Posted on 09/06/2005 8:57:38 PM PDT by Uncle Joe Cannon
PENSACOLA, Fla.,Sept.6-Two Navy helicopter pilots and their crews returned from New Orleans on Aug. 30 expecting to be greeted as lifesavers after ferrying more than 100 hurricane victims to safety.
Instead, their superiors chided the pilots, Lt. David Shand and Lt. Matt Udkow, at a meeting the next morning for rescuing civilians when their assignment that day had been to deliver food and water to military installations along the Gulf Coast.
"I felt it was a great day because we resupplied the people we needed to and we rescued people, too," Lieutenant Udkow said. But the air operations commander at Pensacola Naval Air Station "reminded us that the logistical mission needed to be our area of focus."
The episode illustrates how the rescue effort in the days immediately after Hurricane Katrina had to compete with the military's other, more mundane logistical needs.
Only in recent days, after the federal response to the disaster has come to be seen as inadequate, have large numbers of troops and dozens of helicopters, trucks and other equipment been poured into to the effort. Early on, the military rescue operations were smaller, often depending on the initiative of individuals like Lieutenants Shand and Udkow.
The two lieutenants were each piloting a Navy H-3 helicopter - a type often used in rescue operations as well as transport and other missions - on that Tuesday afternoon, delivering emergency food, water and other supplies to Stennis Space Center, a federal facility near the Mississippi coast. The storm had cut off electricity and water to the center, and the two helicopters were supposed to drop their loads and return to Pensacola, their home base, said Cmdr. Michael Holdener, Pensacola's air operations chief.
"Their orders were to go and deliver water and parts and to come back," Commander Holdener said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
It is easier to ask for giveness than beg for permission. Good for them!
Follow orders...
They have to be reprimanded but I think they'll live with it. They knew what they were doing.
I don't think so, if soldiers did willy nilly what they wanted you have chaos. Follow orders.
I just don't buy this.
Just another case of "Jack Bauer Syndrome" - Good for Them!
Ah, the New York Times.....
Good for the pilots, and shame on their commanders.
This was a life-saving operations analog of taking out some enemy targets of opportunity while completing the specified mission during combat operations. I doubt any military commander would chide subordinates for taking out hostiles beyond what was ordered, why the heck are they complaining about rendering service beyond what was ordered in this case?
I wonder why sometimes I have to register to read a NYT article and sometimes I don't.
What a tough call this is. Follow orders or rescue people.
Glad I'm not the judge & jury.
They'll never make admiral but they saved lives!
Me neither - just like that CNN wrong Charleston report...I'm smellin' a RAT.
They told Rambo only to take photographs, and not rescue any prisoners.
He showed THEM what a soldier can do!
They should be reprimanded. They did not know what their superiors had in mind for them. They might have had another mission planned for these pilots after delivering the supplies that was equally as important.
I worked on H3s from 1987-1992 and was amazed they could still fly back then.
Well, I wonder if the Commander really chewed them out or just said "Naughty naughty boy. I had to say that, it is my job. Now, can I buy you a beer?"
GRIN!
As for their Commander, well...
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