Air Force Brat

I sometimes get emails from my father, that have been forwarded to huge numbers of former military folk before it gets to him, and then he sends it along to his mailing list. Depending on which way the wind is blowing, that may include his kids, some of whom are Democrats. He is a life long Republican and cannot have a conversation with us Dems without getting pissed off. My brother frequently has to inform him to check "snopes" before believing everything he is being told by his buddies. Snopes is a website that exposes hoaxes, and confirms truthful stories.

I got an email today from someone who has an email address that I've seen before, on my dad's Military mailing list. It was really long, but "PBam59361", was glad to be able forward a letter, supposedly, from the Commanding Officer of the USS Iwi Jima, now in The Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina:

--- PBam59361@---- wrote:> From:Fernhaven@---> Date: Thu, 15 Sep 2005 22:49:32 EDT> Subject: Fwd: Fw: From the USS Iwo Jima> Subject: Fw: From the USS Iwo Jima> From: "Martin" n1jma@---> Date: Thu, 15 Sep 2005 20:27:25 -0400 (EDT) > Subject: Fw: From the USS Iwo Jima:
This is written by Captain Richard S. Callas. Who is the Commanding Officer of the USS Iwo Jima (LHD 7) He is a native of Wellesley and Newton, Massachusetts, Capt. Callas graduated from Boston College and was commissioned through Officer Candidate School in 1979
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Hello All,
Since I took command of the USS IWO JIMA over a year ago, I felt as though I had control of the destiny of the ship. I thought I lost it today, the first time ever, and we were merely reacting to events rather than controlling them.
Within the first 24 hours after arriving pierside in New Orleans, the IWO JIMA has become many things. We are one of the few full service airports in the area and have been operating aircraft on and off our deck for almost 15 hours each day.
We are one of the only air conditioned facilities within a ten mile radius and though we have had problems making water from the polluted Mississippi, and we are the only hot shower within miles. All day long, we have been accommodating local policemen, firemen, statetroopers, national guard, 82nd Airborne division personnel with hot showers & hot food. I met an ambulance team from Minnesota who just drove straight to New Orleans when they heard of the tragedy and have been supporting hospitals free of chargefor the last week. They hadn't had a hot meal in over a week and were grateful to have the opportunity to have lunch onboard.
The Deputy Commander of the RI National Guard reported to me he had guardsmen who were whipped, yet after a hot shower and an IWO JIMA breakfast, theywere ready to hit the patrols again. Rarely have I seen so many smiling, happy faces than on these people. After two weeks in the trenches sleeping on concrete floors, no shower, and eating MREs, good ship IWO JIMA has been a Godsend to them.
I had an opportunity to talk to the Directorof Homeland Security for a few minutes in my cabin. I asked him if there was any- thing more I could do for him, he asked if he could get a shower. I was glad to turn over my cabin to him. The local FEMA coordinator, his logistics and security teams were on my quarter- deck this afternoon asking permission to set up their command center on the pier next to the ship. While they had sophisticated command and control equipment, they had no place to berth their 250 FEMA members. We were glad to give them a home. Contrary to the press, all the FEMA people I met had been on station since last Sunday (before the Hurricane hit), never left the area, and have been in the field ever since.
The command duty officer was told a state trooper had driven 80 miles to get to the ship. And he said that the word was out: Come to IWO JIMA. So we expect that the flood gates will open on us.
Early this morning, we received our first medical emergency. An elderly woman with stroke-like symptoms. And through-out the day we received about a dozen medical emergencies. The most serious was an elderly man who had been stabbed in the chest and was bleeding to death. The doctors performed surgery on him and saved his life. As I toured the hospital ward, I found all our charges were elderly & disadvantaged individuals. As with Hotel IWO JIMA, we expect to see many more casualties tomorrow.
Our curse appears to be our flight deck and our extraordinary command and control capabilities. Our challenge today was the tidal wave of Flag and General Officers that flooded onboard, 17 total, virtually all without notice. I couldn't believe there were so many involved in this effort and they all wanted to come here. They poured onto the flight deck in one helicopter after another in order to meet with General Honore, the JointTask Force Commander. The majority showed up around the same time and all wanted to leave at the same time, making it a nightmare for our flight deck team to control and coordinate flights on and off the ship for all these admirals & generals while supporting the humanitarian effort. I spent most of the day running around the ship getting these people off and on helicopters and in and out of the meetings and command spaces. While it was like herding cats, the ship performed superbly and "flexed"to meet the challenge.
Regretfully, we expect nearly 20 admirals and generals onboard tomorrow for more meetings. To add to the challenges, virtually all of these commands are sending liaison staffs to help coordinate issues, and already a number of admirals and generals have "permanently" embarked. The Inn is full.
I talked to one of the FEMA team members who had also worked the disaster relief for 9/11. I asked him how much more difficult was the Katrina relief effort compared to 9/11. He said it was without measure, thousand of times worse than 9/11. He couldn't articulate the magnitude of the destruction. Despite all the challenges, I think we regained control by the end of the day. We are forearmed for tomorrow's onslaught.
At our evening Dept Head meeting, I asked all my principals to tell me what the stupidest thing they heard or saw today. The list was enormous. The most absurd item was when my Tactical Action Officer, who runs our 24 hour command center (CIC) got a phone call from the Director of the New Orleans Zoo. Apparently, there was a large fire near the zoo. It was so intense, the fire department had to abandon the cause, while military helos were heavily engaged in scooping up giant buckets ofwater and dumping in on the blaze in an effort to put it out. The director complained to us the noise from the helos was disturbing the animals, especially the elephants, which he was most concerned about, and asked us to stop. The TAO thanked him for his interest in national defense.
It is inspiring to meet and talk to such a huge number of individuals who are doing the Lord's work to recover this city. They have had little sleep, little food, no showers, working 16-18 hours a day, and in some cases no pay, and they are thanking ME for a hotmeal!
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Me again; I replied to the whole lot of them with a simple question:

You did not mention any meals or showers for the people of the gulf coast. Are they getting those on the Cruise Ships? - Airforce Brat

Which didn't get an answer yet, except , the "Who the hell are you and why are you writing to me?" sort.

Who is PBam59361? Do I really care? No.

Some people sure do get grumpy when you just ask a simple question!
Sounded like quite an exciting time on the military ship, USS Iwo Jima, what with all the showers and food and big wigs. I'm as patriotic as the next person, I just thought it seemed odd that the letter didn't mention any accomodations, except for the few in the hospital ward, for the huge numbers of desperate people who have been trapped in the city for days.