Tank rolls over a bomb

I can't believe it's been 8 years since I filmed this in Mosul, Iraq in 2008, 7 since my squad leader posted it, and it's still going around.

As a combat Engineer on a route clearance team, we had a Navy EOD team with us and two Abrams with us for extra security. I remeber that it was our third time passing that area on route Porshe, I still find the irony funny. Our lead vehicle noticed that the car was not there 3 hours before. It had no engine and was obviously placed there for a reason. Our buffalo (our second vehicle) passed it and thought that they saw some wires in the back seat. Our platoon sergeant told EOD to pull the robot out and take a look, then they should blow it up so that it couldn't be used by the enemy. When the tankers heard that, they wanted to run it over. Even though that morning we told them in the mission briefing that it was now policy from regiment not to run over anything. So the Navy EOD was excited to let them run over the car because they had never seen it before and thought it would be cool. After arguing with our platoon leader over the net, our LT said they can do what ever they want but he will not be held responsible for it. So EOD drove by it looking in the back seat and said it was clear, not pulling out the robot to look inside the trunk or under the car. So my LT looked up at me on the gun and said, "did you bring your camera today." I replied, "Of course I did sir, and yes I am already getting it out to film this stupidity." He said, "Good, make sure to give me a copy as soon as we get back." And as you can see, this is why tankers are stupid. The car had a pressure plate in its trunk, probally for later. The crew was fine but it destroyed the track, blow off a couple of road wheels, and almost punctured the gas tank on that side. The crew was very lucky, but needed to be towed back to base.

Moral of the story, there is a reason policies are made because of stuff like this.

Let's get something straight here. I was the loader in the other tank. What the route clearance platoon leader told us was that the vehicle had been cleared and to prevent anyone else from putting an IED into the vehicle again, to go ahead and crush it. THIS IS WHAT WAS ASKED BY THE SAME PEOPLE THAT SAID IT WAS CLEARED! The discussion we were having is that "this seems stupid but if that's what they need us to do, we'll do it, as long as it's cleared." I understand the reason for crushing the car when they asked, but would have never agreed to do it knowing that the IED was still in there. After that incident, our platoon made sure we wasn't task again to that stupidity of a Route Recon package. Yes there was a 15-6 for that incident and guess what? No one got relieved in my platoon. So before you call tankers stupid get the whole story and that goes for those of all ranks.

4 TBIs, coming up!