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All right, we're ready for departure. Here at the Pilot Project Podcast,

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the best source for stories and advice from the pilots of the RCAF.

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Brought to you by Skies magazine and RCAF today.

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I'm your host, Brian Morrison. With me today is our guest from the

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Christmas episode, Greg Gerling. Greg, welcome to the

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show and thanks so much for being here.

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Hey, thanks for having me.

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Before we start, let's go over Greg's bio.

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Greg graduated from flight training in 2008 and was

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posted to 403 Squadron in Gagetown, New Brunswick, flying the

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Ch 146 Griffin. After getting qualified, he

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was deployed to Afghanistan with a Canadian helicopter Force

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Afghanistan from October 2009 until

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August 2010 in support of Op Athena. While

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there, he flew close to 600 combat hours in

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103 sorties, doing mostly Chinook escort

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reconnaissance, close combat attack, and armed overwatch

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missions. While deployed, he held the position of

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electronic warfare officer. Upon his return,

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he was able to complete his Advanced Tactical Aviation Course, or

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ATAC, and got his A Category Instructor rating and was

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employed as a standards officer and check pilot. In

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2019, Greg was posted to the Joint Rescue Coordination

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Center, or JRCC.

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In Halifax.

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As an aeronautical coordinator there, he was responsible for

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defining and coordinating missions for SAR crews, including

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marine, air and humanitarian missions.

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On his days off, Greg got his airline transport pilot

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license for helicopters and was able to fly for Breton Air,

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based in Sydney, Nova Scotia. In August

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2023, Greg was posted to the Halifax Recruiting Center

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and is just getting started there. Greg has close to 3000

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hours military flying, including 600 combat,

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800 instructional, and 500 on

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NVGs. So where did

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aviation start for you, Greg?

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Great question. Aviation, it's, um,

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not something I ever grew up thinking about or wanting. I

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actually grew up on a farm in Anaganish,

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Nova Scotia. We had a beef farm, and my dad had a

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farm equipment dealership. So my whole dream

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in life was to sell tractors. So I

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started with an agricultural business diploma from the Nova Scotia

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Agricultural College. I did a farm equipment

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mechanics apprenticeship course on the side while I was working

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as a mechanic. And then I also went to St of X University in

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Anaganish to get my degree in business.

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Towards the end of that degree, my dad had an

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offer to buy his business. And I looked at the numbers

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and stuff, and I knew that if they had that kind of money to buy him out, they

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had that money to put him out, too. So the business

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decision for him was definitely to sell. So that kind of

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left me up in the air. What I was going to do with the rest of my life.

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And it started a little journey on the business path where I went to

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work for a company called Irving, and I worked for them for two years.

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And on the sidelines, I

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started in the infantry reserves going into my last year university

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because my roommate was doing it, and he's like, hey, this will be fun for the

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summer. Run around, shoot guns, throw grenades. That does

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sound like I can go do that. So I never had

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any interest in the military at all. And then I sort of got my foot

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in the door because of my friend that got me into

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that. Then I was doing that on the side while I was still working for

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Irving and decided that, you know what, I really wanted to pursue a

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full time military career. So I went to the recruiting center and I

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said, hey, I want to go full time military. At this time, I

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had already done all of my officer training, and, uh, I

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was employed as a platoon commander with the first Nova Scotia Highlanders at a

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Picto. So I said, that was a lot of hard work to get

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all that done, so I'd like to do that job. And at

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the time, Afghanistan was going on and I was interested in

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deploying as an infantry officer. When I went into the

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recruiting center, the guy there basically said, well, you have a business

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degree. You could be a logistics officer. And I said, Well, I haven't really thought

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about anything else. And then he said, well, geez, you could be a

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pilot if you want.

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And I'm like, that sounds pretty good.

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Put me down for that. So that's how I became

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a pilot. Like, just that simple. And, uh, I went through

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the training and the selection, and here I am today.

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Did you have any background experience in

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aviation? Had you ever flown an airplane before that,

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or did you go to air shows or anything like that?

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So my dad had taken me to an air show in Shearwater

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when I was a kid, and I still remember that. And the funny thing

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about that story is, years later,

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after training, I got my wings and I flew my dad out to

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Winnipeg. Uh, and you know how that is, the wings grad

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party. We had a few drinks and stuff, and we were at the back of the

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mess and I said, dad, isn't it crazy? Like, all I ever wanted to do was

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sell tractors. And he said to me, he's like, you know what, all I ever

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wanted to do is be an Air Force pilot.

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No way.

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And I never knew that until I had wings on my chest. And it

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was really interesting because, um, he actually went and applied

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for the Air Force, but he immigrated from Holland

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after World War II. My grandparents survived World War

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II, got married, had my dad and then immigrated here to

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farm. So he didn't learn English until

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he was nine. So he was always a little bit behind in school. Super

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smart, very, very common sense.

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Just full of common sense.

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He ended up going to the recruiting center and they said, well, you

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need to have a degree. And he's like, Well, I'm not getting a degree. He went

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on and got a mechanics license and then went on and became successful in

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business. And I did know that he did pursue a little bit of

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flying when I was a kid, but he was too busy with the kids and

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the business was sort of taking off at the time, too, so so it's really

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interesting that my dad had such an interest in aviation

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that I never knew about. And then here I ended up sort of

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living his dream and he sort of lived what I always dreamed that.

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I was going to do.

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How did you find your flight training experience in the forces?

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Really, really rewarding, challenging,

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rewarding. Super fun.

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Yeah.

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Had a really good time and I had really good, uh,

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instructors and I had really good peers around me. My strength

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was always hands and feet.

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I don't know why.

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I think partly because of growing up on a farm, just

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operating equipment really served me well, and also having that work ethic

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from being on a farm to be able to put the work in. I

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had really good friends around me to help me with the book stuff. There's

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one guy who's a lieutenant colonel now, Chris Bowers, who's in

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Winnipeg, and we did every course right from air crew

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selection together, right up until we had our wings. And

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I would go to his house every night and

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study, and he would teach me everything that was going on in the ground

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school. And I beat him on every exam

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except the very last one at our wings

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course. And I definitely credit him for

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being one of the best instructors that I've had

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for the ground stuff, and certainly a very good friend in the

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peer. And he's off doing really big things now, too. He

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went into the maritime helicopter community and now he's in Winnipeg

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doing big senior staff officer stuff.

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Awesome. Yeah.

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Were you stressed out at all, or was it fairly smooth

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sailing for you?

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So I wasn't stressed, um, too

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much for the simple fact that it was never my dream

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to be a pilot. And I think that that served me very well

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when I had a stumbling block or something I found

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challenging.

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And it's like, I don't know if.

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I'm going to get through this or not. I was like, well, if I don't,

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I'm going to go to the infantry. Because I was already qualified as an

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infantry platoon commander, and I was already a lieutenant at the time too.

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So I had options, like I was going to be in the

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military and I was going to do something that I loved to do, whether it was being a

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pilot or in the infantry at that

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time, they were both good options to me.

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So because of that, I really handled the

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stress well, because it wasn't something that I was

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going to lose. I never felt like it was something I had or

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really even wanted to be honest with you.

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So I'm really grateful that that was the approach that I took,

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because stress is the thing that really

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is the most challenging thing for student pilots, for

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sure.

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I think managing it is one of the hardest skills you learn, and

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it's such a hard thing for a lot of people. That

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is their dream. Right? For most of them, I would argue that is

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their dream. So you do put a lot of pressure on yourself, and it's such a

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tricky thing to manage.

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Yeah.

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So you've got through your flight training, and selection time rolls around

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and you get selected. Griffins was that what you

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wanted?

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I got a good story about that one. So

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when I joined as a pilot, I went

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to do my OJT at 413 Squadron in Greenwood,

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Nova Scotia. And I wanted

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comarons, for sure. I got

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out with a guy named Major Steve Reed. Uh, he's still in

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he's at Gander right now. He's over at Wing Ops

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there. And he was just a wonderful mentor to

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me. He took me on flights and stuff.

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And after the crash in 2006 of

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914, there was lots of issues and there was

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hesitation in taking OJT pilots flying.

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That was the comrade.

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The comrade.

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Yeah.

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Off cancer. Nova Scotia. So I was there at that time,

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uh, and he still took me

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on this one mission where we went like 150 miles offshore

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off of Yarmouth. And we rescued a lady

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who had a lot of problems on a cruise ship. And, uh, I

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watched the Sartex go down and package

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her up and take her up, and just working on her in the

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helicopter. And they saved her life. And it was

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very impactful for me

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as a human, but also as a member of this

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team. Even though I was just a passenger, that really stuck

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with me, and that was something that I wanted to do.

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So then I went through flight training and stuff, and at the end

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of Moosejaw, I did well, and

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they tried to push me jets, and I was very interested in

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jets. I had spent time in Cold Lake, and I really

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loved the community. Like, all the people there were amazing. Some

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of the best pilots you'll ever meet. And my

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flight commander at the time was a very experienced fighter

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pilot who did the F 15 exchange tour

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up in Alaska a few years before. And he had been around for a long

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time. I think he even started on Voodoos. So

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he was telling me, hey, I think you'd be really good at this. And of course, as a

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student know, you're just going to be happy getting wings at that

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point, right? And then to kind of have your tires pumped a little

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bit like this. It felt really good. And I also I

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loved the form phase. Like flying in the Harvard and doing

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formation was just I just loved it.

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Yeah, it's very exciting and it's very.

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Challenging and it's the one thing that only the

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military really does. You know what I mean? It just felt this is

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military flying, right? So

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I told him, I'm like, I'm not sure.

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And he's like, well, come to work tomorrow. We're going to put you

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up in the Hawk. We'll send you for a flight. So there's a two ship flight going

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out with a person that was just upgrading.

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They had to do a radar square, so just take off two

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ship, an instrument approach leading a two ship.

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And then we had a whole bunch of gaffes. So they're like, well, then we're going to go

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play. So we went out to the training area and we did like, 500 foot

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separation. And the pilot I was with is actually,

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um, Major Parker, who's the lead of

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the Snowbirds right now. Um, yeah, I talked to him

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here in Halifax not too long ago and he let me

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fly the whole thing. And so after I landed, I

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came in and my flight committer was like, so was that a fun flight? I'm like, honestly, that was

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the best flight I've ever had in my life. Who gets to fly these

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jets around and do all this? He's like, so are you going to go

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jets? And I'm like, well, I need a little bit of time to think about. He's like, you have

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30 minutes. And I was like, well, I've wanted to do chrome runs

236
00:10:33.038 --> 00:10:35.938
for two years at this point, so 30 minutes isn't going to

237
00:10:35.944 --> 00:10:37.666
be enough time to think on this.

238
00:10:37.768 --> 00:10:38.802
So I said no.

239
00:10:38.936 --> 00:10:41.794
So after I told him no, I went back to Anigan and Sean leave.

240
00:10:41.912 --> 00:10:44.786
And a couple of days later he had called me and said, hey, Greg, we really

241
00:10:44.808 --> 00:10:47.674
want you to go this. We've got a few jet slots here. And there was a lot of

242
00:10:47.712 --> 00:10:50.698
really skilled pilots on my mooseja course too, that a

243
00:10:50.704 --> 00:10:53.514
bunch of them did go on to fighter jobs and they're very

244
00:10:53.552 --> 00:10:55.914
successful there and they've had a lot of operational experience.

245
00:10:56.112 --> 00:10:58.938
But he wanted me to go and he talked me into it pretty

246
00:10:58.944 --> 00:11:01.786
much. And I'm like, look, I'm 95% in on this. I

247
00:11:01.808 --> 00:11:04.506
just need to talk to one guy, Major Steve Reed,

248
00:11:04.618 --> 00:11:07.486
because he's been my mentor, he's been very good to me. So at the time he

249
00:11:07.508 --> 00:11:10.238
was at a desk job in Ottawa. So I called,

250
00:11:10.404 --> 00:11:13.246
left a message he was busy. And I went

251
00:11:13.268 --> 00:11:16.158
out for a run just on a dirt road in behind my house in

252
00:11:16.164 --> 00:11:19.106
Antigone ish about six k into the run, a

253
00:11:19.128 --> 00:11:21.970
Comrade helicopter flies right over my head. And I'm like,

254
00:11:22.040 --> 00:11:25.006
that has to be a sign. I ran home, I packed a bag,

255
00:11:25.038 --> 00:11:27.966
I went down to Greenwood. I stayed with, uh, a friend of mine, Ron Bush,

256
00:11:27.998 --> 00:11:30.918
who was a pilot on the Comrade at the time, and also

257
00:11:31.004 --> 00:11:33.718
a good friend, too. And I went, I talked to everybody in the

258
00:11:33.724 --> 00:11:36.598
community, and I talked to a friend of mine that I recruited into the

259
00:11:36.604 --> 00:11:39.074
military who was a Woofie tech, water fuel, environmental

260
00:11:39.122 --> 00:11:42.106
technician. Like, we went to high school together, and so we went and had lunch. And I'm

261
00:11:42.128 --> 00:11:45.100
like, this is what it's all about. It's like being in my home,

262
00:11:45.470 --> 00:11:48.460
know, flying search and rescue missions. And for me and,

263
00:11:48.460 --> 00:11:51.434
uh, where I was at in my life at that time, it just made the most sense

264
00:11:51.472 --> 00:11:54.398
to gun for the Comrade spot, not knowing that I could

265
00:11:54.404 --> 00:11:57.086
get a Comrade spot. Yeah, I'm now putting my hat in for

266
00:11:57.108 --> 00:11:59.838
helicopters. So then when I went to

267
00:11:59.844 --> 00:12:02.606
helicopter school, I ended up being on the

268
00:12:02.708 --> 00:12:05.246
small group evaluation for the Outlaw. So I was on the first Outlaw

269
00:12:05.278 --> 00:12:08.210
course. There was four of us, and they wanted

270
00:12:08.280 --> 00:12:11.186
a person to go to each of the fleets. So there

271
00:12:11.208 --> 00:12:13.730
was a Comrant spot, a Griffin spot,

272
00:12:14.280 --> 00:12:17.154
uh, Seeking spot, and a Chinook Exchange

273
00:12:17.202 --> 00:12:20.182
in Australia. So I knew that I better

274
00:12:20.236 --> 00:12:22.742
take a look at these communities before I

275
00:12:22.796 --> 00:12:25.526
actually go to helicopter school because I didn't know anything about

276
00:12:25.548 --> 00:12:28.490
maritime, I didn't know anything about Tech Hell mhm

277
00:12:28.490 --> 00:12:31.366
at the time. I just knew that I loved Comarines and the mission

278
00:12:31.398 --> 00:12:34.378
set, right? So I talked to my

279
00:12:34.384 --> 00:12:37.258
flight commander, and I recommend this to all OJTs. Try to

280
00:12:37.264 --> 00:12:40.086
get a week OJT, uh, on this airframe.

281
00:12:40.118 --> 00:12:42.326
Like, go over and see the aurora, go over and see the

282
00:12:42.368 --> 00:12:45.258
cyclone. If you can do that, and if it's in the budget, it's

283
00:12:45.274 --> 00:12:48.106
very beneficial because if we can get our OJT

284
00:12:48.138 --> 00:12:51.118
pilots on airframes that they enjoy the most and are the

285
00:12:51.124 --> 00:12:54.078
best fit for them, not just for airframe, but mission set

286
00:12:54.164 --> 00:12:56.866
and also location mhm we're going to keep them longer, so it

287
00:12:56.888 --> 00:12:59.346
benefits us. I went and spent a week on the

288
00:12:59.368 --> 00:13:02.226
Seeking, and it was very interesting what they

289
00:13:02.248 --> 00:13:05.106
do. Their mission set is very cool. They get to travel the world and all that

290
00:13:05.128 --> 00:13:08.086
stuff, but it just wasn't a good fit for me. And then I went

291
00:13:08.108 --> 00:13:11.058
up to Gagetown and a guy named Jim Newton, who ended

292
00:13:11.074 --> 00:13:14.054
up being the, uh, squadron commander there, took me under his

293
00:13:14.092 --> 00:13:16.966
wing and he put me in the simulator. He'd got

294
00:13:16.988 --> 00:13:19.718
me flying every day, got me on night flights, on night vision

295
00:13:19.734 --> 00:13:22.714
goggles, and it was low level flying. And I actually

296
00:13:22.752 --> 00:13:24.742
flew with, uh, General Alexander.

297
00:13:24.806 --> 00:13:25.130
Okay.

298
00:13:25.200 --> 00:13:28.170
He actually flew me there. He probably wouldn't remember that very cool,

299
00:13:28.240 --> 00:13:29.034
but I remember it.

300
00:13:29.072 --> 00:13:29.418
Yeah.

301
00:13:29.504 --> 00:13:32.346
That week was a game changer for me because I fell in love

302
00:13:32.368 --> 00:13:35.086
with Tackl. I mean, with my army background as well,

303
00:13:35.108 --> 00:13:37.946
too. I understood the customer because the customer of Tackle

304
00:13:37.978 --> 00:13:38.942
is the army, right?

305
00:13:38.996 --> 00:13:39.310
Yeah.

306
00:13:39.380 --> 00:13:42.174
And I also understood what it was like being a soldier, getting

307
00:13:42.212 --> 00:13:44.974
supported by air, especially helicopter

308
00:13:45.022 --> 00:13:47.954
support. Right. So I was like, wow, I really

309
00:13:48.152 --> 00:13:50.962
love this flying. This is like, a really good fit.

310
00:13:51.096 --> 00:13:53.662
And so when it came to selection in Portage,

311
00:13:53.806 --> 00:13:56.590
I did top the course. So I had my first choice,

312
00:13:56.670 --> 00:13:59.470
and there was a comb run spot available in, uh,

313
00:13:59.470 --> 00:14:02.326
Greenwood. And my course director at the time, he's like, you

314
00:14:02.348 --> 00:14:05.318
got your comrade spot. Do you want to do that? And I said, I kind of want

315
00:14:05.324 --> 00:14:08.306
to go to 430 Squadron because I want to learn French.

316
00:14:08.418 --> 00:14:11.338
And then I want to get posted to Gagetown and become an

317
00:14:11.344 --> 00:14:13.994
instructor there on my second tour so I can be on the East Coast because

318
00:14:14.032 --> 00:14:16.300
location was very important for me.

319
00:14:16.670 --> 00:14:19.258
So then they said no to the

320
00:14:19.344 --> 00:14:22.182
430 Squadron because my French wasn't good enough. I had a profile.

321
00:14:22.246 --> 00:14:25.198
Yeah. But then my course director came to me and

322
00:14:25.204 --> 00:14:27.626
he's like, hey, would you be interested in going as a pipeline

323
00:14:27.738 --> 00:14:29.962
to 403 Squadron?

