May is both Military Appreciation and Mental Health Awareness month. We're often talking about Mental Health Awareness and Action at Stack Up, so we decided to focus our Redshirt Roundtable on Military Appreciation. In particular, what our Veterans and Active Duty community members did in the Military.
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
What was your job in the Military?
What is a memorable moment from your service?
This is chance to learn about some of the folks hanging out in the Stack Up discord. Get to know our community better by hanging out with us. Join our discord.
DJKeens
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
United States Coast Guard
What was your job in the Military?
Avionics Electrical Technician
What is a memorable moment from your service?
Thanksgiving 2003. The SAR alarm went off just as we were sitting down for dinner (because of course it did). The call was for two crewmembers on a container ship that had fallen off a scaffold in the main hold shattering a femur on one and fracturing the lower spine of the other. The end result is that we had to airlift both victims directly from the hold at night in a high sea state with heavy fog while maneuvering between two of the loading gimbles. The ship was also empty which meant the entire ship was swaying pretty heavily. Since we were about to hit bingo, we had to get them both out quick but the cabin of a 65 is pretty small so in order to get both litters in we had to leave the swimmer on the ship. He was picked up at a port further north. Successful case and lots of pats on the back (I did get a commendation medal for it).
Countryjames66
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
Army
What was your job in the Military?
Military police
What is a memorable moment from your service?
While deployed to Iraq in 2007 dungeons and dragons brought a random group of people together to do a campaign. To this day I am still in contact with those people and we laugh about the times we had. Even in war gaming brings joy and people together.
Deathroyale | Kick
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
US Airforce and US Army
What was your job in the Military?
Weapon systems USAF, cook US Army
What is a memorable moment from your service?
My last couple years in I served as Cadre for the Northern warfare training center and climbed up to the grassy knoll. Good times and increased view. Makes you realize how small you are
DarthSagaSwag
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
Navy
What was your job in the Military?
Fire Controlman - Tomahawk Technician - my job was the maintenance and operation of the weapon control system that shoots the Tomahawk missile. Sounds cool, but was a boring job with rare software maintenance so I often ended up doing other jobs around the ship.
What is a memorable moment from your service?
This happened while I was doing my Damage Control Petty Officer duty where you learn how to fix leaks, how to maintain and repair basic fire and flood safety equipment, and learn to fight fires on a ship. Almost everyone has to do it when assigned to a ship at some point, but I loved it. I probably would've been happier as a Damage Controlman. We went underway in preparation for INSURV for a week. It was raining pretty steadily and the waves were the kind that jumped over the back of the ship. It was the 2nd time the Vella Gulf had been at sea since her stay in the shipyards and we discovered the aft sonar tech room had a leak from a scuttle (round door that's basically a hole in the floor) that opened up to the aft deck. I was on duty so I had to go see if we could fix it. The hole was warped and would need weld-level repairs so the only way to stop the leak was to stuff the edges of it with rubber. The whole time I'm stuffing it with rubber while sticking out of the scuttle like a groundhog on the lookout, it's steadily drizzling rain. Waves are crashing over the aft deck. I can barely see, my glasses are soaked. My coveralls are just drenched. I'm practically absorbing salt water down to the socks inside of my boots. It was amazing. The whole time my shipmates are amazed that I'm not even hesitating, I just get the job done, push through and I do a perfect temporary fix on the problem. No leak whatsoever after that. I let the DC Senior Chief know and gave him my assessment on the problem, when we got back to port, they fixed it. I think that's eventually why I got a Rear Admiral's award. (Aside from being a darn good DCPO.)
OneForMrsE | YouTube
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
Army
What was your job in the Military?
Intel Analyst
What is a memorable moment from your service?
I got to brief a room of full bird colonels which was pretty cool.
Payperheirplain
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
USAF
What was your job in the Military?
2A573A, which no longer exists, but I was officially an avionics systems maintainer specialized in Communication, Navigation, and Mission systems equipment. I was assigned to an Air Mobility Operations Group, which also no longer exist outside of the deployment units (to my knowledge), so I was cross trained into a bunch of other specialties and had a bunch of extra duties as a member of a small 10 man team. We supported rapid deployments of basically anyone by moving their stuff and helping to set up forward air bases.
What is a memorable moment from your service?
Probably my most eventful rapid deployment. We had a brand new deployment manager in the office and he was making all the travel plans for us. Since it was so last minute we didn't even have time to line up rapid transit via connecting a bunch of military flights together so he was signing us up for a bunch of civilian flights. As a result, I got deployed to Iraq via Baghdad International Airport, on the civilian side. It was quite the experience traveling about 28 hours in the air and then landing in civilian clothing, finding out some of our gear had been confiscated during an interim stop, and then spent several hours hanging out in Baghdad International arguing with customs about why I wasn't going to give them my information or request a visa while OSI was working to get past the front security because he was refusing to give up his weapons to get us. Good times were had by all. We wound up getting escorted to the nearest camp and the commander and chief both met us and said "Yall must be tired, let's go eat, don't worry about putting on a uniform". Got escorted by top brass into the dining hall and the first person I see is a TCN who stood up and waved at me excitedly because he recognized me.
Pretty sure everyone thought we were a USO tour.
TapRackBang
Which branch(es) of the Military were you in?
Marine Corps
What was your job in the Military?
Infantry - 0351 Assaultman
What is a memorable moment from your service?
We weren't supposed to, but one day on patrol we crossed the Helmand river. Met a local, drank some nasty goat milk, got chased by some wild camels...all in a day's work. (I'm 3rd in from the right in the pic.)
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