Spc Perez and Private Mills find some old documents of the
abandoned insane asylum. Those papers were from 1938. Pretty cool.




That paper is almost a century old




Keys we found and it opened nothing!




Lt Lopez calling through the radio.




This is us messing around in that basement. Set on timer baby!



WOOOOOOOOO! enough said!

Lt Col Holliday rockin` and rolling! Hopefully he likes that caption. lol



Spc Lacorte being him.




Sgt Lovett looks out the window for any threats




This was kinda our home.




Our interpreter drinking tea. It's a culture thing but I love the tea

 So I didn't mention that we had to perform a few key leader engagements but for security purposes I will not post those photos.

These next few photos was just a fun day for us. Fun = Free rounds for us to practice shooting and only 3 hours of training. Wooo! We needed that!



Airman 1st Class Fuerst fires off some rounds




A Humvee speeds through the lane to pick up a patient during an exercise




Staff Sgt. Sutton calls for a MEDEVAC during an exercise




Get Some!

So that is all I'm posting for today. I think I posted quite some photos though. My next post will consist of us in combative training and at the bowling alley. Yes, a bowling alley. Thanks to our leadership, they managed to allow us some free time and get us off base to go bowling in civilian clothes. Way to keep the motivation up! Now, I did promise you all one photo for the end. I told you I couldn't get great night time photos for a reason. I've shot through an Astro Scope (night vision camera lens) before but thanks to my home unit [not], This is what I resorted to. Not to mention, I've missed out on ALOT of great night vision opportunities due to not having an Astro Scope. Bummers!!!!  So check this out!



Yep that's tape all around my camera with a Night Vision Goggle on the front.
Sucks when you don't get the equipment you NEED!

 Well folks, that is all for now. I hope you enjoyed this longgg entry. Might be my longest so far not quite sure. That's what happens when you fall behind on work due to training but once I get downrange I should have a semi-routine. Thanks for reading and soon enough you will be getting images of downrange. Thank god the world did not end! HA! I kid I kid...