EOD Airmen Serve as Anaconda's Explosive Countermeasure

Photo By Staff Sgt. Jerome Bishop | The bomb suit issued to EOD technicians adds additional protection against larger explosives or from situations that won't allow for other clearance methods.  

BALAD, IRAQ

08.16.2005

Courtesy Story

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By Spc. Jerome Bishop
1st COSCOM Public Affairs

LOGISTICS SUPPORT AREA ANACONDA, Balad, Iraq -- Small arms attacks, indirect-fire attacks, and improvised explosive devices have been a danger to Coalition forces since the beginning days of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

In response, Explosive Ordnance Disposal teams, like Logistics Support Area Anaconda's Air Force 332nd Expeditionary Civil Engineering Squadron, EOD Flight have been making the roads safe and keeping unexploded ordinance at bay.

"We respond to any request for any assistance with any kind of explosive device, improvised or not," said Air Force Master Sgt. Michael Bernard, 332nd EOD operations noncommissioned officer in-charge. "We also have teams that support forward operating bases such as FOB O'Ryan, FOB Normandy, FOB Warhorse, FOB Caldwell, and FOB Cobra."

Since IEDs are the highest risk to Coalition forces, a lot of focus has been placed on pacifying and destroying these weapons.

"IED's are our biggest threat out here," said Senior Airman Eric Charlton, EOD technician, 332nd EOD. "Basically if it looks like an IED, we get called up. We've responded to things like stacks of melons on the side of the road to dead animals. IEDs can be concealed in or as every day items. Basically dead animals pose a threat because if it isn't an IED, it could become one."

EOD aren't the only people who need to be aware of their surroundings when out on the roads. Anyone else who happens to encounter an IED needs to know how to react.
"If [anyone] comes across anything that could be an IED, follow your unit's standard operating procedures, Charlton said. "They need to cordon off the area and report up through the proper channels.

"The biggest thing is not to mess with them," he said. "We go out sometimes where people have messed with them and thought to ourselves "Why did you do that?"" Thank God they haven't had anything happen to them. IED's are no joke."
Being in close range of a powerful and often unstable explosive can present dangers similar to the EOD technicians as it would to a targeted convoy.

"The measures we have are our Army protection. We never go out without the Quick Reaction Force," Charlton said. "We also have security on site which gives us 360 degrees of protection. We always take out our weapons, bomb suits and robots."
EOD robots, usually equipped with something as simple as a few cameras and a gripping claw, make a great advance in the safety of EOD technicians.

"The robots are a means of protection," Charlton added. "It gives us a safe stand-off distance so we can get up close to the IED without being in danger."
Expensive and complex equipment isn't the only thing that keeps the job of an EOD technician safe during missions.

"The training we do is constant," Bernard said. "Anyone in the Department of Defense EOD program attends the same inter-service EOD School. Following that each service has its own unique on-the-job training. For deployment to the Iraqi Theater of Operations additional 'spin-up" training is conducted that helps prepare the EOD techs for all situations we might encounter."

Any mission concerning IEDs or any other type of explosive ordnance can quickly become a disaster if not handled properly which is a scenario that EOD technicians keep in mind with every task assigned to them.

"You have a certain amount of control. There are safety measures that we follow and if you follow them you should be fine," said Charlton. "When you go out and defuse or blow up something and now it can't kill anyone else, it makes it all worth it.
"Our EOD motto is "Initial success or total failure". If you mess it up, you're gone."

"There's a certain feeling when you know you only get one mistake, and that keeps you on you toes," Charlton added. "I wouldn't do anything else for the Air Force. Our job is a brotherhood you can't find anywhere else in the Air Force. This job is a blast â?¦ literally."

• Date Taken: 08.16.2005
• Date Posted: 08.16.2005 17:19
• Story ID: 2749
• Location: BALAD, IQ