324
00:14:30.106 --> 00:14:32.720
And I was like, yeah, I would be.

325
00:14:33.170 --> 00:14:36.119
Okay, so we're going to shift gears, and the rest of the interview is going to

326
00:14:36.119 --> 00:14:37.870
be focused on your time in Afghanistan.

327
00:14:37.950 --> 00:14:38.674
Sure.

328
00:14:38.872 --> 00:14:41.250
How did you find out you were going to Afghanistan?

329
00:14:41.590 --> 00:14:44.546
So when I left helicopter school and got posted to

330
00:14:44.568 --> 00:14:47.526
403 Squadron, I started my course right away. Like I

331
00:14:47.548 --> 00:14:50.546
mentioned earlier, that's when Canada decided

332
00:14:50.578 --> 00:14:53.298
to buy six Shinook helicopters and deploy eight Griffins

333
00:14:53.394 --> 00:14:55.942
to theater. So when I was on

334
00:14:55.996 --> 00:14:58.838
course on my Griffin course, I was told by

335
00:14:58.924 --> 00:15:01.706
my Co at the time that I was going to

336
00:15:01.728 --> 00:15:04.442
go, and I was really excited about it. So

337
00:15:04.576 --> 00:15:07.370
it's funny because when you're going through pilot training,

338
00:15:07.440 --> 00:15:10.174
like, when I was going through, we didn't have

339
00:15:10.212 --> 00:15:13.040
any deployed air assets other than,

340
00:15:13.070 --> 00:15:15.578
uh, uh, transport missions

341
00:15:15.754 --> 00:15:18.686
in theater at the time, and there was no visibility that

342
00:15:18.708 --> 00:15:21.466
that was going to happen. And then all of a sudden,

343
00:15:21.658 --> 00:15:24.190
we bought six Chinooks and put eight Griffins

344
00:15:24.350 --> 00:15:27.186
into Afghanistan, which was a very

345
00:15:27.288 --> 00:15:30.242
active combat zone. And here I was,

346
00:15:30.296 --> 00:15:32.962
just a student, still learning how to fly and

347
00:15:33.016 --> 00:15:35.918
preparing to go to this combat theater. So I think it's

348
00:15:35.934 --> 00:15:38.854
really important for a lot of your listeners who are

349
00:15:38.892 --> 00:15:41.798
pilots going through the training system to know that, hey,

350
00:15:41.964 --> 00:15:44.918
the stuff that you're learning right now, you may be using this within a

351
00:15:44.924 --> 00:15:47.846
year even. You just never know what Canadian foreign policy is

352
00:15:47.868 --> 00:15:50.774
going to be totally. And where the government is going to commit

353
00:15:50.822 --> 00:15:52.550
its assets, its, uh, resources.

354
00:15:52.630 --> 00:15:52.874
Yeah.

355
00:15:52.912 --> 00:15:55.866
I never expected to, within less than a year

356
00:15:55.888 --> 00:15:58.522
of finishing qualifying on the Aurora to be flying over

357
00:15:58.576 --> 00:15:59.514
Iraq. That's for sure.

358
00:15:59.552 --> 00:15:59.850
Right.

359
00:15:59.920 --> 00:16:02.666
This is submarine hunter, so that was not in my

360
00:16:02.688 --> 00:16:03.254
crystal ball.

361
00:16:03.302 --> 00:16:05.786
It's crazy. My aircraft commander at the time, Ron

362
00:16:05.818 --> 00:16:08.798
Krueger, he said, I feel bad for you guys, because he was

363
00:16:08.804 --> 00:16:11.746
at the end of his career and I was at the beginning of mine, and he's like, this is the

364
00:16:11.768 --> 00:16:14.210
highlight of your career. Like, this Afghanistan

365
00:16:14.630 --> 00:16:17.442
job is very important

366
00:16:17.576 --> 00:16:20.562
and very dynamic, and it is what

367
00:16:20.616 --> 00:16:23.474
Takhel is all about. And you are

368
00:16:23.512 --> 00:16:25.270
not going to get this again in your career.

369
00:16:25.270 --> 00:16:28.226
Uh, I would bet that's the pinnacle of what Takhel is

370
00:16:28.248 --> 00:16:28.770
meant to do.

371
00:16:28.840 --> 00:16:29.170
Yeah.

372
00:16:29.240 --> 00:16:32.134
And for me, it actually worked out really well, because I went in

373
00:16:32.172 --> 00:16:35.078
and I got to deploy and do the job for ten months. When I came back, I

374
00:16:35.084 --> 00:16:38.026
had more combat flying time than I had domestic flying time. So

375
00:16:38.048 --> 00:16:40.586
I was very experienced with combat operations and

376
00:16:40.608 --> 00:16:43.434
with the EOIR MX 15, like,

377
00:16:43.472 --> 00:16:46.250
electro optic infrared systems and combat attack

378
00:16:46.320 --> 00:16:49.194
work and all that stuff. And escort that

379
00:16:49.232 --> 00:16:50.266
EOIR that you were.

380
00:16:50.288 --> 00:16:53.130
Talking about there, electro optic infrared, uh,

381
00:16:53.130 --> 00:16:55.722
and that, for the listeners, is the camera.

382
00:16:55.866 --> 00:16:56.702
Yeah, that's right.

383
00:16:56.756 --> 00:16:56.974
Yeah.

384
00:16:57.012 --> 00:16:58.286
So I always try to call it.

385
00:16:58.308 --> 00:17:00.122
EOIR, but we call it EOIR.

386
00:17:00.186 --> 00:17:02.426
Everybody calls it flur, and some systems.

387
00:17:02.458 --> 00:17:04.714
Are flur systems, but flur being forward looking infrared.

388
00:17:04.762 --> 00:17:07.566
That's right. Yeah. Anyways, that became a very useful

389
00:17:07.598 --> 00:17:10.434
tool for us because our role on the Griffin is

390
00:17:10.552 --> 00:17:12.190
attack and reconnaissance.

391
00:17:12.350 --> 00:17:12.770
Right.

392
00:17:12.840 --> 00:17:15.494
And tactical aviation does three

393
00:17:15.532 --> 00:17:17.894
roles mobility, attack and

394
00:17:17.932 --> 00:17:20.902
reconnaissance. So the Griffin basically took over the attack

395
00:17:20.956 --> 00:17:23.846
and reconnaissance roles for Afghanistan, and the Chinook was

396
00:17:23.868 --> 00:17:24.710
the mobility.

397
00:17:25.610 --> 00:17:26.746
How did you feel when you found.

398
00:17:26.768 --> 00:17:29.434
Out you were going? I was excited. Yeah.

399
00:17:29.552 --> 00:17:31.130
Any trepidation?

400
00:17:31.870 --> 00:17:32.780
Of course.

401
00:17:34.110 --> 00:17:34.474
Yeah.

402
00:17:34.512 --> 00:17:37.466
There's risk involved. Right. But we

403
00:17:37.488 --> 00:17:38.454
all signed up for that risk.

404
00:17:38.502 --> 00:17:38.666
Yeah.

405
00:17:38.688 --> 00:17:41.514
It's a funny thing, because we sign a blank check when we first sign up

406
00:17:41.632 --> 00:17:44.442
for whatever risk the government chooses us to take. We've

407
00:17:44.506 --> 00:17:45.822
already pre signed the check.

408
00:17:45.876 --> 00:17:46.478
Right. Yeah.

409
00:17:46.564 --> 00:17:49.006
I think the interesting thing is when you start to

410
00:17:49.028 --> 00:17:51.710
define the mission and location that you're going,

411
00:17:51.860 --> 00:17:54.270
then you start to think about the specific

412
00:17:54.340 --> 00:17:57.266
risks. And I think that if anybody didn't have

413
00:17:57.288 --> 00:17:59.026
trepidation about it, I don't think.

414
00:17:59.048 --> 00:18:00.206
That would be healthy.

415
00:18:00.238 --> 00:18:03.154
I think it's healthy to think about, hey, what can go wrong?

416
00:18:03.192 --> 00:18:06.146
What is the risk? And then, how can we mitigate it? Right. So I

417
00:18:06.168 --> 00:18:09.060
was, um, probably more excited, though, because

418
00:18:09.530 --> 00:18:12.386
my infantry background and having known infantry

419
00:18:12.418 --> 00:18:15.206
friends that had deployed, and I wanted to be in the fight, and

420
00:18:15.308 --> 00:18:16.498
I believed in the mission.

421
00:18:16.594 --> 00:18:16.854
Yeah.

422
00:18:16.892 --> 00:18:19.786
I mean, all of us who signed up post 911 kind

423
00:18:19.808 --> 00:18:22.134
of knew there was a decent chance you'd end up in Afghanistan.

424
00:18:22.182 --> 00:18:22.490
Right.

425
00:18:22.560 --> 00:18:25.510
Yeah. So I was more excited,

426
00:18:25.670 --> 00:18:28.602
but cautious as well. So it allowed me to really focus

427
00:18:28.656 --> 00:18:29.562
on my training, though.

428
00:18:29.616 --> 00:18:29.978
Yeah.

429
00:18:30.064 --> 00:18:32.586
Speaking of your training, what was the workup training like for

430
00:18:32.608 --> 00:18:33.510
Afghanistan?

431
00:18:33.670 --> 00:18:35.482
It was a lot it was very intense.

432
00:18:35.546 --> 00:18:35.822
Yeah.

433
00:18:35.876 --> 00:18:37.758
So I was a brand new Fo.

434
00:18:37.924 --> 00:18:39.082
I just learned how to fly.

435
00:18:39.146 --> 00:18:41.854
And then I learned how to employ the Griffin tactically low level

436
00:18:41.892 --> 00:18:44.814
flying. And then we had to step that up a level and

437
00:18:44.852 --> 00:18:47.746
say, let's do it at 50 degrees, and let's do it

438
00:18:47.768 --> 00:18:50.754
at 3000ft, and let's do it with dust. And now

439
00:18:50.792 --> 00:18:53.666
let's do it with somebody shooting at you. Mhm, you know what I mean? So

440
00:18:53.768 --> 00:18:56.742
we had to prepare for all that stuff but the workup training

441
00:18:56.796 --> 00:18:59.622
that we did, it was incredible. We did everything

442
00:18:59.676 --> 00:19:02.646
from rehearsing mission orders to planning was there was a lot

443
00:19:02.668 --> 00:19:05.574
of planning training which was basically we just did

444
00:19:05.612 --> 00:19:08.146
missions but we ran through the whole operational planning

445
00:19:08.178 --> 00:19:11.146
cycle and then we would employ our tactics on these different

446
00:19:11.168 --> 00:19:13.978
types of missions with the given threats that they would give us. And a

447
00:19:13.984 --> 00:19:16.970
funny story is we did simulators so we would actually

448
00:19:17.040 --> 00:19:19.958
get the intelligence briefs. We were in, like, Petawala

449
00:19:19.974 --> 00:19:22.710
at the time or something, I think or Edmonton. And we were doing an

450
00:19:22.720 --> 00:19:25.706
exercise, and this one was in Edmonton.

451
00:19:25.898 --> 00:19:28.894
And, uh, they gave us a scenario and we planned this mission and then we go into

452
00:19:28.932 --> 00:19:31.886
these little tents that had computers in them and we would fly the

453
00:19:31.908 --> 00:19:34.846
missions on a simulator. And this one mission, I

454
00:19:34.868 --> 00:19:37.714
remember we went and we did and we got shot down. As

455
00:19:37.752 --> 00:19:40.530
luck would have it, we got shot down for real

456
00:19:40.600 --> 00:19:43.506
pretty much in the same spot as we did in

457
00:19:43.528 --> 00:19:46.386
that simulation which really prepared us

458
00:19:46.408 --> 00:19:49.366
well for it. Uh, and I tend to use the term shot up

459
00:19:49.388 --> 00:19:52.358
more than shot down because we were sort of able to recover the helicopter and it

460
00:19:52.364 --> 00:19:55.206
feels like more of a win that we recovered it. It

461
00:19:55.228 --> 00:19:58.138
was pretty damaged and we didn't get it all the way home. We just got a

462
00:19:58.144 --> 00:20:00.938
two Ford operating base. But the crazy thing is

463
00:20:01.024 --> 00:20:03.850
that's exactly how we handled that situation in the simulator

464
00:20:04.670 --> 00:20:07.594
six months before it actually uh, happened. So very

465
00:20:07.632 --> 00:20:10.618
intense training plus all your first aid and there's a lot

466
00:20:10.624 --> 00:20:13.342
of things that you don't think about. There's cultural awareness training

467
00:20:13.396 --> 00:20:16.366
so you know where you're flying and how the

468
00:20:16.388 --> 00:20:19.326
people deal with day to day life so

469
00:20:19.348 --> 00:20:21.886
you know actually what patterns of life look like and stuff like that.

470
00:20:21.908 --> 00:20:24.766
Because uh, for us, something that maybe would

471
00:20:24.788 --> 00:20:27.602
appear to be a threat with the knowledge they gave us about

472
00:20:27.736 --> 00:20:30.562
the communities that were living there, we knew that, oh, actually people

473
00:20:30.616 --> 00:20:33.394
gather here because of this at this time

474
00:20:33.592 --> 00:20:34.146
or just.

475
00:20:34.168 --> 00:20:36.450
That every household has a

476
00:20:36.520 --> 00:20:37.246
rifle.

477
00:20:37.358 --> 00:20:38.740
Yeah, absolutely.

478
00:20:40.180 --> 00:20:43.106
Uh, I will say that by the time pre deployment training was

479
00:20:43.128 --> 00:20:45.926
done we were all very happy to actually get deployed

480
00:20:46.078 --> 00:20:48.630
to have that end. It was a lot of work, it was intense.

481
00:20:48.710 --> 00:20:51.594
Yeah, but as you were saying, you never know when that training

482
00:20:51.632 --> 00:20:54.470
is going to come in handy. Right? You do it in a simulator

483
00:20:54.550 --> 00:20:56.902
and then you see that in real life, and it's just that much easier.

484
00:20:56.966 --> 00:20:59.674
Yeah, absolutely. And that's like flying and handling. Just

485
00:20:59.712 --> 00:21:01.210
normal flying emergencies, right?

486
00:21:01.280 --> 00:21:01.900
Yeah.

487
00:21:02.690 --> 00:21:05.406
We've spoken a little bit about this, but what were the roles the

488
00:21:05.428 --> 00:21:06.954
Griffins filled in Afghanistan?

489
00:21:07.082 --> 00:21:09.994
So the role of the Griffin was doing attack and reconnaissance

490
00:21:10.042 --> 00:21:12.654
work, and, uh, the Chinook did the mobility

491
00:21:12.702 --> 00:21:15.694
piece. So with that mobility piece that the Chinook

492
00:21:15.742 --> 00:21:18.146
was handling, they were the workhorse of

493
00:21:18.168 --> 00:21:20.674
Afghanistan. It was the Chinook. Our

494
00:21:20.792 --> 00:21:23.454
mission for CHFA was to protect ground

495
00:21:23.502 --> 00:21:26.370
troops and to do that,

496
00:21:26.440 --> 00:21:28.834
80% of the casualties at the time were due to roadside

497
00:21:28.882 --> 00:21:31.720
bombs. So flying people by air

498
00:21:32.090 --> 00:21:34.982
was the safest way to do it. M and Canada basically

499
00:21:35.036 --> 00:21:37.766
bought these Chinooks to put them there so that we wouldn't have to

500
00:21:37.788 --> 00:21:40.146
rely on partner nations to move our own troops.

501
00:21:40.258 --> 00:21:42.774
CfHA I think we said earlier is Canadian forces

502
00:21:42.822 --> 00:21:44.326
helicopter Afghanistan.

503
00:21:44.438 --> 00:21:45.050
Yeah.

504
00:21:45.200 --> 00:21:47.946
In order to put the Chinook there and keep it safe, it needed an

505
00:21:47.968 --> 00:21:50.966
armed escort, which we decided

506
00:21:50.998 --> 00:21:53.994
to put the Griffin there in that role. So anywhere a Chinook

507
00:21:54.042 --> 00:21:56.798
goes, it has protection with it. So the Chinook is the

508
00:21:56.804 --> 00:21:59.650
protected force and the Griffin is the protector. So, uh,

509
00:21:59.700 --> 00:22:02.414
probably about 70% of our workload was Chinook

510
00:22:02.462 --> 00:22:05.202
escort. The Chinook ended up moving 7 million

511
00:22:05.256 --> 00:22:06.334
pounds of cargo.

512
00:22:06.382 --> 00:22:06.690
Wow.

513
00:22:06.760 --> 00:22:08.718
And 91,000 troops.

514
00:22:08.814 --> 00:22:09.682
That's crazy.

515
00:22:09.816 --> 00:22:12.562
And CHFA was able to

516
00:22:12.696 --> 00:22:15.650
reduce the casualty rates significantly there.

517
00:22:15.800 --> 00:22:18.614
So I'm really proud of being a part of that just because

518
00:22:18.652 --> 00:22:21.574
I know that being able to move

519
00:22:21.612 --> 00:22:24.466
those troops by air kept a lot of troops alive. You don't

520
00:22:24.498 --> 00:22:27.494
know for sure, but we felt that the job was very important,

521
00:22:27.612 --> 00:22:30.474
very rewarding. So that was the

522
00:22:30.512 --> 00:22:33.434
bulk of our work with Chinook escort. But we were

523
00:22:33.472 --> 00:22:36.090
also able to do reconnaissance. So sometimes

524
00:22:36.160 --> 00:22:39.034
intelligence would need imaging of something. So we had our camera system

525
00:22:39.072 --> 00:22:41.610
that we could go out and take, uh, pictures,

526
00:22:41.690 --> 00:22:44.682
or we could look at future landing zones

527
00:22:44.746 --> 00:22:47.646
and stuff like that for upcoming operations. We did a lot

528
00:22:47.668 --> 00:22:49.806
of air assaults where we would take

529
00:22:49.908 --> 00:22:52.840
soldiers, whoever they might be, um,

530
00:22:52.840 --> 00:22:55.706
sometimes special forces, sometimes conventional army

531
00:22:55.738 --> 00:22:58.594
troops, and put them into different areas of operation to complete

532
00:22:58.632 --> 00:23:01.618
their missions. We would move them by air so we could go out and

533
00:23:01.624 --> 00:23:04.466
get imagery of the landing zones and stuff like that to see if it was

534
00:23:04.488 --> 00:23:07.330
safe. Or we could get pattern of life stuff as well.

