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U.S.
Army
Major
Darin
Gaub
learned
a lot on
his
first
deployment
to
Afghanistan
from
2003 to
2004.
But it
was
nothing
compared
to his
second
deployment.
During
his
first
deployment,
Gaub
served
as an
aviation
task
force
intelligence
officer.
He
provided
air
crews
with
intelligence
briefings
for
their
daily
missions,
as well
as
maintained
accountability
for
headquarters
staff
and
equipment.
“It
wasn't a
glorious
job, but
it
needed
to be
done,”
he said.
“That
[deployment]
told me
that I
didn't
want to
go back
to
Afghanistan
and be
in a
staff
position,
that I
wanted
to go
back and
be in a
leadership
position,
and go
out into
the
country
more.”
He got
what he
asked
for in
his
second
deployment.
“That
one was
a lot
more
eventful,”
Gaub
said.
“It was
more
active,
and more
hazardous.
And more
rewarding.”
When
Gaub was
redeployed
to
Afghanistan
in 2006
he went
as the
commander
of a
Blackhawk
company.
He had
gone to
flight
school
in 1998,
the same
year he
was
commissioned
as an
officer.
During
the
first
half of
the
year-long
deployment
he flew
almost
eight
hours a
day.
The 10
Blackhawk
helicopters
in his
company
were
flown on
missions
of all
kinds.
They did
everything
from
accompanying
Special
Forces
on
assault |
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missions, to
transporting the Commanding
General of the 10th Mountain
Division. |
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However,
one of
the most
intense
missions
of the
whole
deployment,
Gaub
said,
was a
battlefield
circulation
mission
Gaub
piloted
over the
northeast
of the
country.
Three
Blackhawks
and one
Apache
helicopter
were
involved
in the
mission
to fly
some
soldiers
over the
battlefields
where a
major
offensive
was to
be
started.
Each
Blackhawk
had
eight to
10
passengers
aboard,
Gaub
said.
As the
four
helicopters
come
down a
valley,
“we got
caught
in a
complex
ambush,”
Gaub
said.
–They
were hit
with
rocket
propelled
grenades
(RPGs),
and
machine
gun fire
of all
different
types.
“It
created
some
drama,”
he said.
While
the
first
aircraft
flew
through
the
ambush
unscathed,
the
second
had some
damage
to its
rotor
blades.
When
Gaub,
who was
piloting
one of
the
Blackhawks,
flew
through
the
ambush a
RPG
exploded
right
above
them,
going
right
through
the
rotor
system,
and
knocking
the
helicopter
onto its
side, he
said.
Said
Gaub, “I
had one
crew
chief
saying
‘All I
can see
is
machine
gun
fire,'”
as he
looked
straight
down at
the
ground
below,
“and the
other
one
saying
‘All I
can see
is sky.”
Somehow,
Gaub
managed
to right
the
helicopter,
and
escape
the rest
of the
ambush
to a
tiny
base and
air
strip in
Jalalabad,
where
they
could
assess
the
damage
to the
Blackhawk.
In
Jalalabad
they
decided
that the
helicopter
could be
flown
back to
their
home
base in
Bagram.
However
the
helicopter
was
vibrating,
and
“acting
kind of
funny,”
Gaub
said.
For
safety
he flew
slowly
and no
more
than 50
feet off
the
ground,--in
case the
engine
gave
out.
“It's in
the back
of your
mind,”
he said.
“You're
thinking
‘don't
break,
don't
fall
apart on
me.' But
you
can't do
anything
about
it, so
you keep
flying.”
When
they
arrived
at
Bagram
he was
able to
land,
and got
the
engines
to idle.
“And
that's
when
they
shut
off,” he
said.
“And
they're
not
supposed
to do
that...My
co-pilot
and I
just
kind of
looked
at each
other
and we
were
like
‘Well.
That was
well-timed.'”
After
the
fact,
everyone
involved
was
pretty
shaken
up, Gaub
said,
but he
still
went out
and flew
again
the next
day.
“You
don't
have
time to
stop and
think
about
it,” he
said.
“You
just
keep
going.”
Gaub
earned a
Bronze
Star for
his 2003
to 2004
deployment,
and an
Air
Medal
and
Combat
Action
Badge
for the
2006 to
2007
deployment. |
