Nate News

Hello from Ft. Rucker!

I know Alex usually wrights these because, as she so elegantly told me, she is a better writer than me. But I thought I would update our friends and family on where I’m at in training. As you all know, I came down here to Alabama in January, and, as many of you know, I pulled my hamstring two weeks into my stay here. So, for about a month and a half I was in eligible for “real” training, as I could not pass a PT test. After my leg healed, I was on hold for about two more weeks and then a slot opened for me to get started with class.

The class I am in now is aviation’s version of the course I was in at Ft. Sill back in November. Yes, that means that the Ft. Sill was a complete waste of time. I am actually learning something here, which makes Sill look even more wasteful, but I’m in the Army, they love to waste time. Anyway, I am in Aviation Basic Officer Leadership Course Bravo/Junior Officer Professional Development, or ABOLC-B/JOPD (I’ll refer to it as JOPD for ease).

The intent behind JOPD is to help us understand what we are getting into as Lieutenants in the United States Army. They have been teaching us everything from the Military Justice system, to Combined Army Doctrine, to vehicle identification (learning every military vehicle for every country), to hand to hand combat. All of which is turning us not only the best rotary wing pilots in the world, but the best officers we can be.

Last Tuesday we took a tour of the Army Aviation Museum here on post. Our tour took a little over two hours to look at about 30 different aircraft. We saw everything from the Wright Flyer that was developed for the Army by Orville and Wilbur Wright, to the first Presidential helicopter developed for Dwight D. Eisenhower. As the curator of the museum walked us through the “history of our family,” as he called it, he stressed the fact that we are the history of tomorrow. Someday an aircraft that one of us flies could be in the museum. He challenged us to live up to the standard of those who came before us, to be the best Aviators possible and to support the guys on the ground as they create history.

This challenge hit really close to home for me because not too long after I took the tour my company commander gave me a call. She told me that I will be finishing flight school by at least June of next year. They will push me through training faster if it looks like I am getting held up, because in August of 2011 we will be mobilizing. This means that for three months we will train somewhere in the US, and then spend approx. nine months overseas in Iraq, returning home in August of 2012.

Everything is still up in the air, so that’s pretty much all I know right now. We will keep you all up to date as I find out more, but right now we would appreciate your thoughts and prayers as we try to figure out the next 16 months. I should be done with school by May of next year, but there are so many variables that could extend my training (hopefully we won’t have many hurricanes). Well, I’ve got a lot of studying to get done, so that’s all for now.