Bosnian War

[696574CC]

Mt.crewchief,

As far as I know none of the gunship guys spent time on the ground but if I recall correctly I heard some of the MC-130 Talons did, just hearsay, this was between my two trips and most folks involved had already rotated back home. Glad you liked the site, a lot of good historical information there.

Regards,

Jody

[HeyChief]

I forgot you guys did not have SKE. I guess they came and modded you guys later.

I remember that about the Mortar fire. It was mostly Guard and Reserves doing the airlift. I know there were some active units there but mostly Guard and Reserve made up Delta Squadron...

The 37th was there from the start until the very end. The unit didn't even stand-down when we moved from Rhein-Main to Ramstein. Usually 3 aircraft daily doing 3 turns from Split and then later from Ancona for Provide promise. Later during IFOR and SFOR it was usually the same sort of schedule except turning back to Ramstein for concurrent servicing/cargo load for sortie 2.

37th aircraft took fire and damage on several occasions, from simple skin damage to nose-to-tail system damage from multiple rounds. I have a piece of cargo compartment floor in my shadow box from 0947 after recovering it with damage.

Guard and Reserve definitely worked their asses off, just wanted to remind folks of the good work the 37th did every day during the Bosnian effort.

[Spectre623]

Heychief, you are absolutely correct in the fact the 37th did great work during that time...and still do. As in my post about the -7 engine. No outfit is perfect, and because we all stumble and sometimes fall, we are all in on these operations together...to hack the mission for the old red,white and blue. We pickup and backup each other in the C-130 world. In my time in I've cleaned up behind other units and they have surly cleaned up some of my messes. Bill :)

[Thomas Young]

I'm a former C-130 flight engineer, now retired from the Air Guard and writing military-related novels. My newest novel, THE WARRIORS, is set in present-day Bosnia, and it includes a flashback to a C-130 mission during the Bosnian war. (My main character, Air Force flier Michael Parson, flew as a Herk navigator in Bosnia.) Here's a link to the Amazon page:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Warriors-Tom-Young/dp/0399158472

[MHeflin]

I was with 7th SOS/352nd SOG @ Alconbury, as the Ops. Sup for the AD Flight. We had just made the conversion over to the MC-130H Talon II when the 37th started getting hot and heavy into airdrop over Bosnia and we were sent to Rhein-Main to augment. However, upon arrival the press made a big deal that AFSOC was in the house and that covert missions delivering arms would be commencing shortly. Since no other Herc looks quite like a TII, the powers that be didn't want to deal with the aggrevation and speculation about what we were/weren't doing every time we taxied out, so we weren't permitted to fly any of the out-country missions.

We (LMs) did fly with the 37th crews on missions into Bosnia and we also developed and conducted flight test of the TRIADS humanitarian food distro system, from a TII at Graf. The first mission into Bosnia was flown onboard 3, 37th Slicks and it went spectacularly well, with one exception. During the development drops, we never went with a full load of MRE packets in the tri-wall containers, because of the difficulty in policing them up on the DZ. For the actual drops the boxes were loaded up to their maximum capacity. I nearly soiled myself at the Combat Entry when we de-pressurized @ 16K and all the meal packets inflated, swelled the boxes to near bursting and began to spill out. Myself and RG were running around the back end (which is damn difficult in body armor, survival vest, helmet, parachute and dragging a hose) trying to scoop them up and out of the way in order to keep them from causing a malfunction when we reached Green Light. You forget one little thing....

Another story... the 37th had just made the switch from the S&W 38s, to the 9mm. However, Life Support hadn't had the time to convert the holsters in the survival vests. So the boys really had a difficult time getting Baretta's securely into the holster. Anyway, on one of the first CDS missions, the LM went back on the ramp and was struggling to retrieve the static lines back into the aircraft, when his pistol came out of the holster and went overboard. The same thing was repeated by another LM the next night. After the mission, during the de-brief, the entire formation was treated to a rip roaring, ass chewing by the Wing King (Gen. Lorranger), who stated that the next LM who lost his weapon over Bosnia had just better bail the F out after it, because his life wouldn't be worth spit back at RM.