'Wheel' saves lives in Afghanistan

  • Published
  • By Capt. Michael Meridith
  • 455th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs
KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan (AFPN) --  Days after deploying here, Tech. Sgt. Stephen Thackery saw first-hand the cost of the Taliban's war on the Afghan people, and responded as he was trained, by saving lives. 

The Hamilton, Va., native was on alert when the call came in to the 33rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron. A suicide bombing had resulted in a large number of casualties. While two other squadron medics, Tech. Sgt. David Denton and Tech. Sgt. Nicholas Falcon, flew out to the scene on Army CH-47 Chinook helicopters, Sergeant Thackery flew out alone on one of the squadron's HH-60 Pave Hawks. 

"I treated four patients in the course of two missions -- all were critical," he said. "We had everything from fractures and shrapnel wounds to cardiac arrests." 

Since February, 2006, Air Force HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters, like those assigned to the 33rd ERQS, have been flying alongside Army aircraft to help provide medical evacuation throughout Afghanistan. 

"During a mission, my training sets in and I start doing triage in my head. I work on one patient, while I'm thinking about how I'll treat the other. I don't think about what I've been through until afterward," said Sergeant Thackery, who is deployed from the 43rd Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron at Pope Air Force Base, N.C. 

For medics like Sergeant Thackery, whose experiences are with the Air Force's Aeromedical evacuation mission, medevac is something entirely new. Medevac missions move patients via helicopter from the point of injury, where they are often in critical condition, to a nearby medical facility. AE missions usually fly stabilized patients aboard fixed-wing aircraft from a medical facility to a higher level of care. 

Typical AE missions can have anywhere from one to three nurses and between two and four medical technicians. If a patient is in critical condition, with burns or breathing trouble, a critical care air transport team is added to the flight. The CCAT team usually consists of a doctor, a nurse and a respiratory technician. However, things are far different for the medevac mission. 

"On our missions we are the only medical provider on the aircraft. Between us and the rest of the crew, we are the critical care team for the patient and we can make the difference whether the patient makes it to the next level of care or dies," said Tech. Sgt. William Crain, a Riverview, Fla., native deployed to the 33rd ERQS from the 622nd AES at Macdill Air Force Base, Fla. 

Sergeant Crain, who is also a firefighter/paramedic with the Hillsborough County, Fla., Fire Rescue Department, says that the nature of the mission, sometimes flying directly into harms' way to pick up patients from the battlefield, means additional
responsibilities for the medics. 

"We're not just medics, we're part of the crew," Sergeant Crain said. "We're always alert for danger." 

That shared responsibility and interaction between the entire crew, medics, pilots, flight engineer, aerial gunners, and the maintainers back at the base, is just one part of what Sergeant Thackery calls "the wheel," where each person is a "spoke" that helps ensure the entire mission turns properly. 

"For a lot of our maintainers, it's a race to see who can get out to the helicopter first when the call to launch comes," said Master Sgt. Sean Siegal, the squadron's maintenance production superintendent, a Moreno Valley, Calif., native who is deployed from the 718th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at Kadena Air Base, Japan. "The person who launches it gets to paint a green foot on the door representing the 'save' when it returns." 

Despite the dusty Kandahar weather, which makes maintaining the Pave Hawks a tough job, Sergeant Siegal says he and his maintainers are glad to be part of the mission. "We work hard but you don't hear many complaints. When we look back, we'll be proud of what we did here," he said.

The 33rd ERQS find the challenges personally rewarding, members said.

"Most of the missions are very challenging because of the terrain, weather and 
low-illumination (many mission are flown at night). Every time you go out it is something different, but it's rewarding to help someone who's injured and needs your help," said flight engineer Staff Sgt. Zachary Gyokeres, a Farmington Hills, Mich., native, who is deployed with the squadron from its home station, at Kadena Air Base, Japan. 

Despite the rewards, the nature of the mission means that Airmen are often exposed to the harsh results of the Taliban's violent extremism, both against coalition forces and the Afghan people. However, the camaraderie shared by this close-knit unit helps them keep a balanced perspective and maintain their focus on the mission, said unit members. 

"It's part of our daily life," said Sergeant Thackery. "But we talk about it among
ourselves and it helps. The people we work with are extremely professional and our motivation is to help get patients safely back to their families. It's a noble thing and it is the high point of my career." 

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