MEDIA CONTEST: No more trips outside the wire Published Dec. 26, 2006 By 2006 Media Contest Feature Entry 10 ACC MEDIA CONTEST -- Mission accomplished. Those are words that not many units in Iraq can say and mean. But for the Airmen of the 732nd Expeditionary Civil Engineering Squadron, Detachment 10, it is a fact. Their mission - to provide civil engineering support to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division area of operations - has come to an end at Kirkuk - and for the 58 members of Det. 10, it is past the time to go home. "We have been here for a long time, and have seen the other AEF (aerospace expeditionary force) rotations come and go - now it's our turn," said Master Sgt. Ken Dunbar, Det. 10 superintendent of operations and acting first sergeant. "It's been very strenuous, and sometimes extremely dangerous. I'm ready to get home, see my family and unwind!" The Airmen in Det. 10 frequently leave the safety of Kirkuk to maintain and repair four main convoy routes, two alternate convoy routes and seven forward-operating bases, or FOBs, in an area covering about 10,000 square miles. IED crater repair When an improvised explosive device, or IED, detonates on one of the roads coalition forces travel, it is Det. 10's job to go out and repair it. But this in itself can be extremely hazardous. "If there is an IED crater in the road, this gives insurgents the chance to put another in there, and this one would be almost impossible to see," Sergeant Dunbar said. "Not to mention the fact that we know we become the target when we go out. You have the Army in their ACUs, and we're in DCUs - and it's the ones in DCUs who are repairing the roads. Add to that we're going really slowly, usually only 25 miles per hour or slower, and leave and come back by the same route." In fact, during their first mission to Ft. McHenry on Jan. 27, Det. 10's lead gun truck was hit point-blank by a roadside IED. Senior Master Sgt. Sidney McNeil, Det. 10 chief of operations, was in the vehicle at the time. "We were just driving along conducting our first mission, when we heard an explosion," Sergeant McNeil said. "I felt the explosion in my feet, and saw flames outside the window. It happened so fast that the driver and I just looked at each other for a few seconds after it happened, then I said 'oh (expletive),' and we got out of there!" Sergeant Dunbar and Senior Airman Keith Walters were in the second truck and saw it all. "Right after it happened, Dunbar turned to me and we both said, 'Did you SEE that?!' Then we got the (heck) out of there!" Airman Walters said. "When we went through training in Colorado for this deployment, it was just ground burst simulators - nothing really big. But when an actual IED went off during that first convoy, there was a huge 'BOOM' that wasn't anything like training. But it was remarkable that after it actually happened, all the training just kicked in and we went to work." The team assessed the damage, kept accountability of the team and got out of the "kill zone" quickly to get back to base. Two days later they went back out and completed their orientation with the Army as well as a large crater repair mission. Now almost eight months later, Det. 10 has finished its last crater repair. And according to Sergeant McNeil, the detachment has been very lucky. "We've been blessed that nobody in the team has been seriously injured," he said. "There have been some close calls though, and we have lost some of our Army brethren on missions. We've been to each one of the ramp ceremonies, and have said our own good-byes to our friends and partners." FOB support In addition to going outside the wire for crater repair, the Airmen of Det. 10 were also responsible for numerous maintenance, repairs and construction missions at seven FOBs in the area. Their first mission was to renovate and construct a complex underground facility to support the bed down of Task Force Phantom, a 101st division long-range reconnaissance mission, in February. This proved to be a challenge, especially because of flooding caused by heavy rains and major structural faults in the facility. "We not only had to deal with all the water, but also the fact that the facilities that Phantom wanted to use just weren't able to be used," Sergeant Dunbar. So the team salvaged materials, found another abandoned facility and completed a full-scale structural, electrical and heating, ventilation and air condition renovation in 30 days, transforming Phantom from a single waterlogged tent into a 4,000 square feet facility for operations. Other missions during their tour included transforming an Army annex on Kirkuk into the Bastogne Tactical Operations Center, or TOC; closing Patrol Base Barbarian in Kirkuk, which required the demolition and removal of 400 feet of Hesco barriers and concrete T-walls, and disposing of the sand in the Hescos fill site to restore it to prewar conditions; transforming the Kirkuk Ivory Combat Clinic from dilapidated tents into a 3,800 square-foot hardened wooden structure that turned the facility into a modern facility with 30 percent more usable space and dual-voltage capability; as well as numerous projects on the FOBs such as electrical renovation, constructing septic systems and firing ranges, and building containerized housing units, or CHUs, for the Army at numerous locations around the AOR. "Without us, hundreds of soldiers would probably still be living in tents, and showering in them too," Sergeant Dunbar said. "Our sole purpose is to the support the Army. We are Air Force Airmen assigned under tactical control of the 101st Airborne." Sensitive Site Exploitation Another vital mission that Det. 10 conducts is called "sensitive site exploitation," where the Airmen either confirm or deny the existence of buried chemical weapons. This is based on information they have received from agents in the Air Force Office of Special Investigations and past chemical weapons inspectors. It took intense planning with AFOSI, the Kirkuk Explosive Ordnance Disposal Flight and other agencies to unearth, secure and transport possible chemical weapons storage containers. These missions, led by the 1st BCT, often came with a degree of risk for all those involved. Airmen and soldiers frequently donned full chemical-protection gear for long periods of time to ensure their safety. Since their arrival in January, Airmen in Det. 10 have completed 25 improvised explosive devices crater repair missions, repairing and marking more than 140 craters; conducted two chemical exploration digs with a total of 12 excavations; completed several oil pipeline support missions; and went on numerous runs to the FOBs for repair, maintenance and building missions such as FOB Bernstein, Andrea, McHenry and FOB Warrior at Kirkuk. According to Maj. Chris Fuller, detachment commander, Det. 10 is the first and last Air Force Civil Engineering unit doing these types of combat operations outside the wire. "We have extended well beyond our traditional CE mission, and delivered it well," he said. As Det. 10 prepares to head home, their missions with the Army have strengthened all the Airmen who have had the opportunity to take part in this small slice of history. "We've been running ever since our feet hit the ground in January," Sergeant Dunbar said. "We can now stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our Army brothers and sisters and say, 'Yeah, we did that too.'"