535
00:23:07.400 --> 00:23:10.326
So that was sort of the biggest part of the reconnaissance role. But we would

536
00:23:10.348 --> 00:23:13.254
also go out at night and look for roadside bombs. The really

537
00:23:13.292 --> 00:23:15.720
cool thing about the camera that we had

538
00:23:16.090 --> 00:23:18.886
with the, uh, infrared on it basically gives you an

539
00:23:18.908 --> 00:23:21.846
image based off of temperature. So the way

540
00:23:21.868 --> 00:23:24.234
that Afghanistan was was in the day, it would be like 50

541
00:23:24.272 --> 00:23:27.174
degrees, so everything would warm up. All the ground

542
00:23:27.222 --> 00:23:30.186
would heat right up. And then at night, it would

543
00:23:30.208 --> 00:23:33.038
get down to sometimes like -15. Okay, so. There's a

544
00:23:33.044 --> 00:23:36.014
huge temperature swing. And at night the

545
00:23:36.052 --> 00:23:38.922
Taliban would go out and dig these roadside bombs

546
00:23:38.986 --> 00:23:41.854
into the roads, letting all that cool air into that

547
00:23:41.892 --> 00:23:44.718
top layer of dirt. So we would fly down the

548
00:23:44.724 --> 00:23:47.586
road and we'd see these things called lollipops, which was

549
00:23:47.608 --> 00:23:50.354
the main charge in the center of the road. And then they would

550
00:23:50.392 --> 00:23:53.266
dig a line, like a detonation cord kind of thing. So

551
00:23:53.288 --> 00:23:56.254
you'd have like a lollipop for us, it would show up in the camera

552
00:23:56.302 --> 00:23:58.222
and we would see that's a bomb.

553
00:23:58.286 --> 00:23:58.814
Yeah.

554
00:23:58.952 --> 00:24:01.858
And so we would call that to an EOD team. Explosive

555
00:24:01.874 --> 00:24:04.774
ordinance disposal. Yeah. So we would get an EOD team out in the morning

556
00:24:04.812 --> 00:24:07.686
and they would detonate the bomb and it would save lives. And then sometimes we

557
00:24:07.708 --> 00:24:10.578
would find people digging in the road as well, which we

558
00:24:10.604 --> 00:24:13.306
had certain rules of engagement that we would follow to deal with

559
00:24:13.328 --> 00:24:16.186
those threats and that sort of carries over into the

560
00:24:16.208 --> 00:24:19.194
attack work that we would do. So our attack work was

561
00:24:19.312 --> 00:24:22.046
if anybody was in theater, in the area that we

562
00:24:22.068 --> 00:24:24.926
were, like basically we mostly operated just in

563
00:24:24.948 --> 00:24:27.550
Canada's area of operations. But

564
00:24:27.620 --> 00:24:30.526
any troops that came into contact could call us

565
00:24:30.548 --> 00:24:33.082
up if we were flying in the area, whether we would be on Chinook

566
00:24:33.146 --> 00:24:36.066
escort or just as a two ship of Griffin's flying around

567
00:24:36.168 --> 00:24:39.106
and they would call us to support the firefight. Most of

568
00:24:39.128 --> 00:24:42.034
the time we would show up and the firefight would be done because

569
00:24:42.072 --> 00:24:45.026
the enemy were scared of us because of the gun. The

570
00:24:45.048 --> 00:24:47.394
gun M really was effective. Very, very

571
00:24:47.432 --> 00:24:50.422
effective. And if we had to engage the enemy, we were

572
00:24:50.476 --> 00:24:53.222
capable of doing that. We did a lot of training on different

573
00:24:53.276 --> 00:24:56.070
patterns and tactics that we employed to do the attack

574
00:24:56.140 --> 00:24:59.046
work and work with the ground forces to make sure it's an effective

575
00:24:59.078 --> 00:25:01.882
attack. With the primary goal of that

576
00:25:01.936 --> 00:25:04.842
being where are the friendlies? Uh, protect

577
00:25:04.896 --> 00:25:07.690
the friendlies, don't shoot at the friendlies. That was

578
00:25:07.760 --> 00:25:10.550
the biggest rule out there, is like, first where's the friendlies?

579
00:25:10.630 --> 00:25:13.374
And then start working out from there. Try to see if you can help

580
00:25:13.412 --> 00:25:16.366
support those friendlies and the firefight. Yeah, the friendlies were

581
00:25:16.388 --> 00:25:19.246
very good at handling their own firefights a lot of the time,

582
00:25:19.428 --> 00:25:21.918
but I don't know any

583
00:25:22.004 --> 00:25:24.786
Griffin crew that was, uh, out there for very long in a

584
00:25:24.808 --> 00:25:26.962
firefight. The firefights ended pretty quick.

585
00:25:27.016 --> 00:25:29.906
Yeah, well, those Dylan guns, like

586
00:25:29.928 --> 00:25:31.870
you said, how many rounds per minute?

587
00:25:31.950 --> 00:25:34.402
I think it's 3000 rounds a minute. Yeah.

588
00:25:34.456 --> 00:25:35.934
I mean that's a pretty huge advantage.

589
00:25:35.982 --> 00:25:38.802
It's a lot. Yeah. So we would carry 4000 rounds.

590
00:25:38.866 --> 00:25:39.542
Wow. Yeah.

591
00:25:39.596 --> 00:25:42.550
So it's like we could shoot for a minute. So you got to be

592
00:25:42.620 --> 00:25:43.506
careful what you're shooting.

593
00:25:43.538 --> 00:25:46.506
But is it hard to tell troops from each other, like enemy from

594
00:25:46.528 --> 00:25:46.806
friendly.

595
00:25:46.838 --> 00:25:47.980
When you're flying around?

596
00:25:48.830 --> 00:25:51.766
No, it's easy to tell friendlies, but it's

597
00:25:51.798 --> 00:25:54.566
hard to tell civilian

598
00:25:54.678 --> 00:25:57.302
and enemy. It's very challenging.

599
00:25:57.366 --> 00:25:57.546
Yeah.

600
00:25:57.568 --> 00:25:58.842
That must be really difficult.

601
00:25:58.976 --> 00:25:59.274
Yeah.

602
00:25:59.312 --> 00:26:01.340
So our rules of engagement were very

603
00:26:01.710 --> 00:26:03.794
appropriate, I'll say, for the theater.

604
00:26:03.942 --> 00:26:06.286
Canada, to my knowledge, has

605
00:26:06.308 --> 00:26:09.034
never had any kind of collateral

606
00:26:09.082 --> 00:26:12.026
damage that I know of. Canada's preferred method

607
00:26:12.058 --> 00:26:14.546
of attack work was the Griffin in

608
00:26:14.568 --> 00:26:17.550
Afghanistan. From what I've seen anyways,

609
00:26:17.630 --> 00:26:20.546
it worked really well because we had

610
00:26:20.568 --> 00:26:23.394
small bullets and we had to be right there, so we knew

611
00:26:23.432 --> 00:26:26.386
exactly what we were shooting and we weren't going to take down a building with

612
00:26:26.408 --> 00:26:26.546
that.

613
00:26:26.568 --> 00:26:29.186
Yeah, it's not like you're using explosive rounds or something that causes

614
00:26:29.218 --> 00:26:30.130
collateral damage.

615
00:26:30.210 --> 00:26:33.030
Exactly. Yeah. There is a capability that the Griffin has

616
00:26:33.100 --> 00:26:35.618
on the Gao 21, which is a 50 caliber.

617
00:26:35.714 --> 00:26:35.974
Okay.

618
00:26:36.012 --> 00:26:38.874
Yeah, we can put explosive rounds in that, but I've never used

619
00:26:38.912 --> 00:26:41.690
them before. What's it like being in a firefight?

620
00:26:42.590 --> 00:26:44.294
It's busy.

621
00:26:44.422 --> 00:26:45.222
Really busy.

622
00:26:45.286 --> 00:26:45.706
Yeah.

623
00:26:45.808 --> 00:26:48.714
I'll tell you a quick story. We were doing

624
00:26:48.752 --> 00:26:51.738
a patrol in Afghanistan, just two Griffins. So it was

625
00:26:51.744 --> 00:26:53.918
always two Griffins. We called them a Griffin's weapons team or a

626
00:26:53.924 --> 00:26:56.666
GWT. So a, uh, Griffin never went anywhere

627
00:26:56.698 --> 00:26:59.678
alone. We always had mutual support. So if one person

628
00:26:59.764 --> 00:27:02.654
is sort of off to the front left, the other

629
00:27:02.692 --> 00:27:05.586
Griffin would kind of stay back to the rear right, so it can cover

630
00:27:05.768 --> 00:27:08.766
the 06:00 or the tail of the lead aircraft.

631
00:27:08.798 --> 00:27:11.614
And then the lead aircraft would sort of COVID or scout

632
00:27:11.662 --> 00:27:14.482
the ground that the trailing aircraft was going to fly. That's just an example

633
00:27:14.536 --> 00:27:17.446
of one tactic on how to fly. But we were able to keep each

634
00:27:17.468 --> 00:27:20.406
other really safe, working in pairs. So we were

635
00:27:20.428 --> 00:27:23.026
flying around one day and we got a call from a sniper

636
00:27:23.058 --> 00:27:25.862
detachment at a forward operating base. And they had

637
00:27:25.916 --> 00:27:28.874
a target of four people that had

638
00:27:28.912 --> 00:27:31.740
an illegal vehicle checkpoint set up. And

639
00:27:32.190 --> 00:27:34.918
it was a valid target within our rules of engagement.

640
00:27:35.094 --> 00:27:37.942
So I was flying with a very senior

641
00:27:38.006 --> 00:27:40.826
team at the time. We had our camera system, so we just

642
00:27:40.848 --> 00:27:43.726
punched up the lat long and the camera went right to it and we

643
00:27:43.748 --> 00:27:46.654
were able to validate that. Okay, this is the

644
00:27:46.692 --> 00:27:49.402
target, and it does fit the rules of engagement.

645
00:27:49.466 --> 00:27:52.366
So the team on the ground, the snipers, wanted to take

646
00:27:52.388 --> 00:27:55.166
the first shots, which is fairly common in combat

647
00:27:55.198 --> 00:27:57.746
operations. So you probably saw this, uh, in Iraq as well.

648
00:27:57.848 --> 00:28:00.674
Usually like a Predator or some kind of

649
00:28:00.712 --> 00:28:03.586
UAV or a fast air asset will drop a bomb and

650
00:28:03.608 --> 00:28:06.222
then they'll bring in helicopters, sort of for cleanup,

651
00:28:06.286 --> 00:28:09.074
or people that survived the initial

652
00:28:09.122 --> 00:28:11.894
impact of the bomb and are now running from the area.

653
00:28:12.012 --> 00:28:14.534
Helicopters were a good asset to sort of track them down and find

654
00:28:14.572 --> 00:28:17.446
them. So you can also do this

655
00:28:17.468 --> 00:28:20.426
with snipers as well. So the sniper team on the ground that

656
00:28:20.448 --> 00:28:22.938
day wanted to take the first shot. It was a long

657
00:28:23.024 --> 00:28:25.866
shot, 2.6 km probably for

658
00:28:25.888 --> 00:28:28.586
them, something like that. Uh, which would be like sort of world record

659
00:28:28.688 --> 00:28:31.578
territory sort of thing. So we came up with an

660
00:28:31.584 --> 00:28:34.538
attack plan. We briefed the section. We worked with the ground forces that are

661
00:28:34.544 --> 00:28:37.466
going to take the opening shot. So we were sort of in a holding area, and then

662
00:28:37.488 --> 00:28:40.410
we dropped low level and we turned in for the target. There was four

663
00:28:40.480 --> 00:28:43.298
tack Taliban troops at the time, so we sort of had it

664
00:28:43.304 --> 00:28:46.114
divided up, like, who's going to attack what, or we cover

665
00:28:46.152 --> 00:28:48.386
off different directions to make sure that we do an

666
00:28:48.408 --> 00:28:51.166
appropriate attack on the target, right? That's

667
00:28:51.198 --> 00:28:54.146
efficient and safe for us. We call the

668
00:28:54.168 --> 00:28:57.014
attack. So we roll in, snipers call shots away.

669
00:28:57.132 --> 00:28:59.858
The bullets probably got, like, a five second flight time, I'm

670
00:28:59.874 --> 00:29:02.594
guessing. And, um, I'm watching on the camera

671
00:29:02.642 --> 00:29:05.378
system, and I know this is a valid target,

672
00:29:05.474 --> 00:29:08.130
but nobody moves, nobody falls,

673
00:29:08.210 --> 00:29:11.170
nothing. And the, uh, snipers called the

674
00:29:11.180 --> 00:29:14.074
attack off. So we broke off and we came back up to our holding area,

675
00:29:14.192 --> 00:29:17.126
and they're like, hey, we missed it's such a distance

676
00:29:17.158 --> 00:29:20.138
that the bullet went subsonic, so they didn't hear it. So we're going to

677
00:29:20.144 --> 00:29:22.894
try this attack again. And at the time, I was

678
00:29:22.932 --> 00:29:25.642
flying with my commanding officer, who is a very senior

679
00:29:25.706 --> 00:29:28.574
aviator, very switched on person. And

680
00:29:28.612 --> 00:29:31.502
he's like, hey, we got this, right?

681
00:29:31.556 --> 00:29:34.494
So we come up with a new attack plan, right? At that

682
00:29:34.532 --> 00:29:37.442
time, there was a forward operating base, like, very close, within,

683
00:29:37.496 --> 00:29:40.466
like, a kilometer or something like this. We could look down, see them because we were in a

684
00:29:40.488 --> 00:29:43.166
sort of a top cover, kind of up at altitude,

685
00:29:43.278 --> 00:29:46.086
coming up with our plans. And they called us and they

686
00:29:46.108 --> 00:29:47.318
were taking fire.

687
00:29:47.404 --> 00:29:47.654
Okay?

688
00:29:47.692 --> 00:29:50.646
And they were involved in a tick, right,

689
00:29:50.668 --> 00:29:53.446
which is troops in contact. So

690
00:29:53.628 --> 00:29:56.566
they're like, hey, can you come and help us? And we're like, yeah,

691
00:29:56.668 --> 00:29:59.386
we're rolling in. So we had done all this work working on this

692
00:29:59.408 --> 00:30:02.346
illegal vehicle checkpoint. I'm not sure

693
00:30:02.368 --> 00:30:05.194
how many minutes it would have been total, but basically, then

694
00:30:05.232 --> 00:30:08.182
these guys are actually being shot at. They're

695
00:30:08.246 --> 00:30:11.226
involved in a firefight. And the flexibility that

696
00:30:11.248 --> 00:30:14.014
we had as a crew was just amazing looking back at

697
00:30:14.052 --> 00:30:16.922
because we basically just started diving

698
00:30:16.986 --> 00:30:19.934
low level, left hand turn, briefed our, uh, dash two.

699
00:30:19.972 --> 00:30:22.846
Hey, it's going to be a right door gun engagement. There's two at. We

700
00:30:22.868 --> 00:30:25.714
use clock distance reference or clock distance feature, right?

701
00:30:25.752 --> 00:30:28.242
So 02:00, 300 meters, two

702
00:30:28.296 --> 00:30:31.218
Taliban fighters behind a brick wall. And then we just rolled in

703
00:30:31.224 --> 00:30:34.034
and we just engaged on those two fighters at the time.

704
00:30:34.152 --> 00:30:37.058
So it was crazy. And then we popped up, and then we

705
00:30:37.064 --> 00:30:39.458
were like, okay, well, let's go back to this illegal vehicle checkpoint.

706
00:30:39.554 --> 00:30:41.890
But they were gone because they heard all the firing.

707
00:30:41.970 --> 00:30:44.678
Well, yeah, I guess so, yeah. I don't know, but

708
00:30:44.764 --> 00:30:47.734
it's wild to sit here and talk about it because it was very much

709
00:30:47.772 --> 00:30:50.666
like our life at the time. And, I mean, it feels like

710
00:30:50.688 --> 00:30:53.402
a lifetime ago, but it was the job. But it still

711
00:30:53.456 --> 00:30:56.026
feels unnatural, do you know what I

712
00:30:56.048 --> 00:30:59.002
mean? But it is very much the job. And

713
00:30:59.136 --> 00:31:01.962
nobody ever wants to get into attack work, but we definitely

714
00:31:02.016 --> 00:31:04.666
want to keep our troops on the ground safe.

715
00:31:04.858 --> 00:31:07.806
What is the feeling when you go in and you guys are going

716
00:31:07.828 --> 00:31:10.686
to I mean, we'll just say it. You're going to kill somebody. So what

717
00:31:10.708 --> 00:31:12.494
is that feeling when you go in and you get some bad.

718
00:31:12.532 --> 00:31:15.006
Guys when they're shooting back at

719
00:31:15.028 --> 00:31:15.646
you?

720
00:31:15.828 --> 00:31:18.674
I never had a problem with it. And I will say this.

721
00:31:18.712 --> 00:31:21.450
There's a dissociation that I'm able to have as a pilot

722
00:31:21.450 --> 00:31:24.338
mhm, because I didn't have a finger on a trigger. And I

723
00:31:24.344 --> 00:31:27.058
think that the door gunners. So we would operate with an

724
00:31:27.064 --> 00:31:29.906
infantry door gunner in the back. And they generally,

725
00:31:29.938 --> 00:31:32.886
for us, had a ground tour before we took them, and they

726
00:31:32.908 --> 00:31:35.890
brought a lot of knowledge to the crew on what's going on in the ground.

727
00:31:35.970 --> 00:31:38.966
And then we also had a flight engineer door gunner. They

728
00:31:38.988 --> 00:31:41.786
were the ones actually pulling the trigger. So it's interesting because the

729
00:31:41.808 --> 00:31:44.746
responsibility lies with the aircraft commander. We will work with,

730
00:31:44.768 --> 00:31:47.226
like, a joint tactical air controller or somebody on the

731
00:31:47.248 --> 00:31:50.138
ground about defining the target. Is it

732
00:31:50.144 --> 00:31:52.906
within the rules of engagement? All this stuff is done by the aircraft

733
00:31:52.938 --> 00:31:55.886
commander, and now the aircraft commander has to talk on

734
00:31:55.908 --> 00:31:58.522
the door gunner to make sure that they're engaging the right target.

735
00:31:58.666 --> 00:32:01.614
Right. So there's a lot of responsibility there that

736
00:32:01.652 --> 00:32:04.158
the aircraft commander holds and then

737
00:32:04.324 --> 00:32:07.106
the door gunner. I like to think of it this way

738
00:32:07.128 --> 00:32:09.938
anyways, it'd be interesting to get their take, but

739
00:32:10.024 --> 00:32:12.782
they're not deciding what to engage. They're just following

740
00:32:12.846 --> 00:32:15.790
the orders, which I think gives a little bit of,

741
00:32:15.790 --> 00:32:18.226
uh, a healthy dissociation with it.

