Posted on Jun 5, 2016
Do you remember your first Freedom Bird home from your first deployment?
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The wierdest thoughts in my head like us getting yanked off the bird. The irony of dying in a plane crash. Where we were just 24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours before. Then the doors closed, we start to taxi, speed increases, and the bird lifts off & EVERYONE, as if rehearsed yells with excitement. I watch tears give way to exhaustion as my guys put on headphones and fall asleep. I awoke in Ireland
Deployment
Overseas
Memories
Posted >1 y ago
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No Freedom Bird, but "Channel fever" the night before pulling in. Mess deck was usually full, card games, dominoes, watching TV, just talking and BS'ing. The MS's would put out some food. No one could sleep.
Pull into San Diego harbor the next morning. Having the local strip clubs come out in boats advertising their "assets" and holding up signs for special deals. Having signs hanging from the Coronado Bay Bridge saying "Welcome home crew of USS -------, report for de-briefing ASAP!" . Then spouses and family waiting on the pier as we pulled in, manning the rails. It was an awesome feeling! Except if you had your duty day upon arriving...not so good...lol
Pull into San Diego harbor the next morning. Having the local strip clubs come out in boats advertising their "assets" and holding up signs for special deals. Having signs hanging from the Coronado Bay Bridge saying "Welcome home crew of USS -------, report for de-briefing ASAP!" . Then spouses and family waiting on the pier as we pulled in, manning the rails. It was an awesome feeling! Except if you had your duty day upon arriving...not so good...lol
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In Vietnam, 1969-1970, we did not go over, or come back as a unit. Going over the mood was somber. Coming back, I was afraid that we would be shot down on takeoff. The mood coming back was boisterous.
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SSG Robert Hawk
Were you in Da Nang? I spent three days and two nights in the “terminal” waiting for any available north-bound chopper to take me on up country to Quang Tri. Then again in Da Nang a night in a barracks ( much better than the concrete floor at the airfield) on my way out to R&R. Noisiest terminal in the world maybe (at the time) with all the F-4 traffic - but what beauties in the air! (Hawk]
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SSG Robert Hawk
That reminded me that coming home in ‘70, a couple of us from my outfit (1/64 of Army 5th Division) flew a C-130 in which the crew chief was on HIS last flight before heading home, and he said he was especially glad to be on the ground in Da Nang because we’d lost an engine on the way out of Quang Tri. We were all just happy to be headed outbound.
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SSG Robert Hawk
I’m not great with this social media stuff but thank you. And you as well, Sergeant!Sgt (Join to see)
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No, but I remember the first leg really well, and my LAST "Freedom Bird." Probably remember the first leg out of BIAP because it was a short hop to Balad and the taxi was so long and slow it was as if we were DRIVING to Balad. I remember my last of three deployments departing Manas Transit Station, Kyrgyzstan in 2011, because we flew on a Delta charter and not a private brand like Omni. I have an uncle who is a retired Delta FA (he married my Aunt, an AA FA) and he said he loved doing the military charters. Probably because we know how to behave and have leadership to keep us out of trouble.
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MSG (Join to see)
"Probably because we know how to behave and have leadership to keep us out of trouble." For all the stereotypes of joes being hounds, I never saw on a chartered flight anyone act inappropriately toward the flight attendants. Effin' Hollywood.
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