After an amazing 24 hours in Rome where I fell in love with Italy, Italians, and international travel it was time to get down to business. Let me put this in perspective for you, in case you wonder if your cool crew that looks like they have been there and done that forever, ever did it all a first time, oh yes we did…
When we were taking the crew bus to the hotel from the airport we drove right past the Colosseum, as one does, on the way into town. It was too much for me. I jumped up out of my seat and cried “F*ck me! It’s the Colosseum!!”
Our fearless leader from New York turned around and in her icy German accent quietly asked: “First time in Rome, Montana?”
Ya think?!
Our hotel was not the usual crew hotel and was directly across the street from the US Embassy. We were greeted with Prosecco (NOT SOP for airline crews) and checked in. Upon entering my room in this beautiful old Italian building I was struck by the gorgeous bathroom and all of the…
Italian Marble!!! I did laugh at myself on that one.
The sheets on the bed were actual linen, like clothes you would wear. I felt like such a goober.
We had a great time exploring Rome and then a very serous final briefing before heading downrange. It seemed things were heating up and we needed to be alert and maintain a high state of situational awareness as we approached and for the 4 hours we would sit on the ground while the troops would offload their equipment. Copy that.
We boarded our aircraft and got all onboard weapons stowed. Boarding was interesting and I asked about the hierarchy out of curiosity. Being the military, there was definitely a system. Officers, the Chaplain and the Snipers sat in first class.The Snipers sat in front. That was sobering. I didn’t ask. I just decided I might want to sit further back. This is what it looked like to look out into the main cabin when we were ready to go:
We all felt a huge responsibility to every face looking back at us. They were a part of us now. The guys and ladies were amazing. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the overwhelming respect and courtesy was something I had never experienced in my 20+ years of flying and I would have laid my life down for them at that point. They were grateful for every little thing we gave them and kind to a fault.
I wanted to do something for them, so during the 10 hour flight I waded through the sea of camouflage and took pictures of smaller groups. I would get the names of each soldier in the group and any emails they wanted me to send the pictures to. During my 10 hour empty flight back I prepared over 100 emails and sent them to families back home, sending one last glimpse of their baby on their way to war and one last goodbye. I also sent shots of them deplaning and heading off into the desert so they could see where they were. Pictures on the flightline were forbidden, so don’t tell anyone ok?
As we approached Kuwait City we were given the signal to go dark. All CRAF flights were operated under the cover of darkness, but we turned off any and all lights outside and inside the aircraft. Everyone would know exactly why a US flag carrier was flying into Kuwait while we’re threatening Shock and Awe, so there’s no use lighting us up and putting a target on us. We had to make a simple, calm announcement to lower all window shades. Now I don’t know if any of you have noticed the haphazard compliance with this request on a vacation flight when we are going to show a movie back in the old days, but when we made that announcement with the troops those shades snapped down before the announcement was over. Done. Our jaws dropped.
Flight attendants strapped our chem suits around our waists, which would not come off until we cleared the local airspace upon departure, did a final check of the cabin and took our jumpseats for landing.
I sat on my jumpseat in the dark with almost 300 troops piercing through the night towards a war zone and I had a vision of another plane doing the same thing coming from the other direction with warriors who would fight these men and women and a tear escaped. What were we doing?? I had to hold it together. What were they thinking? Were they scared?
We touched down and even before we finished the rollout I got my answer. The song started with a few but caught on fast and by the time it got to the chorus that plane was rocking. It was Toby Keith’s “The Angry American” and they were pounding their fists when they got to “We’ll put a boot in your ass, it’s the American Way!”
I was so proud!! We all clapped. Those kids were going to do all right.
In the landing PA, our lead flight attendant added at the end that we love to hug, so if anybody needed one last hug from home as they left to just ask any one of us. We were all standing and saying goodbye and shaking hands and this one, very large gentleman who looked just like Michael Clarke Duncan from The Green Mile stopped in front of 5’1” 105lb me and said: “Ma’am, I think I need one of those hugs.” He even had the voice! Well I latched on to his waist and hugged that big guy with his sidearm in my face and cried like a baby.
And off they went…
Whitefish Dog and Home 