742
00:32:18.408 --> 00:32:21.398
That okay, everything's been defined and stuff and I just have to

743
00:32:21.404 --> 00:32:24.386
pull the trigger. And for a pilot, we just had to fly

744
00:32:24.418 --> 00:32:27.154
them and put them in a position to be able to engage the target

745
00:32:27.282 --> 00:32:30.086
in the best manner. Right. So for me, uh, to

746
00:32:30.108 --> 00:32:32.602
answer your question, I never had a problem with.

747
00:32:32.656 --> 00:32:34.698
Yeah, I didn't do it a like.

748
00:32:34.784 --> 00:32:37.370
This is not something we did on a daily basis. This was

749
00:32:37.520 --> 00:32:38.906
few and far between.

750
00:32:39.008 --> 00:32:41.386
Okay, so now that we've covered the.

751
00:32:41.408 --> 00:32:44.366
Roles that you guys were filling in Afghanistan, can

752
00:32:44.388 --> 00:32:47.002
you tell us what an average day looked like for you in Afghanistan?

753
00:32:47.146 --> 00:32:47.300
Yeah.

754
00:32:47.300 --> 00:32:50.126
Ah, so we were on pretty much like a three day cycle. So

755
00:32:50.148 --> 00:32:52.942
you'd do a day of planning. You'd get up in the morning,

756
00:32:52.996 --> 00:32:55.870
you'd probably go to breakfast at, like, seven or something,

757
00:32:56.020 --> 00:32:58.866
jump in the trucks and drive over to work. We were on the other side of

758
00:32:58.888 --> 00:33:01.880
the air base. We would get over there and, uh,

759
00:33:01.880 --> 00:33:04.866
you just start a day of planning. So operations would come and they'd be like,

760
00:33:04.888 --> 00:33:07.718
hey, we have this mission coming up, you guys need to plan for it.

761
00:33:07.804 --> 00:33:09.520
So prepare. It could be anything from like, ah,

762
00:33:10.650 --> 00:33:13.574
a standard Chinook escort where they would just

763
00:33:13.612 --> 00:33:16.466
start moving troops. They just kind of go from Fob to Fob, dropping

764
00:33:16.498 --> 00:33:19.302
off some supplies. And it's kind of like almost like a milk run

765
00:33:19.356 --> 00:33:22.154
sort of thing. Or it could be like a, uh, bigger operation, like, hey,

766
00:33:22.192 --> 00:33:24.854
we're pushing. We were part of an operation

767
00:33:24.982 --> 00:33:27.562
in Helman province where they're moving like 15,000

768
00:33:27.616 --> 00:33:30.474
troops. So it's like somebody has assigned, hey, you need to plan

769
00:33:30.512 --> 00:33:33.286
this. So those were kind of set aside for the planning

770
00:33:33.318 --> 00:33:36.286
days and then you would end up flying for two days. So you

771
00:33:36.308 --> 00:33:36.846
go out?

772
00:33:36.948 --> 00:33:37.546
It depends.

773
00:33:37.578 --> 00:33:40.442
I mean, it could have been a night mission, could have been day. The schedule

774
00:33:40.506 --> 00:33:43.086
changed a lot. But you'd go out and we'd fly

775
00:33:43.118 --> 00:33:45.826
typically from 6 hours

776
00:33:45.928 --> 00:33:48.594
would probably be the average six hour flying days. Maybe

777
00:33:48.712 --> 00:33:51.250
a lot of eight hour days. A lot of

778
00:33:51.400 --> 00:33:54.366
extensions to fly. And I think my longest

779
00:33:54.398 --> 00:33:56.994
mission in a day was a 10.2, which

780
00:33:57.032 --> 00:33:59.066
is a lot in that heat.

781
00:33:59.118 --> 00:33:59.958
It's a lot of time in a.

782
00:33:59.964 --> 00:34:02.886
Helicopter and it's a lot of time in a helicopter. Yeah, you

783
00:34:02.908 --> 00:34:05.618
get a callus on your butt for sure. And it's

784
00:34:05.634 --> 00:34:08.426
intense where it's not mundane, any of

785
00:34:08.448 --> 00:34:11.370
it. You're in a threat environment the whole time,

786
00:34:11.520 --> 00:34:14.234
so your mind is constantly on

787
00:34:14.272 --> 00:34:17.258
alert and, uh, being aware. And so at the end of the

788
00:34:17.264 --> 00:34:20.010
day, you're so tired. But

789
00:34:20.160 --> 00:34:23.078
we would work on fitness, so I'd go play floor hockey or go

790
00:34:23.104 --> 00:34:25.854
to the gym. There's a couple of really good gyms there. The food

791
00:34:25.972 --> 00:34:28.762
was decent, so we would always get square meals.

792
00:34:28.826 --> 00:34:31.726
And my bed was amazing. We lived in a tent, but it had a little

793
00:34:31.748 --> 00:34:34.686
air conditioner and, uh, so I shared like a Mod tent with

794
00:34:34.708 --> 00:34:37.394
eight other pilots and that was connected to another tent with eight more

795
00:34:37.432 --> 00:34:40.206
pilots. And it was all the Griffin pilots. So we're a very tight

796
00:34:40.238 --> 00:34:43.106
team and we would do some social activities as

797
00:34:43.128 --> 00:34:45.906
well too. Like we played Jenga and some other games and

798
00:34:45.928 --> 00:34:48.854
stuff and hang out and see, uh, who got

799
00:34:48.892 --> 00:34:51.698
the latest box of candy sent from Canada. And we'd

800
00:34:51.714 --> 00:34:54.598
share that. Right. And then we would go out. And

801
00:34:54.684 --> 00:34:57.666
when you're flying those missions, you're doing the roles that I spoke

802
00:34:57.698 --> 00:35:00.154
about earlier. They're busy days.

803
00:35:00.272 --> 00:35:00.554
Yeah.

804
00:35:00.592 --> 00:35:03.350
And then I did that for ten months and then,

805
00:35:03.350 --> 00:35:05.814
uh, I got two two week breaks.

806
00:35:05.862 --> 00:35:06.630
HLTAs.

807
00:35:06.710 --> 00:35:08.554
So you guys were going seven days a week?

808
00:35:08.672 --> 00:35:10.678
Yeah. No breaks?

809
00:35:10.774 --> 00:35:13.706
No, not really. There's nothing else to do there but

810
00:35:13.728 --> 00:35:14.554
work anyways, right?

811
00:35:14.592 --> 00:35:14.758
Yeah.

812
00:35:14.784 --> 00:35:17.200
Generally, I remember I did have a day off.

813
00:35:17.650 --> 00:35:20.334
I probably the whole time, maybe I had three days that

814
00:35:20.452 --> 00:35:22.240
we just didn't go into the office.

815
00:35:23.970 --> 00:35:25.198
I want to go to the office.

816
00:35:25.284 --> 00:35:27.966
You're like, I want to go to the office. Because we believed in the mission

817
00:35:27.998 --> 00:35:30.946
right. So the more time we had at the office and the more time

818
00:35:30.968 --> 00:35:33.966
we put towards planning, the better prepared we were and the less stressful

819
00:35:33.998 --> 00:35:35.550
the missions. Which is like flight training.

820
00:35:35.640 --> 00:35:37.240
Yeah, absolutely.

821
00:35:38.410 --> 00:35:40.566
What was the hardest part of the job when you got to

822
00:35:40.588 --> 00:35:41.590
Afghanistan?

823
00:35:42.090 --> 00:35:45.014
The hardest part of the job was just adjusting to the climate. First

824
00:35:45.052 --> 00:35:47.846
of all, the hot weather and the dust was

825
00:35:47.948 --> 00:35:50.874
challenging the smells. Uh, we were living

826
00:35:50.912 --> 00:35:53.654
on a base that I was told this before. It was designed

827
00:35:53.702 --> 00:35:56.586
for 3000 people and there's 30,000 people on

828
00:35:56.608 --> 00:35:59.226
it. So the base basically

829
00:35:59.408 --> 00:36:02.346
grew around the pooh pond. So when you had like

830
00:36:02.368 --> 00:36:05.018
a south wind, it was, it was pretty pungent.

831
00:36:05.114 --> 00:36:06.910
Stings the nostrils, as they say.

832
00:36:06.980 --> 00:36:09.018
That pooh pond is pretty infamous.

833
00:36:09.114 --> 00:36:12.010
It's pretty infamous. Anybody that's been to Afghanistan knows

834
00:36:12.090 --> 00:36:14.798
the pooh pond and we all drive over and take a look and it's like, oh, there's

835
00:36:14.814 --> 00:36:17.426
the like it's like the touristy thing to

836
00:36:17.448 --> 00:36:19.826
do. Tactical tourism, we call it.

837
00:36:19.848 --> 00:36:20.034
Right.

838
00:36:20.072 --> 00:36:22.814
But yeah. So adjusting to the climate

839
00:36:22.942 --> 00:36:25.742
was challenging. And from, uh, an operational

840
00:36:25.806 --> 00:36:28.802
perspective, being able to fly the Griffin in that environment

841
00:36:28.866 --> 00:36:31.574
was a challenge too. And same with the Chinook cruise as well.

842
00:36:31.692 --> 00:36:34.566
The Chinook is an amazing helicopter. I heard your podcast with

843
00:36:34.588 --> 00:36:37.578
Jackie there and she had a great story from Molly and the things that the

844
00:36:37.584 --> 00:36:40.026
new Chinook is doing as well. So

845
00:36:40.208 --> 00:36:43.034
getting her insight on the

846
00:36:43.072 --> 00:36:45.706
planning for that helicopter that's so capable. I

847
00:36:45.728 --> 00:36:48.410
mean, there's still so much going on

848
00:36:48.480 --> 00:36:51.238
to adjust to the climate, even with, uh, a

849
00:36:51.264 --> 00:36:52.250
beast like the Chinook.

850
00:36:52.330 --> 00:36:52.622
Yeah.

851
00:36:52.676 --> 00:36:55.570
So that was probably the biggest thing that we had to adjust to was, uh,

852
00:36:55.570 --> 00:36:56.538
the climate.

853
00:36:56.714 --> 00:36:58.654
How did you folks overcome that?

854
00:36:58.852 --> 00:37:01.726
We, uh, just prepared for it. We

855
00:37:01.748 --> 00:37:04.526
were in the books. So for the Griffin, it's a

856
00:37:04.548 --> 00:37:06.994
very limited machine based off of its

857
00:37:07.032 --> 00:37:09.902
capability. The Chinook is much more capable.

858
00:37:10.046 --> 00:37:13.042
So we were just doing planning all the time. Like, where are we going,

859
00:37:13.096 --> 00:37:16.066
what is the altitude, what is the temperature going to be there today? Is it

860
00:37:16.088 --> 00:37:18.326
dusty? Do they have a prepared LZ and.

861
00:37:18.348 --> 00:37:19.314
LZ is landing zone.

862
00:37:19.362 --> 00:37:21.878
Landing zone, yeah, exactly. So they had different

863
00:37:21.964 --> 00:37:24.774
methods in Afghanistan to deal with the dust. So they had a thing called

864
00:37:24.812 --> 00:37:27.398
rhino snot, which was like

865
00:37:27.564 --> 00:37:30.406
some kind of goo they would spray on the ground and then it would

866
00:37:30.428 --> 00:37:31.974
make a suitable landing zone.

867
00:37:32.022 --> 00:37:34.166
Basically like bind it all up so it doesn't go flying.

868
00:37:34.278 --> 00:37:37.258
Yeah, so it's just like tar almost. Right, okay, so they would do

869
00:37:37.264 --> 00:37:39.994
that. But there's other methods too. I mean, they would get gravel or they would

870
00:37:40.032 --> 00:37:42.582
get these, um, sort of metal

871
00:37:42.726 --> 00:37:45.726
pads that they would stake into the ground. And there's all kinds of ways

872
00:37:45.748 --> 00:37:48.702
of doing it. And when they had those, it was much,

873
00:37:48.756 --> 00:37:51.646
much safer because the dust was the most challenging, for

874
00:37:51.668 --> 00:37:52.058
sure.

875
00:37:52.164 --> 00:37:52.482
Yeah.

876
00:37:52.536 --> 00:37:55.454
Well, it led to two accidents in Afghanistan.

877
00:37:55.502 --> 00:37:55.922
Right. Yeah.

878
00:37:55.976 --> 00:37:58.722
We lost two helicopters, three people

879
00:37:58.776 --> 00:38:01.506
killed. Yeah. So in July 2009,

880
00:38:01.528 --> 00:38:04.374
a Griffin ended up getting caught in some

881
00:38:04.412 --> 00:38:06.760
dust. And it can happen really quick.

882
00:38:06.900 --> 00:38:09.318
Uh, it's a scary thing to think about

883
00:38:09.484 --> 00:38:10.114
overcoming.

884
00:38:10.162 --> 00:38:13.094
It basically was lots of prep and

885
00:38:13.132 --> 00:38:13.842
practice.

886
00:38:13.986 --> 00:38:14.582
Exactly.

887
00:38:14.716 --> 00:38:15.720
Yeah. Yeah.

888
00:38:16.730 --> 00:38:19.226
What did you find was the most fulfilling part of the job in

889
00:38:19.248 --> 00:38:20.170
Afghanistan?

890
00:38:21.070 --> 00:38:23.594
The most fulfilling part of the job would

891
00:38:23.632 --> 00:38:26.618
be when you got called on the

892
00:38:26.624 --> 00:38:29.498
radio by troops that are in contact, and you hear in

893
00:38:29.504 --> 00:38:32.174
their voice the stress and they need

894
00:38:32.212 --> 00:38:34.922
help, and you hear them returning fire in the background.

895
00:38:35.066 --> 00:38:37.806
And you get the lat long and you fly over there.

896
00:38:37.908 --> 00:38:40.798
And then like I said earlier, most of

897
00:38:40.804 --> 00:38:43.626
the time we didn't shoot a single round and the firefight

898
00:38:43.658 --> 00:38:46.530
would end just because they would hide, they would run away,

899
00:38:46.600 --> 00:38:49.506
whatever it might be. But then now you could talk to

900
00:38:49.528 --> 00:38:52.254
that soldier on the ground and you could tell that the stress

901
00:38:52.302 --> 00:38:53.282
had left their body.

902
00:38:53.336 --> 00:38:54.382
You could hear the relief.

903
00:38:54.446 --> 00:38:56.950
Yes. Very

904
00:38:57.020 --> 00:38:57.602
rewarding.

905
00:38:57.666 --> 00:38:58.662
That's really cool.

906
00:38:58.796 --> 00:38:59.480
Yeah.

907
00:39:00.250 --> 00:39:03.026
Were you guys very often called into ticks?

908
00:39:03.218 --> 00:39:06.098
It wasn't the most common thing. I wouldn't even

909
00:39:06.124 --> 00:39:07.354
know a number for me.

910
00:39:07.472 --> 00:39:08.140
Okay.

911
00:39:08.670 --> 00:39:10.730
What was your best day in Afghanistan?

912
00:39:11.390 --> 00:39:13.790
My best day in Afghanistan was probably, uh,

913
00:39:14.750 --> 00:39:17.706
Christmas Day. It was very rewarding to

914
00:39:17.728 --> 00:39:19.920
be able to be tasked by

915
00:39:20.690 --> 00:39:23.230
a foreign nation to support

916
00:39:23.380 --> 00:39:26.362
flying their general around to see their troops.

917
00:39:26.426 --> 00:39:27.040
Yeah.

918
00:39:27.570 --> 00:39:29.310
It was just a real proud moment.

919
00:39:29.460 --> 00:39:31.502
As a Canadian, it's a position of.

920
00:39:31.556 --> 00:39:34.320
Trust they put you into. Yeah, for sure.

921
00:39:34.770 --> 00:39:37.522
We weren't going to do anything anyways that day except work, but I remember

922
00:39:37.576 --> 00:39:40.002
it's like the first Christmas I ever missed at

923
00:39:40.056 --> 00:39:42.658
home. But I was with amazing people.

924
00:39:42.744 --> 00:39:45.234
Like, our teams over there were just

925
00:39:45.352 --> 00:39:48.318
amazing, so we had a lot of laughs. Like,

926
00:39:48.344 --> 00:39:51.158
I could show you some pictures of me wearing a Christmas sweater and a

927
00:39:51.164 --> 00:39:54.066
mullet wig that day. We always kept

928
00:39:54.098 --> 00:39:56.886
it light, which you have to, I think, when you're in a theater like

929
00:39:56.908 --> 00:39:59.594
that. And then we got home to our

930
00:39:59.712 --> 00:40:02.298
Christmas dinner in a box lunch. It was like, in

931
00:40:02.384 --> 00:40:05.180
Styrofoam. And we ate and we loved it.

932
00:40:05.180 --> 00:40:05.600
Ah.

933
00:40:05.600 --> 00:40:08.122
We had a great time. Other

934
00:40:08.176 --> 00:40:10.760
than being home with family or whatever,

935
00:40:10.760 --> 00:40:13.518
um, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else

936
00:40:13.604 --> 00:40:16.426
than with, uh, sort of your band of brothers

937
00:40:16.458 --> 00:40:18.238
and sisters. Right. So absolutely.

938
00:40:18.324 --> 00:40:18.958
Yeah.

939
00:40:19.124 --> 00:40:22.014
And if listeners would like to hear more about that, we first

940
00:40:22.052 --> 00:40:24.894
had Greg on the show for our Christmas episode

941
00:40:24.942 --> 00:40:26.818
last year, and you can hear the full story there.

942
00:40:26.904 --> 00:40:27.540
Yeah.

943
00:40:28.390 --> 00:40:30.610
What was your hardest day in Afghanistan?

944
00:40:31.190 --> 00:40:33.330
The hardest days were when Canadians were yeah.

945
00:40:33.400 --> 00:40:34.020
Yeah.

946
00:40:34.390 --> 00:40:36.820
We would go out. There was, uh, an

947
00:40:37.510 --> 00:40:40.020
five there's five casualties, and

948
00:40:40.950 --> 00:40:43.862
they were blown up real really, it was a big,

949
00:40:43.916 --> 00:40:46.400
big bomb. And so we went out.

