Initial success or total failure; no in between for EOD

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Rich Romero
  • 40th Air Expeditionary Group Public Affairs
OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM (AFPN) --  One job for civil engineers does not allow for mistakes. It is either initial success or total failure.

Explosive ordnance disposal units are made up of people of doubtful reliability and questionable mentality, according to a mission briefing put together by Tech. Sgt. Thomas Cowern, 40th Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron’s EOD flight chief at a forward-deployed location. They have a job where even at this location mistakes are not tolerated because just one could result in death or severe injury.

“Safety is our No. 1 priority,” said Senior Airman Bambi Brown, an explosive ordnance disposal technician deployed here from Little Rock Air Force Base, Ark. “In school, you virtually fail for missing one safety question. We never walk out the door without conducting a safety briefing.”

Their mission is to neutralize hazards from explosive ordnance or explosive devices which, because of unusual circumstances, present a threat to operations, installations, people or other assets, said Sergeant Cowern who is deployed from Westover Air Reserve Base, Mass.

“In the simplest terms … we blow (stuff) up,” Airman Brown said.

Although simply stated, it is not a task the team’s Airmen take lightly. The first day they arrived at this location, they disposed of a hung flare on a bomber. Since then, they also responded to a suspected armed fuse on a joint direct attack munition, which turned out not to have been armed.

Tech. Sgt. Will Clemmons, noncommissioned officer in charge of EOD flight operations, recently returned from a five-day trip with the British royal marine commandos to sink illegal fishing vessels.

“That mission didn’t pan out,” said Sergeant Clemmons who is deployed from Charleston Air Force Base, S.C. “We weren’t able to pull the first boat off the reef into deep water, so we ended up having to leave it. The second boat turned up missing.”

Two of their primary missions are to handle any hazard associated with aircraft munitions and to respond to in-flight emergencies. They also have a force-protection role. With aircraft in the air at any time day or night, they have two technicians on call 24 hours daily.

“Every day is different,” Sergeant Clemmons said. “You never know what kind of environment you’re going to be in. One day you’ll be giving end-of-runway classes to people, and the next day you’ll be on patrol with the British royal marine commandos.”

Unlike many other jobs in the theater of operations, the environment here does not pose any real challenges or create any frustrations for EOD. The biggest limitation is a lack of equipment, such as C-4 explosives, detonators and blasting caps, to conduct training.

“Even though the British royal marines own the (explosives) range, they let us determine what we can and can’t do out there,” Airman Brown said. “Our only limitation is we don’t have enough bang.”

Although it may seem a bit unusual for a woman to want to work in EOD, 21-year-old Airman Brown knew it was what she wanted to do since she was 15.

“My uncle’s next door neighbor was a retired EOD tech,” said Airman Brown, who completed her initial training about two years ago. “Talking to him sparked my interest from the get-go.”

And while some people joke that anyone who wants to join EOD must be insane, she feels just the opposite.

“Come on, anyone who would turn down the opportunity to blow (stuff) up is insane,” Airman Brown said. “We’re the sanest people around. It’s most everyone else who is insane.”

Insane or not, their job is a blast.