950
00:40:46.400 --> 00:40:49.398
Um, we supported any of

951
00:40:49.404 --> 00:40:52.246
the IDs, like, we always would go and do an in or outer cordon

952
00:40:52.278 --> 00:40:55.258
rights for security. Uh, and then

953
00:40:55.264 --> 00:40:57.866
we would go and pick up the bodies. And, uh, the

954
00:40:57.888 --> 00:41:00.826
Griffin generally didn't pick up the bodies. It was always

955
00:41:00.848 --> 00:41:03.726
a Chinook task, but we always escorted to Chinook. And I

956
00:41:03.748 --> 00:41:06.746
always remember going back into, uh, Kandahar. You'd

957
00:41:06.778 --> 00:41:09.662
be it's sort of like in Canada when you're flying around, you carry the rescue call

958
00:41:09.716 --> 00:41:12.446
sign, everybody gets out of your way. In

959
00:41:12.468 --> 00:41:15.260
Afghanistan, it was called Angel Flight, and, uh,

960
00:41:15.364 --> 00:41:18.254
it was really hard. The main pieces of the bodies

961
00:41:18.302 --> 00:41:21.298
right, were kind of set aside, and then they had picked up all the

962
00:41:21.304 --> 00:41:24.110
rest of the body parts, and they put them in one body bag,

963
00:41:24.270 --> 00:41:27.238
and that was the only cargo. So it just made sense for a

964
00:41:27.244 --> 00:41:29.974
Griffin to do it. So we went up to this place called Camp

965
00:41:30.012 --> 00:41:31.094
Naismith to pick it up.

966
00:41:31.132 --> 00:41:33.926
And, uh, it's good to talk

967
00:41:33.948 --> 00:41:36.760
about and, like, you know,

968
00:41:37.130 --> 00:41:37.990
it's.

969
00:41:40.410 --> 00:41:43.386
The that's the toughest part. There's another day, too, that

970
00:41:43.408 --> 00:41:46.326
there's bison, uh, that got hit by a roadside

971
00:41:46.358 --> 00:41:49.206
bomb, and it was really bad. And you talk about, like, going to mental

972
00:41:49.238 --> 00:41:51.306
health. Um, I used to go to the.

973
00:41:51.328 --> 00:41:53.760
Clinic here in Staticona, and,

974
00:41:53.760 --> 00:41:55.054
uh, they.

975
00:41:55.092 --> 00:41:57.966
Have pictures and plaques of all the people that were

976
00:41:57.988 --> 00:42:00.926
killed. And so those two are right there. So every time I'd have to go to see

977
00:42:01.028 --> 00:42:03.918
the therapist or whatever, I'd walk by that, and it's just such a

978
00:42:03.924 --> 00:42:04.154
trigger.

979
00:42:04.202 --> 00:42:04.366
Right.

980
00:42:04.388 --> 00:42:04.830
Yeah, man.

981
00:42:04.900 --> 00:42:05.098
Yeah.

982
00:42:05.124 --> 00:42:06.302
Because I was there when they died.

983
00:42:06.366 --> 00:42:08.690
Right. So it's tough. Yeah.

984
00:42:08.760 --> 00:42:11.234
I can't say I understand because I didn't have those

985
00:42:11.272 --> 00:42:13.886
experiences, but I know it's hard to have tough

986
00:42:13.918 --> 00:42:14.318
stuff.

987
00:42:14.424 --> 00:42:17.270
I think you do understand. I mean, I think it's different for

988
00:42:17.340 --> 00:42:19.880
everybody, but you understand that

989
00:42:20.250 --> 00:42:22.102
sometimes this emotion comes in, right?

990
00:42:22.156 --> 00:42:22.760
Yes.

991
00:42:23.450 --> 00:42:24.806
It's tough to control.

992
00:42:24.988 --> 00:42:26.840
That is part of the process.

993
00:42:27.610 --> 00:42:30.486
Now, you have a red entry in your logbook representing

994
00:42:30.518 --> 00:42:33.466
the day that you were shot down. Can you tell us more about that

995
00:42:33.488 --> 00:42:34.054
flight?

996
00:42:34.182 --> 00:42:37.070
Yeah, so that was my 9th mission. So, uh,

997
00:42:37.168 --> 00:42:40.042
I was fairly new to the theater. On arrival, we were doing

998
00:42:40.096 --> 00:42:42.890
sort of our indoc and stuff, and I was doing a lot of stuff focused on,

999
00:42:42.890 --> 00:42:45.246
uh, the electronic warfare piece.

1000
00:42:45.428 --> 00:42:48.110
So once I hit the flight line, we started

1001
00:42:48.260 --> 00:42:50.638
going pretty hard. And on

1002
00:42:50.724 --> 00:42:53.698
November 24, 2009, we were tasked with

1003
00:42:53.704 --> 00:42:56.498
a Chinook escort to, uh, head up

1004
00:42:56.584 --> 00:42:59.330
north to a place called Terrancout to support

1005
00:42:59.400 --> 00:43:00.494
some Dutch troops.

1006
00:43:00.542 --> 00:43:02.546
I believe on that day, it was.

1007
00:43:02.568 --> 00:43:05.362
A challenging day, uh, for weather, because we actually

1008
00:43:05.416 --> 00:43:08.366
had rain and clouds, which we didn't have

1009
00:43:08.408 --> 00:43:11.398
very much of. I can't remember another day that stands out of

1010
00:43:11.404 --> 00:43:14.326
my mind that we had these conditions, but it

1011
00:43:14.348 --> 00:43:16.662
made it challenging because we had to go up through the mountains in the higher

1012
00:43:16.716 --> 00:43:19.658
terrain and our route, we have to

1013
00:43:19.664 --> 00:43:22.586
keep a certain minimum safe altitude. And we

1014
00:43:22.608 --> 00:43:25.546
didn't have any kind of approach capability with the Griffin at the time in

1015
00:43:25.568 --> 00:43:28.534
theater because we stripped all the Ils

1016
00:43:28.582 --> 00:43:30.954
and all that instrument equipment out to save

1017
00:43:30.992 --> 00:43:33.662
on. Ah, yeah. And we took the side

1018
00:43:33.716 --> 00:43:36.606
doors off as well, because we needed every ounce that we

1019
00:43:36.628 --> 00:43:39.486
could get. So it really restricted us

1020
00:43:39.508 --> 00:43:42.366
a lot for the places that we could go. So we were

1021
00:43:42.388 --> 00:43:45.278
sitting on this mission for the day and we were watching the

1022
00:43:45.284 --> 00:43:48.146
weather. And then we decided, okay, hey, we can go and do this.

1023
00:43:48.328 --> 00:43:51.314
So we started heading up north. The Chinook was in the lead,

1024
00:43:51.352 --> 00:43:54.194
and then we had two Griffins shake down, two five and two

1025
00:43:54.232 --> 00:43:56.200
six in the back,

1026
00:43:56.650 --> 00:43:59.570
following them. And as we were going, we generally

1027
00:43:59.650 --> 00:44:02.566
there's a certain safe altitude in combat that you want

1028
00:44:02.588 --> 00:44:05.334
to keep. What we call the threat band is like

1029
00:44:05.372 --> 00:44:08.358
from a low altitude to a high altitude. If you're

1030
00:44:08.374 --> 00:44:11.254
above it, you're good. If you're below it, you're generally good for small arms

1031
00:44:11.302 --> 00:44:11.754
fire.

1032
00:44:11.872 --> 00:44:14.746
So, on this day, we were going.

1033
00:44:14.848 --> 00:44:17.702
Up a, uh, valley that had rising terrain

1034
00:44:17.766 --> 00:44:20.458
on the valley, and each mountain peak on the

1035
00:44:20.464 --> 00:44:23.274
sides were covered in cloud. We

1036
00:44:23.312 --> 00:44:26.286
just knew we wanted to get a little bit higher because we were aware that we were

1037
00:44:26.308 --> 00:44:29.166
in the threat band a bit. And so we kind of wanted to creep up,

1038
00:44:29.188 --> 00:44:31.986
but we did not want to creep into the clouds. Yeah, it would have been

1039
00:44:32.008 --> 00:44:34.946
really bad. So we were kind of creeping up a little

1040
00:44:34.968 --> 00:44:37.778
bit. And then, um, I heard this

1041
00:44:37.864 --> 00:44:40.594
loud bang and smoke started

1042
00:44:40.632 --> 00:44:41.790
pouring into the cockpit.

1043
00:44:41.870 --> 00:44:42.514
Oh, wow.

1044
00:44:42.632 --> 00:44:44.738
Yeah. Uh, so

1045
00:44:44.824 --> 00:44:47.654
immediately, as a trained pilot, I

1046
00:44:47.692 --> 00:44:50.646
was like, oh, white smoke in the cockpit. What would you think that

1047
00:44:50.668 --> 00:44:50.950
is?

1048
00:44:51.020 --> 00:44:51.702
Electrical fire.

1049
00:44:51.756 --> 00:44:54.530
Electrical fire. So I started. Okay. Like, descend

1050
00:44:54.610 --> 00:44:57.206
land as soon as possible, whatever the checklist said. I

1051
00:44:57.228 --> 00:45:00.166
started executing that. At the same time, we lost our ability

1052
00:45:00.198 --> 00:45:01.990
to communicate with each other as a crew.

1053
00:45:02.070 --> 00:45:02.362
Okay.

1054
00:45:02.416 --> 00:45:05.046
Because we were using a, uh, certain secure communications

1055
00:45:05.158 --> 00:45:07.738
capability, we ended up losing a

1056
00:45:07.744 --> 00:45:10.634
generator. It went offline, which knocked that

1057
00:45:10.672 --> 00:45:13.454
offline, and then we just had static on the radio, so we

1058
00:45:13.492 --> 00:45:16.446
couldn't really communicate with the formation or each other as

1059
00:45:16.468 --> 00:45:18.990
a crew, which made it pretty challenging.

1060
00:45:19.410 --> 00:45:22.326
So at that time, I heard the door gunner yelling,

1061
00:45:22.378 --> 00:45:25.118
like, break right or break left? That door

1062
00:45:25.134 --> 00:45:27.966
gunner now is actually on his multi

1063
00:45:27.998 --> 00:45:28.658
engine course.

1064
00:45:28.744 --> 00:45:29.202
Oh, wow.

1065
00:45:29.256 --> 00:45:31.282
Yeah. Alex Cluccier, shout out to him.

1066
00:45:31.336 --> 00:45:31.510
Cool.

1067
00:45:31.510 --> 00:45:34.350
Um, yeah, he's switched over to pilot recently

1068
00:45:34.430 --> 00:45:37.314
and is now doing that. He's a great, great guy. And

1069
00:45:37.352 --> 00:45:40.230
then Ron Krueger was the aircraft commander at the time with me. And then, uh,

1070
00:45:40.236 --> 00:45:43.046
Luke Carlson was our doorganner. And we get in touch every

1071
00:45:43.068 --> 00:45:45.878
time, every anniversary. But one of them

1072
00:45:45.964 --> 00:45:48.918
yelled, Break right, we're being shot. So I start breaking. And then

1073
00:45:48.924 --> 00:45:51.722
you could see the bullets going by. Wow.

1074
00:45:51.856 --> 00:45:54.570
We had been shot. A bullet had actually

1075
00:45:54.640 --> 00:45:57.466
came up through the belly of the aircraft right by my leg and into that

1076
00:45:57.488 --> 00:46:00.346
air data computer sitting next to you there. And I

1077
00:46:00.368 --> 00:46:03.114
thought it was an electrical fire because we had all the electrical

1078
00:46:03.162 --> 00:46:05.790
problems, but that's because the bullet went through 50

1079
00:46:05.860 --> 00:46:08.622
wires on its way into that. It severed 30

1080
00:46:08.676 --> 00:46:10.910
and right off and 20 were

1081
00:46:11.060 --> 00:46:11.722
damaged.

1082
00:46:11.786 --> 00:46:11.820
Wow.

1083
00:46:11.820 --> 00:46:14.020
Uh, so we had all these problems.

1084
00:46:14.870 --> 00:46:17.794
So it was apparent that this is more

1085
00:46:17.832 --> 00:46:20.546
than an electrical fire. It turned out that

1086
00:46:20.648 --> 00:46:23.234
there's so much dust in Afghanistan, which is like this

1087
00:46:23.272 --> 00:46:26.102
powdery flower, that when the bullet went into that,

1088
00:46:26.156 --> 00:46:29.014
it knocked all this dust loose. That's why I thought, we're on

1089
00:46:29.052 --> 00:46:31.538
fire. Looks a lot like white smoke.

1090
00:46:31.634 --> 00:46:31.942
Okay.

1091
00:46:31.996 --> 00:46:34.806
Yeah. So at that point, I

1092
00:46:34.828 --> 00:46:37.778
start evading, which we would always do that anyways.

1093
00:46:37.954 --> 00:46:40.762
We generally don't fly straight and level, which is

1094
00:46:40.816 --> 00:46:43.562
so against everything we were taught in flight training.

1095
00:46:43.616 --> 00:46:44.374
Yeah, no kidding.

1096
00:46:44.422 --> 00:46:47.398
It's super fun to fly tactical helicopters because it's

1097
00:46:47.414 --> 00:46:50.186
like, okay, just keep a little bit up a little bit. Down a little bit.

1098
00:46:50.208 --> 00:46:52.714
Right? You're a harder target. Right.

1099
00:46:52.912 --> 00:46:55.758
So at this point, we could see the bullets going by,

1100
00:46:55.844 --> 00:46:58.718
not because there was tracers in the rounds, but because of the

1101
00:46:58.724 --> 00:47:01.326
atmospheric pressure and the moisture in the air. It was leaving like little

1102
00:47:01.348 --> 00:47:02.714
matrix type contrails.

1103
00:47:02.762 --> 00:47:04.122
Oh, little like smoke trails.

1104
00:47:04.186 --> 00:47:07.054
Yeah. It was bizarre. But the enemy

1105
00:47:07.102 --> 00:47:09.886
were very smart that day to take the tracers out because we couldn't

1106
00:47:09.918 --> 00:47:12.706
see the point of origin or the poo, we call it.

1107
00:47:12.808 --> 00:47:15.758
So we actually never returned fire to whoever shot

1108
00:47:15.774 --> 00:47:18.280
us that day. What we ended up doing was

1109
00:47:18.650 --> 00:47:21.206
I told all the tactical students that I've ever taught this

1110
00:47:21.228 --> 00:47:24.194
story, because when it happened, I felt my aircraft

1111
00:47:24.242 --> 00:47:27.126
commander get on the controls and start to shake the sticks. And

1112
00:47:27.148 --> 00:47:29.974
I thought, well, he must want control because we couldn't say, hey, you have

1113
00:47:30.012 --> 00:47:32.550
control, I have control. It's really, uh,

1114
00:47:32.550 --> 00:47:35.546
abnormal. But he just reacted and jumped on the stick. So I was

1115
00:47:35.568 --> 00:47:38.506
like, oh, he wants to fly. So I got to fix the radio problem here.

1116
00:47:38.528 --> 00:47:41.194
So I put my head down and I'm start going into the

1117
00:47:41.232 --> 00:47:44.138
computer and started like, what's broken? How can I

1118
00:47:44.144 --> 00:47:47.130
fix this? And I look up and his head's down doing the same

1119
00:47:47.200 --> 00:47:50.026
thing. And in the Griffin we have like, uh, different levels of

1120
00:47:50.048 --> 00:47:52.846
automation and happens. There's one that we call it force

1121
00:47:52.878 --> 00:47:55.778
trim on. So if I press the button and put the stick somewhere and release it, it's going to

1122
00:47:55.784 --> 00:47:58.754
stay there. So it was flying exactly what I wanted it to fly when I

1123
00:47:58.792 --> 00:48:01.586
let go of the sticks and I looked down and

1124
00:48:01.608 --> 00:48:04.578
he's doing the same thing. So then I took control again. But it

1125
00:48:04.584 --> 00:48:07.060
was really interesting, the things that you train for,

1126
00:48:07.370 --> 00:48:10.166
you can't train for every scenario, and that was one that

1127
00:48:10.188 --> 00:48:12.866
happened. So the most important thing is to keep flying.

1128
00:48:12.978 --> 00:48:15.654
So then, um, I brought the aircraft sort of low.

1129
00:48:15.692 --> 00:48:15.942
Level.

1130
00:48:15.996 --> 00:48:18.866
We were able to get in non secure comms a mayday

1131
00:48:18.898 --> 00:48:21.674
call out to formation. The Chinook went high level

1132
00:48:21.792 --> 00:48:24.774
and the other Griffin followed us down low level and we made the decision

1133
00:48:24.822 --> 00:48:27.754
to go to a forward operating base that was very close by,

1134
00:48:27.792 --> 00:48:30.538
like 10. Uh, we flew there

1135
00:48:30.624 --> 00:48:33.354
and landed and the Griffin and the Chinook came behind us

1136
00:48:33.472 --> 00:48:36.406
and put down. A funny story to that is we landed

1137
00:48:36.438 --> 00:48:39.414
in the LZ and we tucked it way over to the side because these forward operating

1138
00:48:39.462 --> 00:48:42.066
bases had so much helicopter traffic bringing in

1139
00:48:42.088 --> 00:48:44.914
supplies, ammo and stuff like that. So we tuck off

1140
00:48:44.952 --> 00:48:47.774
way over to the side, we get out and we see that we had more bullets

1141
00:48:47.822 --> 00:48:50.114
in the helicopter. Like, there's one in the main rotor as well.

1142
00:48:50.152 --> 00:48:50.610
Oh, wow.

1143
00:48:50.680 --> 00:48:53.598
And, uh, certainly the fear was that we would have one in the tail rotor,

1144
00:48:53.614 --> 00:48:56.326
but, um, wasn't the case. So we were able to recover there

1145
00:48:56.348 --> 00:48:56.850
safely.

1146
00:48:56.930 --> 00:48:58.950
How did those 10 Km feel?

1147
00:48:59.020 --> 00:48:59.730
They're scary.

1148
00:48:59.810 --> 00:49:00.054
Yeah.

1149
00:49:00.092 --> 00:49:02.886
So it's funny because, um, we're just

1150
00:49:02.908 --> 00:49:05.890
dealt to deal with emergencies very well as military pilots.

1151
00:49:06.050 --> 00:49:08.834
So I dealt with all the emergencies and then we made the decision

1152
00:49:08.882 --> 00:49:11.766
we're going to fly there. And then it was

1153
00:49:11.788 --> 00:49:14.710
like all we had to do left was fly there. And that was scary

1154
00:49:14.790 --> 00:49:17.754
because I thought, do we have a bullet in the tail rotor? Because we did

1155
00:49:17.792 --> 00:49:20.214
lose an aircraft in 2002, a Griffin

1156
00:49:20.342 --> 00:49:22.746
crashed up, uh, at a Goose Bay in

1157
00:49:22.768 --> 00:49:25.706
Labrador because of a tail rotor crack.

1158
00:49:25.818 --> 00:49:28.526
So I felt that it was sort of a weak spot. And we do

1159
00:49:28.628 --> 00:49:31.214
really in depth inspections on that tail rotor now,

1160
00:49:31.332 --> 00:49:34.318
but certainly, uh, that entered my mind. And yeah, that was

1161
00:49:34.324 --> 00:49:36.546
the scariest part of my tour, probably was that

1162
00:49:36.568 --> 00:49:39.518
10. Then when we landed, I ended

1163
00:49:39.534 --> 00:49:42.418
up jumping on a forklift, was driving by. So

1164
00:49:42.424 --> 00:49:45.346
I jumped on and I said, hey, take me to the Tactical Operations Center because I wanted to go

1165
00:49:45.368 --> 00:49:48.294
and give the information to them so they could send out somebody to go and get this

1166
00:49:48.332 --> 00:49:49.254
person that shot us.

1167
00:49:49.292 --> 00:49:49.878
Right?

1168
00:49:50.044 --> 00:49:52.854
And I get into the Tactical Operations Center or the

1169
00:49:52.892 --> 00:49:55.638
talk and this American Major, it was a

1170
00:49:55.644 --> 00:49:58.166
Canadian Ford operating base, but it had recently been handed over to the

1171
00:49:58.188 --> 00:50:01.126
Americans. He came up and I'm like, hey look, we're parking a helicopter.

1172
00:50:01.158 --> 00:50:04.106
We're going to leave it here, it's full of bullets. And he's like, oh,

1173
00:50:04.128 --> 00:50:06.998
do you need a download? And for those people that don't

1174
00:50:07.014 --> 00:50:09.786
know, a, uh, download is usually when an attack helicopter, like an

1175
00:50:09.808 --> 00:50:12.714
Apache or something comes in that wants to

1176
00:50:12.832 --> 00:50:15.726
take bullets off of the helicopter because they want

1177
00:50:15.748 --> 00:50:18.574
to reduce weight. And it was very common for this forward

1178
00:50:18.612 --> 00:50:21.598
operating base because it was the step off to going into the higher terrain up in

1179
00:50:21.604 --> 00:50:24.510
the mountains. And so he's like, oh, do you want to download?

1180
00:50:24.950 --> 00:50:27.278
He thought you meant you were carrying a ton of ammunition.

1181
00:50:27.374 --> 00:50:30.180
Yeah, exactly. And I was like, no, it's bad guy.

1182
00:50:31.270 --> 00:50:33.720
It's just it's kind of funny that he said that, but,

1183
00:50:33.720 --> 00:50:36.546
uh, then we went from there and we took just our kid off the

1184
00:50:36.568 --> 00:50:39.318
helicopter. We jumped in the Chinook, they flew us home. We felt a little bit of

1185
00:50:39.324 --> 00:50:41.878
shame because we always have this nice little back and forth with the

1186
00:50:41.884 --> 00:50:44.520
Chinook, Griffin and Chinook people. Everybody

1187
00:50:45.050 --> 00:50:47.622
in one wing knows I'm talking about. But, uh, we both

1188
00:50:47.676 --> 00:50:50.374
have a lot of high mutual respect for each

1189
00:50:50.412 --> 00:50:53.258
fleet. I have a tremendous amount of

1190
00:50:53.264 --> 00:50:56.138
respect for the Chinooks and their crews. And I'm thankful for them because they got

1191
00:50:56.144 --> 00:50:59.002
me home that day, even though the Chinook got hit as well.

1192
00:50:59.136 --> 00:51:00.838
And they didn't even know they were shot.

1193
00:51:00.934 --> 00:51:01.206
Wow.

1194
00:51:01.248 --> 00:51:02.858
Not until we got back to Kandahar.

1195
00:51:02.954 --> 00:51:05.818
Man, that was some accurate gunnery.

1196
00:51:05.994 --> 00:51:06.814
It was, yeah.

1197
00:51:06.852 --> 00:51:09.630
So there's actually I have a video from the tailgunner on the

1198
00:51:09.780 --> 00:51:12.734
you know, we didn't know we were being shot at, which was very common

1199
00:51:12.772 --> 00:51:15.406
for us in Afghanistan. We would often get calls from

1200
00:51:15.508 --> 00:51:18.002
troops on the ground being like, hey, you're being shot at from the

1201
00:51:18.056 --> 00:51:20.740
northwest of the Fob or whatever, ford Operating base.

1202
00:51:21.270 --> 00:51:23.774
So we would go and try to find them, but we would never hear the bullets.

1203
00:51:23.822 --> 00:51:26.562
But we know ear muffs. And we had

1204
00:51:26.616 --> 00:51:29.254
CEPS. I'm not sure what the acronym is, but it's basically like

1205
00:51:29.292 --> 00:51:32.006
headphones, like your air pods or whatever would be in your

1206
00:51:32.028 --> 00:51:34.598
ears, plugged into the communication system.

1207
00:51:34.684 --> 00:51:34.982
Okay.

1208
00:51:35.036 --> 00:51:37.734
And then you have your ear muffs on top of that and

1209
00:51:37.852 --> 00:51:40.758
built into your triple layer. Yeah, and we had to

1210
00:51:40.764 --> 00:51:43.626
do that because the door guns, when they're shooting, there's so

1211
00:51:43.648 --> 00:51:46.474
much noise, you still need to be able to communicate to the door gunners, especially

1212
00:51:46.512 --> 00:51:49.194
if you need them to cease fire. So that's why we

1213
00:51:49.232 --> 00:51:51.862
required that amount of hearing protection.

1214
00:51:52.006 --> 00:51:54.460
It just made you be able to communicate a lot better.

1215
00:51:54.460 --> 00:51:56.718
M, so with that, uh, you don't.

1216
00:51:56.724 --> 00:51:59.566
Hear the bullets outside there zinging by you, but in the

1217
00:51:59.588 --> 00:52:01.934
helmet cam that door gunner had, you could hear it.

1218
00:52:02.052 --> 00:52:04.874
We have the audio from this helmet cam footage and it shows

1219
00:52:04.932 --> 00:52:07.858
just how difficult it is to pick out the sounds of shooting over a

1220
00:52:07.864 --> 00:52:10.626
helicopter. Listen closely to the snaps and

1221
00:52:10.648 --> 00:52:12.946
cracks you hear. Those are bullets passing by the

1222
00:52:12.968 --> 00:52:13.730
Chinook.

1223
00:52:23.210 --> 00:52:25.682
No one on board could hear these shots.

1224
00:52:25.826 --> 00:52:28.546
We were engaged by what was assessed to be a PKM

1225
00:52:28.578 --> 00:52:29.154
machine gun.

1226
00:52:29.202 --> 00:52:29.714
Yes.

1227
00:52:29.852 --> 00:52:32.666
And they probably fired anywhere from, uh, one to

1228
00:52:32.688 --> 00:52:35.274
two belts at us. Wow. It'd be like 400

1229
00:52:35.312 --> 00:52:35.910
rounds.

1230
00:52:36.070 --> 00:52:38.950
Yeah, it has a big box of ammo PKM.

1231
00:52:39.030 --> 00:52:42.030
Exactly. So that's what got us that day.

1232
00:52:42.180 --> 00:52:45.118
But then we got back to Kandahar. The Griffin that

1233
00:52:45.204 --> 00:52:47.838
we were in that day ended up we sent out a

1234
00:52:47.844 --> 00:52:50.686
maintenance team. They pretty much, I was

1235
00:52:50.708 --> 00:52:53.646
told, hotwired to hot start like, one of

1236
00:52:53.668 --> 00:52:56.638
the engines to get a special authorization to fly it

1237
00:52:56.644 --> 00:52:59.154
back to Kandahar. And it took five or six weeks, I think, to get that

1238
00:52:59.192 --> 00:53:02.110
aircraft back in the fight. Just it had to be totally rewired.

1239
00:53:02.190 --> 00:53:03.474
Yeah. But it was back in the fight.

1240
00:53:03.512 --> 00:53:06.466
And then great story to that is, uh, it

1241
00:53:06.488 --> 00:53:09.438
came back to Canada, it was rebuilt, and then it ended up at four or three squadron,

1242
00:53:09.454 --> 00:53:12.306
where I was teaching new students how to fly the Gryffin on super cool. The

1243
00:53:12.328 --> 00:53:13.538
very helicopter that I was shot in.

1244
00:53:13.544 --> 00:53:13.660
Yeah.

1245
00:53:13.660 --> 00:53:16.406
Uh, aircraft four, five, eight for anybody that's flying it there, that's

1246
00:53:16.438 --> 00:53:17.020
awesome.

1247
00:53:17.790 --> 00:53:18.106
Yeah.

1248
00:53:18.128 --> 00:53:20.986
So that was definitely a standout day

1249
00:53:21.088 --> 00:53:23.754
for me, for sure. And it worked out really well because we were able to get home,

1250
00:53:23.792 --> 00:53:26.442
and I went to work the next day and got another

1251
00:53:26.496 --> 00:53:27.642
helicopter and went back out.

1252
00:53:27.696 --> 00:53:27.818
Yeah.

1253
00:53:27.824 --> 00:53:30.558
I was going to ask, what was the recovery like from that after

1254
00:53:30.724 --> 00:53:33.630
getting shot up? Do you guys have any,

1255
00:53:33.630 --> 00:53:36.606
uh, after effects, uh, in terms of going back out

1256
00:53:36.628 --> 00:53:37.054
there?

1257
00:53:37.172 --> 00:53:37.840
No.

1258
00:53:39.090 --> 00:53:39.822
Mission nine.

1259
00:53:39.876 --> 00:53:42.494
It's like yeah, I guess you did another 94

1260
00:53:42.532 --> 00:53:42.970
missions.

1261
00:53:43.050 --> 00:53:45.746
Exactly. I felt coming out of that

1262
00:53:45.768 --> 00:53:46.194
experience.

1263
00:53:46.312 --> 00:53:48.814
That and this was as a pilot.

1264
00:53:48.862 --> 00:53:51.858
Sitting in the front, we had armored seats. Our door gunners and

1265
00:53:51.864 --> 00:53:54.754
flight engineers in the back didn't have that. So

1266
00:53:54.792 --> 00:53:57.058
for me, I always felt that either the bullet is going to go.

1267
00:53:57.064 --> 00:53:59.390
Into the armored seat, or it can.

1268
00:53:59.400 --> 00:54:02.246
Only hit me in the legs or the arms or in the head. And I

1269
00:54:02.268 --> 00:54:05.202
always thought a headshot, you're done, arms and legs are going to survive.

1270
00:54:05.266 --> 00:54:08.194
So most likely it's going to hit you either because we had, um, armored

1271
00:54:08.242 --> 00:54:10.906
vests as well, too. So it's either going to get you in the vest or the

1272
00:54:10.928 --> 00:54:13.690
seat. So I just felt that

1273
00:54:13.840 --> 00:54:15.820
if I was going to

1274
00:54:16.830 --> 00:54:19.706
I mean, it's crazy to even talk to you about it right now and to think about it

1275
00:54:19.728 --> 00:54:22.394
this way, but I thought, oh, I could get shot in the arm, and that's not a big

1276
00:54:22.432 --> 00:54:25.386
deal. If I get shot in the head, it's done. It's not going to

1277
00:54:25.408 --> 00:54:28.202
hurt. You know what I mean? Which is just a crazy

1278
00:54:28.256 --> 00:54:31.058
concept to think about in combat. And I think it's just what gets you true.

1279
00:54:31.144 --> 00:54:31.586
Yeah.

1280
00:54:31.688 --> 00:54:32.962
You have to rationalize it.

1281
00:54:33.016 --> 00:54:33.620
Yeah.

1282
00:54:35.110 --> 00:54:37.762
But, uh, a true shootdown story is

1283
00:54:37.816 --> 00:54:40.722
Blowtorch 60 shot down. So

1284
00:54:40.776 --> 00:54:43.586
two very good friends of mine were flying that aircraft that day, and it is an

1285
00:54:43.608 --> 00:54:46.546
incredible story of being shot down. I like to

1286
00:54:46.568 --> 00:54:48.120
say that we got shot up.

1287
00:54:50.410 --> 00:54:53.266
I feel like it's more of a win if I say we got shot

1288
00:54:53.298 --> 00:54:56.166
up because we recovered the aircraft and we didn't make it the whole way home. So

1289
00:54:56.188 --> 00:54:59.106
it's in red in my logbook. But, uh, I mean, the aircraft

1290
00:54:59.138 --> 00:55:02.074
went on to fly lots of missions, whereas that

1291
00:55:02.112 --> 00:55:04.842
Chinook that got shot down, they got shot down. They were

1292
00:55:04.896 --> 00:55:07.706
engaged by heavy weapons. There was 21 troops in the back,

1293
00:55:07.808 --> 00:55:10.714
and they were able to land, uh, and get everybody

1294
00:55:10.752 --> 00:55:13.038
out to safety. And it's pretty amazing story.

1295
00:55:13.124 --> 00:55:13.470
Yeah.

1296
00:55:13.540 --> 00:55:16.462
Bill Fielding is the pilot that's flying, and Bill

1297
00:55:16.516 --> 00:55:18.542
got the Medal of Valor for that, too.

1298
00:55:18.596 --> 00:55:20.746
Yeah, he was, uh, in 400 Squadron.

1299
00:55:20.778 --> 00:55:21.760
When I was there.

1300
00:55:22.210 --> 00:55:25.038
I have a connection a little bit, so maybe I can get him on the

1301
00:55:25.044 --> 00:55:25.514
show.

1302
00:55:25.652 --> 00:55:26.340
Yeah.

1303
00:55:27.350 --> 00:55:29.826
So you and I have something in common. Your time in

1304
00:55:29.848 --> 00:55:32.786
Afghanistan resulted in PTSD. What were the

1305
00:55:32.808 --> 00:55:35.202
signs that this was becoming an issue in your life?

1306
00:55:35.336 --> 00:55:35.682
Yeah.

1307
00:55:35.736 --> 00:55:38.358
So it's an interesting thing. Like, when I got back from

1308
00:55:38.364 --> 00:55:41.318
Afghanistan, I was so excited just even to

1309
00:55:41.324 --> 00:55:44.038
see the color green mhm. It really affected me in a

1310
00:55:44.044 --> 00:55:46.966
positive way when I first returned, because I just had such

1311
00:55:46.988 --> 00:55:49.866
a great appreciation for everything. And that lasted for

1312
00:55:49.888 --> 00:55:52.860
about three months. And then I started to

1313
00:55:53.310 --> 00:55:56.234
just lose patience, you know what I mean? I'm not

1314
00:55:56.272 --> 00:55:58.700
generally angry person, but certainly

1315
00:55:59.070 --> 00:56:01.478
I would be much more quick to anger.

1316
00:56:01.654 --> 00:56:04.638
And I was sort of irritable, and I start to get a

1317
00:56:04.644 --> 00:56:07.040
little bit of anxiety, which was completely

1318
00:56:07.490 --> 00:56:09.806
unknown to me. And at the

1319
00:56:09.828 --> 00:56:12.698
time, it's easy to look back and see that that's

1320
00:56:12.714 --> 00:56:15.566
what I was going through. But I didn't attribute

1321
00:56:15.598 --> 00:56:18.418
it at all to Afghanistan. Not even a

1322
00:56:18.424 --> 00:56:21.106
little know, so it took a little bit of time. And

1323
00:56:21.128 --> 00:56:23.986
then what happens with PTSD is, like, you

1324
00:56:24.008 --> 00:56:26.514
have a bucket that can only hold so much water,

1325
00:56:26.712 --> 00:56:29.606
and, uh, I have a lot of stuff in

1326
00:56:29.628 --> 00:56:31.894
my bucket that I didn't know that I had there from

1327
00:56:31.932 --> 00:56:34.886
Afghanistan. And so now when you start putting your other

1328
00:56:34.908 --> 00:56:37.174
things in your bucket, like your finances or your

1329
00:56:37.212 --> 00:56:39.974
relationships, or somebody cut you off in

1330
00:56:40.012 --> 00:56:42.938
traffic, whatever it is that hits that last drop of

1331
00:56:42.944 --> 00:56:45.738
water that bucket can hold, then you have a little bit of a

1332
00:56:45.744 --> 00:56:48.646
breakdown or you get emotional. It comes out differently

1333
00:56:48.678 --> 00:56:51.594
for different people. So, for me, certainly, I got to the point where

1334
00:56:51.632 --> 00:56:54.302
my bucket was full and I knew that

1335
00:56:54.436 --> 00:56:57.358
something was different. I didn't know what it was at the

1336
00:56:57.364 --> 00:57:00.238
time. I didn't know anything about PTSD. So I just talked to

1337
00:57:00.244 --> 00:57:03.166
my flight surgeon, who was an ex F 18 pilot, and he was,

1338
00:57:03.188 --> 00:57:06.018
like, a really great guy that would

1339
00:57:06.184 --> 00:57:08.914
just tell it to you straight and stuff. Uh, and so

1340
00:57:08.952 --> 00:57:11.586
he ended up sending me for an assessment. And so I got a

1341
00:57:11.608 --> 00:57:14.326
diagnosis of PTSD, and then that sort of

1342
00:57:14.348 --> 00:57:15.986
started my healing journey.

1343
00:57:16.098 --> 00:57:16.710
Yeah.

1344
00:57:16.860 --> 00:57:19.826
Did you have a big incident that led

1345
00:57:19.858 --> 00:57:21.160
you to seek help?

1346
00:57:21.610 --> 00:57:24.486
No, I think back at that

1347
00:57:24.508 --> 00:57:27.338
time, I think they were looking at posting me to Moosejaw, and I

1348
00:57:27.344 --> 00:57:30.134
think that impacted

1349
00:57:30.182 --> 00:57:32.970
me because I had a very strong support

1350
00:57:33.040 --> 00:57:35.866
network, um, on the East Coast. And I

1351
00:57:35.888 --> 00:57:38.090
think that would have been the catalyst.

1352
00:57:38.770 --> 00:57:40.800
They ended up not posting me. Yeah.

1353
00:57:42.450 --> 00:57:45.262
Have you experienced any stigma in the forces as a result

1354
00:57:45.316 --> 00:57:45.790
of this?

1355
00:57:45.860 --> 00:57:48.686
No, none whatsoever. I have

1356
00:57:48.868 --> 00:57:51.866
been somewhat open about my PTSD.

1357
00:57:51.898 --> 00:57:54.706
I think it's important to talk about it. Um, there's a quote that

1358
00:57:54.728 --> 00:57:57.714
says there's no Unwounded soldiers in war, and I believe

1359
00:57:57.752 --> 00:58:00.098
that's true. Some people can come back

1360
00:58:00.264 --> 00:58:02.382
and always see the green grass.

1361
00:58:02.446 --> 00:58:02.674
Right?

1362
00:58:02.712 --> 00:58:05.686
Like Afghanistan. Everything was brown because everything green was covered in

1363
00:58:05.708 --> 00:58:06.242
dust.

1364
00:58:06.386 --> 00:58:07.174
Right.

1365
00:58:07.372 --> 00:58:09.720
So I did experience that really

1366
00:58:10.810 --> 00:58:13.526
strong feeling of appreciation for everything that we have here in

1367
00:58:13.548 --> 00:58:16.246
Canada, which was really good. And some people are able to

1368
00:58:16.268 --> 00:58:19.098
maintain that for a while, and then for other people it's a

1369
00:58:19.104 --> 00:58:21.946
little different, but it remains the

1370
00:58:21.968 --> 00:58:24.826
same that people are going to be different when you

1371
00:58:24.848 --> 00:58:27.706
come back from combat zones and stuff like that.

1372
00:58:27.808 --> 00:58:29.580
When you see traumatic things.

1373
00:58:30.050 --> 00:58:30.414
Yeah.

1374
00:58:30.452 --> 00:58:33.166
So when I came out to my

1375
00:58:33.188 --> 00:58:36.078
supervisors and stuff like that and told them sort of what

1376
00:58:36.084 --> 00:58:38.938
I was experiencing, I found there was lots

1377
00:58:38.954 --> 00:58:40.240
of support. Yeah.

1378
00:58:40.690 --> 00:58:42.206
What about from your peers?

1379
00:58:42.398 --> 00:58:43.554
Peers have been great.

1380
00:58:43.672 --> 00:58:44.290
Yeah.

1381
00:58:44.440 --> 00:58:46.562
Honestly, it's more prevalent than you'd think.

1382
00:58:46.616 --> 00:58:49.586
Yeah. No, I agree. I had a very similar experience. I

1383
00:58:49.608 --> 00:58:52.142
had super supportive supervisors.

1384
00:58:52.206 --> 00:58:55.186
And when I kind of, uh, as you

1385
00:58:55.208 --> 00:58:57.794
say, came out about it and talked a little more widely about

1386
00:58:57.832 --> 00:59:00.758
it, I had people reach out who were going through the same thing. A lot

1387
00:59:00.764 --> 00:59:03.574
of people that I never would have thought that were going through very

1388
00:59:03.612 --> 00:59:04.930
similar experiences.

1389
00:59:05.090 --> 00:59:05.510
Yeah.

1390
00:59:05.580 --> 00:59:06.994
And it's comforting.

1391
00:59:07.042 --> 00:59:08.242
Yeah, it is. Because you're not alone.

1392
00:59:08.306 --> 00:59:10.120
Yeah. You're not alone, that's for sure.

1393
00:59:10.750 --> 00:59:13.626
What do you think has been the most helpful thing in your healing journey so

1394
00:59:13.648 --> 00:59:14.934
far with PTSD?

1395
00:59:15.062 --> 00:59:16.970
Well, the most important thing is asking for help.

1396
00:59:17.040 --> 00:59:17.610
Yeah.

1397
00:59:17.760 --> 00:59:20.698
And then the help. My experience

1398
00:59:20.784 --> 00:59:23.658
with therapy and the mental

1399
00:59:23.674 --> 00:59:26.462
health system has been very good. A lot of people

1400
00:59:26.516 --> 00:59:29.166
really care and they have a lot of experience with this.

1401
00:59:29.268 --> 00:59:29.582
Right.

1402
00:59:29.636 --> 00:59:32.606
There's a lot of different tools out there that you can

1403
00:59:32.788 --> 00:59:35.600
learn to get yourself to a good place.

1404
00:59:35.970 --> 00:59:38.866
And for everybody it's different. So I go to

1405
00:59:38.888 --> 00:59:41.614
therapy regularly and it's

1406
00:59:41.662 --> 00:59:44.526
great. The thing about post traumatic stress disorder

1407
00:59:44.558 --> 00:59:47.320
is that it's stress that's not processed. Mhm,

1408
00:59:47.470 --> 00:59:50.102
and it happens after the event, which is common

1409
00:59:50.236 --> 00:59:53.218
in combat, because you're just too busy doing the job while you're there. You're

1410
00:59:53.234 --> 00:59:56.086
not going to have time to process this. And then when you get back, you're just too

1411
00:59:56.108 --> 00:59:59.014
excited to be back. And then these

1412
00:59:59.052 --> 01:00:01.958
things start to come out over time, the stress has just been never processed.

1413
01:00:01.974 --> 01:00:04.954
So you'll get dreams and all this stuff. Right. M, so the

1414
01:00:04.992 --> 01:00:07.546
therapy can definitely help you work through that stuff and

1415
01:00:07.648 --> 01:00:10.406
process it. And then once it's processed, you can kind of tuck

1416
01:00:10.438 --> 01:00:13.114
it to the bottom of your water

1417
01:00:13.152 --> 01:00:16.142
bucket. It's not ever always going to be gone,

1418
01:00:16.196 --> 01:00:19.086
but you learn how to manage it. And definitely the help that I got gave

1419
01:00:19.108 --> 01:00:20.414
me the tools to be able to manage it.

1420
01:00:20.452 --> 01:00:20.750
Yeah.

1421
01:00:20.820 --> 01:00:22.570
You found that made a big difference in your life.

1422
01:00:22.660 --> 01:00:23.300
Yeah.

1423
01:00:24.310 --> 01:00:27.246
What would you say to anyone who thinks, like, they're

1424
01:00:27.278 --> 01:00:30.114
listening to this and this is ringing a few bells and they maybe

1425
01:00:30.152 --> 01:00:32.340
think they're experiencing something similar?

1426
01:00:32.710 --> 01:00:33.170
Yeah.

1427
01:00:33.240 --> 01:00:36.078
Go into your flight surgeon or whoever, the mental

1428
01:00:36.094 --> 01:00:38.566
health nurse or whoever it has to be, and just talk to.

1429
01:00:38.588 --> 01:00:40.102
Them, get checked out.

1430
01:00:40.156 --> 01:00:43.126
And, uh, there's so much help and

1431
01:00:43.148 --> 01:00:45.654
it's so good. And Veterans Affairs is really good with this stuff

1432
01:00:45.692 --> 01:00:48.486
too. I know that long after I

1433
01:00:48.508 --> 01:00:50.054
retire, I'll still be able to get therapy.

1434
01:00:50.102 --> 01:00:51.670
And it's comforting.

1435
01:00:51.750 --> 01:00:52.314
It's really good.

1436
01:00:52.352 --> 01:00:54.780
So the scariest thing is that

1437
01:00:55.230 --> 01:00:55.594
people.

1438
01:00:55.632 --> 01:00:58.614
May not ask for help. Right. Because it can go to dark places.

1439
01:00:58.662 --> 01:01:01.260
Right. So asking for help is

1440
01:01:01.950 --> 01:01:04.494
the single best thing that you can do, and the help is very

1441
01:01:04.532 --> 01:01:06.366
good from people that really care.

1442
01:01:06.468 --> 01:01:09.454
How did you manage to take that step? Did you have

1443
01:01:09.492 --> 01:01:12.314
fears about losing your ability to fly?

1444
01:01:12.362 --> 01:01:15.266
For sure, yeah. And I think that would be very common with

1445
01:01:15.288 --> 01:01:18.178
any pilot. Our biggest fear is always like, hey,

1446
01:01:18.264 --> 01:01:20.738
am I going to be able to fly? And so for me,

1447
01:01:20.904 --> 01:01:23.826
throughout the process, asking for

1448
01:01:23.848 --> 01:01:25.940
help was I didn't know anything about it.

1449
01:01:27.030 --> 01:01:30.006
I thought I'd still be able to fly. And I did get grounded for

1450
01:01:30.028 --> 01:01:32.998
a brief period of time, and then I got put back on the flight line and

1451
01:01:33.084 --> 01:01:35.542
whereas happy, like, flying was very good for me.

1452
01:01:35.676 --> 01:01:38.614
But there are a lot of pilots that would

1453
01:01:38.652 --> 01:01:41.400
be scared of losing their flying category and stuff like that. And I think,

1454
01:01:41.400 --> 01:01:43.580
uh, it would take a long process

1455
01:01:44.030 --> 01:01:46.714
to get to that point. For me,

1456
01:01:46.752 --> 01:01:49.158
I opted to not take meds.

1457
01:01:49.254 --> 01:01:49.466
Right.

1458
01:01:49.488 --> 01:01:52.426
So I stayed off meds as much as I could. And what ended up

1459
01:01:52.448 --> 01:01:55.134
working for me really well was just working on healthy eating and

1460
01:01:55.172 --> 01:01:58.078
fitness. I always find that if I lead with my

1461
01:01:58.084 --> 01:02:00.830
body, my mind will follow. So if I get out

1462
01:02:00.900 --> 01:02:03.600
and I go for a walk with my dog or whatever like that,

1463
01:02:03.780 --> 01:02:06.626
uh, it's just going to help. Just clear some room in my head

1464
01:02:06.648 --> 01:02:06.994
or whatever.

1465
01:02:07.032 --> 01:02:09.170
Right. So that's always been good for me.

1466
01:02:09.240 --> 01:02:11.858
But yeah, I would say that for anybody worried about

1467
01:02:11.944 --> 01:02:14.786
that and losing their flying category, it's not worth it.

1468
01:02:14.808 --> 01:02:17.446
There's no flying category that's worth having to deal with

1469
01:02:17.628 --> 01:02:19.398
stress that you just need to process.

1470
01:02:19.564 --> 01:02:21.560
Yeah, I agree with that 100%.

1471
01:02:22.250 --> 01:02:24.866
We're going to go back to a little bit of lighter subject

1472
01:02:24.898 --> 01:02:27.478
matter. What was the most memorable flight you.

1473
01:02:27.484 --> 01:02:28.514
Did in the Griffin?

1474
01:02:28.642 --> 01:02:31.258
So the most memorable flight that I ever got to do was

1475
01:02:31.344 --> 01:02:33.946
during pre deployment training. I was

1476
01:02:33.968 --> 01:02:36.906
deploying with 408 Squadron out in Edmonton and I was posted in

1477
01:02:36.928 --> 01:02:39.610
Gagetown, so I was away a lot.

1478
01:02:39.760 --> 01:02:42.582
My grandparents that came from Holland

1479
01:02:42.646 --> 01:02:45.386
were having their 60th weding anniversary on a Saturday

1480
01:02:45.498 --> 01:02:48.174
and I was getting home on a Friday. And my

1481
01:02:48.292 --> 01:02:51.214
commanding officer at that time knew how

1482
01:02:51.252 --> 01:02:54.158
busy I was, and, uh, he told me, he's like, why

1483
01:02:54.164 --> 01:02:57.106
don't you just take a Griffin down instead of driving the four and a half hours or whatever

1484
01:02:57.128 --> 01:02:59.746
it was at the time? Take a griffin. So

1485
01:02:59.928 --> 01:03:02.866
myself and my good buddy Andrew Smith smitty that, you

1486
01:03:02.888 --> 01:03:05.778
know, we ended up grabbing a Griffin and a

1487
01:03:05.784 --> 01:03:08.466
flight engineer and going to

1488
01:03:08.488 --> 01:03:11.378
surprise my grandparents at their 60th weding anniversary. They

1489
01:03:11.384 --> 01:03:14.146
didn't know we were coming. It was only my uncle. We had all the proper

1490
01:03:14.248 --> 01:03:17.226
authorizations and stuff. And basically I had a time on

1491
01:03:17.248 --> 01:03:20.106
Target 03:00. My dad knew and my uncle knew, and that

1492
01:03:20.128 --> 01:03:23.018
was it. So everybody else thought that I wasn't going to make it. And we ended up

1493
01:03:23.024 --> 01:03:25.914
coming around in the circuit and we landed in a field and shut down,

1494
01:03:25.952 --> 01:03:28.474
and the whole family was there. And I had a very large

1495
01:03:28.512 --> 01:03:31.418
family, so, uh, it was very rewarding. And it

1496
01:03:31.424 --> 01:03:34.382
was really cool for my grandparents, too, because, again,

1497
01:03:34.516 --> 01:03:37.374
I'm, um, part of the military that they saw drive

1498
01:03:37.412 --> 01:03:39.838
the tanks into the streets of Holland and bring them chocolate and

1499
01:03:39.844 --> 01:03:41.930
cigarettes. Freedom.

1500
01:03:42.010 --> 01:03:43.694
Yeah. So that's cool.

1501
01:03:43.732 --> 01:03:44.562
That is really cool.

1502
01:03:44.616 --> 01:03:44.882
Yeah.

1503
01:03:44.936 --> 01:03:47.746
I'd also like to clarify all flying is good

1504
01:03:47.768 --> 01:03:50.594
training. This isn't just a case of somebody using

1505
01:03:50.632 --> 01:03:53.554
a government helicopter for personal use. They would have got great

1506
01:03:53.592 --> 01:03:56.338
training out of that. They're flying into an unprepared landing zone,

1507
01:03:56.434 --> 01:03:59.318
lots of other things that they're practicing and getting out of that. So

1508
01:03:59.324 --> 01:04:01.878
it's not just about going and

1509
01:04:02.044 --> 01:04:03.698
going to an anniversary party.

1510
01:04:03.794 --> 01:04:06.486
And in this instance, actually, it was, uh, for like,

1511
01:04:06.508 --> 01:04:09.386
VFR cross country and navigation and stuff, because we had been so

1512
01:04:09.408 --> 01:04:12.394
focused on the tactical portion of stuff, we had no time

1513
01:04:12.432 --> 01:04:14.970
to focus on what about flying in

1514
01:04:15.120 --> 01:04:16.182
Class G airspace?

1515
01:04:16.246 --> 01:04:18.502
Just flying in Canadian domestic airspace.

1516
01:04:18.566 --> 01:04:21.354
Exactly. So we need to keep that

1517
01:04:21.392 --> 01:04:22.590
skill up as well.

1518
01:04:22.660 --> 01:04:23.520
100%.

1519
01:04:24.370 --> 01:04:27.246
So what would you say is the most important thing you do to keep.

1520
01:04:27.268 --> 01:04:29.822
Yourself ready for the job again?

1521
01:04:29.876 --> 01:04:31.200
So it's all about my mental health.

1522
01:04:31.200 --> 01:04:33.714
M. So if I have a good.

1523
01:04:33.752 --> 01:04:36.274
Fitness regime and a good

1524
01:04:36.312 --> 01:04:39.186
diet, I'm pretty good to go. Yeah, that

1525
01:04:39.208 --> 01:04:42.146
is the most important thing. The other thing, too, is just

1526
01:04:42.328 --> 01:04:44.870
maintaining an awareness

1527
01:04:45.290 --> 01:04:46.870
of my capabilities.

1528
01:04:47.370 --> 01:04:49.878
So I have learned a lot in my

1529
01:04:49.884 --> 01:04:52.230
career and I've forgotten

1530
01:04:52.730 --> 01:04:53.958
just as much.

1531
01:04:54.124 --> 01:04:56.834
Like, probably everything I've learned in my career, I've forgotten

1532
01:04:56.882 --> 01:04:59.766
it. And then I've relearned sometimes, you

1533
01:04:59.788 --> 01:05:02.698
know, a good example would be a student will come to

1534
01:05:02.704 --> 01:05:05.526
me and be like, hey, Greg, I have this question about the hydraulic

1535
01:05:05.558 --> 01:05:08.394
system. How does that actuator work?

1536
01:05:08.592 --> 01:05:11.338
And I'll be like, I got to.

1537
01:05:11.344 --> 01:05:14.218
Go get the and it's I always looked at

1538
01:05:14.224 --> 01:05:17.006
it like a so today at the top of the

1539
01:05:17.028 --> 01:05:19.854
wheel is like, the hydraulic system and that actuator and oh,

1540
01:05:19.892 --> 01:05:22.846
jeez, I got to get back in the books and read up on that and

1541
01:05:22.868 --> 01:05:25.762
eventually tomorrow. I don't know what it's going to be, but

1542
01:05:25.816 --> 01:05:28.738
I'm going to be into whatever, like the rotor system

1543
01:05:28.824 --> 01:05:31.730
or the engines or what's the fuel control

1544
01:05:31.800 --> 01:05:34.642
system doing. That'll be tomorrow. And then the next day will be this one.

1545
01:05:34.696 --> 01:05:37.606
And eventually I'm going to come back around to that hydraulic system, because that's what being

1546
01:05:37.628 --> 01:05:40.546
a pilot is. It's just constantly being in the books

1547
01:05:40.578 --> 01:05:43.334
and reminding yourself and just being humble about

1548
01:05:43.372 --> 01:05:46.054
it and being okay with the fact that you do

1549
01:05:46.092 --> 01:05:48.866
forget things. And you do need to remind

1550
01:05:48.898 --> 01:05:50.858
yourself yeah, 100%. And get back into it.

1551
01:05:50.864 --> 01:05:51.034
Right.

1552
01:05:51.072 --> 01:05:53.740
So I think that for me,

1553
01:05:54.190 --> 01:05:56.986
the true skill came in identifying what's going to be

1554
01:05:57.008 --> 01:05:58.570
next on the wheel before I get there.

1555
01:05:58.640 --> 01:05:59.306
Yeah.

1556
01:05:59.488 --> 01:06:02.318
It's, uh, been a while since I've looked at the hydraulic system. Maybe I better you

1557
01:06:02.324 --> 01:06:03.562
get that feeling.

1558
01:06:03.626 --> 01:06:06.606
I was talking to someone about that recently as well. You get

1559
01:06:06.628 --> 01:06:09.454
that little spidey sense almost of like, oh,

1560
01:06:09.652 --> 01:06:12.558
for me, it was not quite a sense of anxiety, but, oh,

1561
01:06:12.644 --> 01:06:15.422
I'm really not as familiar as I should be with this

1562
01:06:15.476 --> 01:06:18.434
emergency procedure or whatever. And that's your sign to go

1563
01:06:18.472 --> 01:06:21.426
and review that. The best way to eliminate that worry is to go and

1564
01:06:21.448 --> 01:06:22.082
relearn it.

1565
01:06:22.136 --> 01:06:25.038
So if I told you you're going to go back to Iraq tomorrow, and I'm

1566
01:06:25.054 --> 01:06:27.854
going to give you an ATO tomorrow, what are you going to be studying tonight?

1567
01:06:27.902 --> 01:06:30.530
Oh, my gosh, it's been forever since you read, which is an air tasking.

1568
01:06:30.610 --> 01:06:33.366
Yeah, I'd have to go back and relearn how to read an

1569
01:06:33.388 --> 01:06:33.762
ATO.

1570
01:06:33.826 --> 01:06:34.342
Exactly.

1571
01:06:34.476 --> 01:06:34.870
Yeah.

1572
01:06:34.940 --> 01:06:37.750
So the important thing and I think this is where the upgrade process

1573
01:06:37.820 --> 01:06:40.658
comes in for aircraft commanders is to be

1574
01:06:40.684 --> 01:06:43.626
able to identify what is the priority to focus on at

1575
01:06:43.648 --> 01:06:46.554
this time. And that translates right through to students as well.

1576
01:06:46.592 --> 01:06:49.478
I mean, I heard a lot of your podcast, and I always loved

1577
01:06:49.494 --> 01:06:52.366
hearing the instructors talk about different techniques and

1578
01:06:52.388 --> 01:06:55.358
stuff for teaching students. And, uh, I think the last one I

1579
01:06:55.364 --> 01:06:57.758
was listening to, they were talking about phase three

1580
01:06:57.844 --> 01:07:00.814
fighter, where their student is taking something

1581
01:07:00.852 --> 01:07:03.746
that they've done, each of these. But it's like you could be thrown any one

1582
01:07:03.768 --> 01:07:06.450
of them on this mission. And that's when we get into

1583
01:07:06.520 --> 01:07:09.234
truly training thinking pilots. I think it's not

1584
01:07:09.272 --> 01:07:12.094
until phase three, but mostly

1585
01:07:12.142 --> 01:07:14.994
phase four, that it's truly like, all right,

1586
01:07:15.032 --> 01:07:15.794
what are you going to do?

1587
01:07:15.832 --> 01:07:18.370
And, uh, when you say phase four, like, on your operational aircraft?

1588
01:07:18.450 --> 01:07:19.800
Exactly. Yeah.

1589
01:07:20.650 --> 01:07:23.190
You're getting out into the real world. You're out of the box,

1590
01:07:23.260 --> 01:07:25.542
and there's a lot more variables out there.

1591
01:07:25.596 --> 01:07:28.262
Exactly. And so the solid, strong

1592
01:07:28.316 --> 01:07:31.206
aircraft commanders are the ones that can identify what's

1593
01:07:31.238 --> 01:07:34.058
coming and prepare for it and prioritize important

1594
01:07:34.144 --> 01:07:34.394
stuff.

1595
01:07:34.432 --> 01:07:35.034
Right. Yeah.

1596
01:07:35.072 --> 01:07:38.026
And that kind of rolls into my next question for you, which is, what do you

1597
01:07:38.048 --> 01:07:39.658
think makes a good pilot?

1598
01:07:39.834 --> 01:07:42.814
I love this question, and I hear all of your

1599
01:07:42.852 --> 01:07:45.822
guests talk about it, and I think

1600
01:07:45.956 --> 01:07:47.840
everybody's pretty much on the same

1601
01:07:48.290 --> 01:07:51.146
wavelength. And for me, I've heard it said

1602
01:07:51.188 --> 01:07:53.954
in different ways on the podcast, but, um, for me,

1603
01:07:53.992 --> 01:07:56.686
it's two things. It's stress management

1604
01:07:56.798 --> 01:07:57.910
and work ethic.

1605
01:07:57.910 --> 01:08:00.370
M. If you're a strong

1606
01:08:00.440 --> 01:08:01.266
worker, you.

1607
01:08:01.288 --> 01:08:04.194
Can overcome the stress management part. I give the example of

1608
01:08:04.232 --> 01:08:06.194
you're going to go into an overhead break, say.

1609
01:08:06.232 --> 01:08:08.258
In Moose Jaw, and you enter the.

1610
01:08:08.264 --> 01:08:10.694
Overhead break and you crank and you turn and you're like, oh, is it

1611
01:08:10.732 --> 01:08:13.606
62 or 63? And now

1612
01:08:13.628 --> 01:08:16.518
you're doubting yourself, but the

1613
01:08:16.524 --> 01:08:19.506
plane is still going 200 knots, or whatever it is.

1614
01:08:19.548 --> 01:08:22.026
And what he means there is 60 degrees bank and

1615
01:08:22.128 --> 01:08:24.106
2G or three G. Yeah.

1616
01:08:24.208 --> 01:08:27.002
So now you're stressed, and your decision making

1617
01:08:27.056 --> 01:08:30.014
is getting smaller because the aircraft is so much closer to your next

1618
01:08:30.052 --> 01:08:32.734
step on your final turn or gear down or

1619
01:08:32.772 --> 01:08:35.646
flaps or whatever it might be, but your head is

1620
01:08:35.668 --> 01:08:38.266
still back on the last decision.

1621
01:08:38.378 --> 01:08:41.358
Right. But with good, hard work,

1622
01:08:41.444 --> 01:08:44.354
you can chairfly that. For some people, they might chair fly it five

1623
01:08:44.392 --> 01:08:47.202
times. For other people, maybe they have to chair fly it 20

1624
01:08:47.256 --> 01:08:49.586
times, but you cannot get in that

1625
01:08:49.608 --> 01:08:52.386
airplane and doubt yourself on that stuff.

1626
01:08:52.568 --> 01:08:55.350
The other thing, I think that it's really important, not so much for students,

1627
01:08:55.420 --> 01:08:58.326
but I think for instructors, the most important thing that

1628
01:08:58.348 --> 01:09:00.950
you can give students is confidence.

1629
01:09:01.530 --> 01:09:04.374
Students need to know that they are

1630
01:09:04.412 --> 01:09:07.286
doing the work, the correct work, because as instructors, it's important for us

1631
01:09:07.308 --> 01:09:10.278
to guide students to focus their energy in the right place, because they

1632
01:09:10.284 --> 01:09:13.178
haven't learned the prioritization bit yet. Right. And

1633
01:09:13.184 --> 01:09:16.166
that's why it's easy in training. It's like, oh, LP One, this is what you're

1634
01:09:16.198 --> 01:09:18.822
doing, right? LP five, you're going to do circuits,

1635
01:09:18.886 --> 01:09:21.674
whatever. Um, so that works really well.

1636
01:09:21.792 --> 01:09:24.766
But as instructors, if we can focus them

1637
01:09:24.788 --> 01:09:27.514
on working on the right things and then just give them confidence,

1638
01:09:27.642 --> 01:09:30.606
sometimes it's good, bad, good. It might be, hey, you showed up in time today

1639
01:09:30.628 --> 01:09:33.566
for your brief. Now let's debrief your flight. And it's like, oh,

1640
01:09:33.588 --> 01:09:36.274
and by the way, your shoes are really shiny. That's really great.

1641
01:09:36.472 --> 01:09:39.058
You got to leave them with something. Because these students are working

1642
01:09:39.144 --> 01:09:42.066
hard, right. And sometimes they're not

1643
01:09:42.088 --> 01:09:44.674
getting the results that they're hoping for, which can be very

1644
01:09:44.712 --> 01:09:47.586
discouraging, but giving them the confidence that it's

1645
01:09:47.618 --> 01:09:50.486
okay to make mistakes and work on this

1646
01:09:50.508 --> 01:09:53.378
and bounce back. And I think the strongest lesson for any pilot

1647
01:09:53.474 --> 01:09:56.306
is that bouncing back from failure is the biggest

1648
01:09:56.338 --> 01:09:57.430
lesson that you're going to get.

1649
01:09:57.500 --> 01:09:59.400
Yeah, it's super hard, too.

1650
01:10:00.190 --> 01:10:03.014
It's really hard when it can be emotional.

1651
01:10:03.142 --> 01:10:06.074
If you fail or you make a big mistake, it can

1652
01:10:06.112 --> 01:10:08.606
cause a lot of emotions that you don't want to feel to come

1653
01:10:08.628 --> 01:10:11.454
up. Some people cry, some

1654
01:10:11.492 --> 01:10:14.010
people feel overwhelmed or angry

1655
01:10:14.090 --> 01:10:16.382
or whatever, and you got to learn to deal with that.

1656
01:10:16.436 --> 01:10:17.134
Yeah.

1657
01:10:17.332 --> 01:10:19.834
And it's a huge growth

1658
01:10:19.882 --> 01:10:22.846
opportunity, you know what I mean? Because that stuff happens to you in

1659
01:10:22.868 --> 01:10:23.610
combat, mhm.

1660
01:10:23.610 --> 01:10:24.254
Do you know what I mean?

1661
01:10:24.292 --> 01:10:27.186
Like, oh, we got shot here. Am I just going to roll over in

1662
01:10:27.208 --> 01:10:29.906
the trench? No, um, you don't have a choice. You have

1663
01:10:29.928 --> 01:10:32.340
to keep moving forward, keep doing the work,

1664
01:10:32.790 --> 01:10:35.140
keep fighting, keep flying that aircraft. Right?

1665
01:10:35.510 --> 01:10:35.874
Yeah.

1666
01:10:35.912 --> 01:10:38.678
And I think that if students and anybody

1667
01:10:38.764 --> 01:10:41.158
really just has the work ethic and

1668
01:10:41.244 --> 01:10:43.830
understands their stress levels and learns how to manage

1669
01:10:43.900 --> 01:10:46.806
them, however that works best for them, whether it be chair

1670
01:10:46.838 --> 01:10:49.766
flying or going to the gym or whatever, and then for instructors

1671
01:10:49.798 --> 01:10:52.726
to give confidence, that's just really, uh, helpful

1672
01:10:52.758 --> 01:10:53.594
for students.

1673
01:10:53.792 --> 01:10:56.234
Love that question, mhm. That's a great

1674
01:10:56.272 --> 01:10:56.860
answer.

1675
01:10:57.870 --> 01:11:00.534
So we're down to our last question. This is my favorite

1676
01:11:00.582 --> 01:11:03.466
question. If somebody's listening and they're

1677
01:11:03.498 --> 01:11:06.074
starting to think, hey, I really want to join,

1678
01:11:06.202 --> 01:11:09.066
I'd love to fly with the RCAF. Or maybe they've

1679
01:11:09.098 --> 01:11:11.854
just joined and they're listening to this and they're getting excited about their flight

1680
01:11:11.902 --> 01:11:14.594
training, what advice would you give to that new

1681
01:11:14.632 --> 01:11:15.410
pilot?

1682
01:11:15.990 --> 01:11:18.900
All right, so another great question. I love

1683
01:11:19.510 --> 01:11:22.386
definitely the best advice that I could

1684
01:11:22.408 --> 01:11:25.298
give for anybody. First of all, if you're thinking about joining, come down and

1685
01:11:25.304 --> 01:11:28.262
see me at the Halifax Recruiting Center and we'll, uh, definitely

1686
01:11:28.316 --> 01:11:31.158
get you on the path for enrollment. Certainly a

1687
01:11:31.164 --> 01:11:34.118
career in the forces is the best thing that's ever happened to me in

1688
01:11:34.124 --> 01:11:37.094
my like, it's been amazing. The people that I've met, the

1689
01:11:37.132 --> 01:11:39.960
friendships, the experiences, the stories, the

1690
01:11:40.410 --> 01:11:43.210
know, the job security, you know, everything

1691
01:11:43.280 --> 01:11:46.074
to pension, you know what I mean? There's just so many

1692
01:11:46.112 --> 01:11:48.986
benefits of a military career, period. I

1693
01:11:49.008 --> 01:11:51.754
mean, pilot for sure worked out really well for me.

1694
01:11:51.872 --> 01:11:54.606
I already discussed it wasn't my first choice. I would have been happy in the

1695
01:11:54.628 --> 01:11:57.610
infantry, but it's awesome. So once, um,

1696
01:11:57.812 --> 01:12:00.718
you get in that door, the best advice that I could give is just

1697
01:12:00.804 --> 01:12:03.090
work hard, don't quit.

1698
01:12:04.230 --> 01:12:07.106
You will get bumps. They will come. It will be

1699
01:12:07.128 --> 01:12:10.034
stressful, it can be emotional. But you just

1700
01:12:10.072 --> 01:12:12.862
need to either just step back, have a coffee,

1701
01:12:12.926 --> 01:12:15.794
and then get back in the books, or go for a run and find

1702
01:12:15.832 --> 01:12:18.614
out whatever works for you to manage that stress and just keep

1703
01:12:18.652 --> 01:12:21.638
working at it. Keep working at it. The dream is a dream. It is

1704
01:12:21.644 --> 01:12:24.614
a dream job. We're very lucky to be

1705
01:12:24.652 --> 01:12:27.650
able to call ourselves Air Force Pilots.

1706
01:12:27.810 --> 01:12:30.794
It's quite an honor and it's definitely worth all the

1707
01:12:30.832 --> 01:12:31.546
hard work.

1708
01:12:31.648 --> 01:12:32.330
100%.

1709
01:12:32.400 --> 01:12:35.306
But it is a lot of hard work. Some people get into it

1710
01:12:35.328 --> 01:12:38.234
and they're shocked about how much hard

1711
01:12:38.272 --> 01:12:40.880
work it is, but it always gets better,

1712
01:12:41.490 --> 01:12:44.026
especially as you get experienced. I mean, the workload becomes

1713
01:12:44.058 --> 01:12:46.702
less. Yeah, for sure. The first, like five

1714
01:12:46.756 --> 01:12:48.714
years are tough.

1715
01:12:48.842 --> 01:12:51.790
You're learning so much, so fast, and

1716
01:12:51.860 --> 01:12:54.534
it requires so much review to make it start sticking.

1717
01:12:54.682 --> 01:12:57.474
And at first it. Feels like it's never going to stick, but it does.

1718
01:12:57.592 --> 01:13:00.354
Eventually, you do enough reviews and you still

1719
01:13:00.392 --> 01:13:02.994
always are, uh, reviewing, but it's much more

1720
01:13:03.032 --> 01:13:05.906
familiar and it'll start to retain and like you

1721
01:13:05.928 --> 01:13:07.150
said, the workload decreases.

1722
01:13:07.230 --> 01:13:07.522
Yeah.

1723
01:13:07.576 --> 01:13:10.198
Then you have more fun. The other thing I will say is have fun.

1724
01:13:10.284 --> 01:13:11.206
Yeah. You know what mean?

1725
01:13:11.228 --> 01:13:14.134
Like and especially for instructors and supervisors out there,

1726
01:13:14.172 --> 01:13:16.706
too. I mean, it's really important to have an environment

1727
01:13:16.898 --> 01:13:19.846
for your students or your new pilots on Squadron

1728
01:13:19.878 --> 01:13:22.714
or whatever to actually have fun. It should

1729
01:13:22.752 --> 01:13:25.430
be know, it's easy because the workload

1730
01:13:25.510 --> 01:13:28.314
is very demanding on Air Force pilots because there's so few of

1731
01:13:28.352 --> 01:13:31.306
us and we're still trying to do the same missions that

1732
01:13:31.328 --> 01:13:34.126
Canada asks us to do. And we all do it, and we

1733
01:13:34.148 --> 01:13:37.006
all put a smile on our face, but it is really easy to

1734
01:13:37.028 --> 01:13:39.966
forget how cool the job is. Yeah, totally. For me,

1735
01:13:39.988 --> 01:13:42.398
it was always Family Day. Like, I go at Family Day and fly a

1736
01:13:42.404 --> 01:13:45.198
civilian, they are going to just be screaming in the back of the

1737
01:13:45.204 --> 01:13:48.114
helicopter and loving it. And you're like, oh, yeah,

1738
01:13:48.152 --> 01:13:51.106
my job is cool because the reality is, every day I go

1739
01:13:51.128 --> 01:13:53.954
to work, I work with pilots that do the exact same thing. So that the cool

1740
01:13:53.992 --> 01:13:56.934
factor wears off. But that's right. It's important, I think, to just step back

1741
01:13:56.972 --> 01:13:59.702
and realize that you have an opportunity to do amazing

1742
01:13:59.756 --> 01:14:02.386
things for your country and to support the ground

1743
01:14:02.418 --> 01:14:05.362
troops or whatever force your airframe is supporting.

1744
01:14:05.506 --> 01:14:08.374
They're very grateful to have that support because air

1745
01:14:08.412 --> 01:14:11.386
power brings a lot to the fight and we get to be the ones

1746
01:14:11.408 --> 01:14:13.590
to do that and wear the flight suits and that's.

1747
01:14:13.670 --> 01:14:14.700
Yeah. Yeah.

1748
01:14:15.390 --> 01:14:18.122
Well, that does it for my questions. I want to thank you

1749
01:14:18.176 --> 01:14:20.746
so much for I didn't mention this, but we're actually at

1750
01:14:20.768 --> 01:14:23.730
Greg's house. My family and I are out,

1751
01:14:23.730 --> 01:14:26.686
uh, traveling the East Coast, so we decided to make

1752
01:14:26.708 --> 01:14:29.374
use of the opportunity and record this live together.

1753
01:14:29.492 --> 01:14:32.446
So thank you for having me here. Thanks for taking the time out

1754
01:14:32.468 --> 01:14:35.342
of your day to chat, and thank you for sharing

1755
01:14:35.406 --> 01:14:38.130
your experiences in Afghanistan. It's been really,

1756
01:14:38.200 --> 01:14:40.482
really a neat thing to learn about, so thank you.

1757
01:14:40.536 --> 01:14:41.554
Oh, thanks for having me.

1758
01:14:41.592 --> 01:14:42.226
Yeah.

1759
01:14:42.408 --> 01:14:45.314
Okay. That's going to wrap things up for our chat with Greg about

1760
01:14:45.352 --> 01:14:48.214
his adventures in Afghanistan. On May

1761
01:14:48.252 --> 01:14:51.158
17, 2020, snowbird Eleven suffered a

1762
01:14:51.164 --> 01:14:53.906
bird strike on takeoff resulting in an ejection.

1763
01:14:54.018 --> 01:14:56.770
One of the two crew members on board did not survive.

1764
01:14:56.930 --> 01:14:59.606
For our next episode, we'll be sitting down with the

1765
01:14:59.628 --> 01:15:02.614
surviving member, Rich McDougall, to talk about his experiences

1766
01:15:02.662 --> 01:15:05.578
being in the snowbirds as well as that day. Do you

1767
01:15:05.584 --> 01:15:08.358
have any questions or comments about anything you've heard in this episode

1768
01:15:08.454 --> 01:15:11.338
or would you or someone you know make a great guest? You can reach out

1769
01:15:11.344 --> 01:15:11.790
to us at, uh,

1770
01:15:11.824 --> 01:15:14.734
thepilotprojectpodcast@gmail.com, or

1771
01:15:14.772 --> 01:15:17.742
on all social media at at podpilot project.

1772
01:15:17.876 --> 01:15:20.814
It's been another great month for us, and we'd just like to thank you so much

1773
01:15:20.852 --> 01:15:23.774
for that and to ask you for your help with the big three that's like

1774
01:15:23.812 --> 01:15:26.546
and follow us on social media. Share with your friends

1775
01:15:26.648 --> 01:15:29.470
and follow and rate us five stars wherever you get your podcasts.

1776
01:15:29.470 --> 01:15:32.466
Uh, that's all for now. Thanks for listening. Keep

1777
01:15:32.488 --> 01:15:34.580
the blue side up. See you.

1778
01:15:36.230 --> 01:15:39.106
Engineer shut down all four. Shutting down all

1779
01:15:39.128 --> 01:15:39.710
four engines.