Getting a Little Bit Better, Kind Of

About a week ago, our tent where we lived and from where we ran our clinic was cleared by the Army for use by soldiers.  We were displaced to another almost completely full tent where we were forced to take top bunks. The fullness of the tent meant that we had no place to put our personal gear, let alone our clinic supplies.  Needless to say, we were not in the best of spirits early last week.  M.M. and I made the executive decision to move our sleeping quarters and clinic into our living CHU.  The CHU has not been set in its permanent location, nor does it have power ran to it.  It is, however, A LOT better than sleeping on a top bunk in a stuffed to the gills tent.  We are living and working in both sides, and so far it has went pretty well.  It got cold a couple of nights, but it always warms back up by about 12 or 1 p.m.  

Our clinic/living quarters.  The porch was delivered to us this afternoon

by forklift by one of the mechanics we made friends with.  I don't know

what used to be on it, but it's made with 2x12s and is quite sturdy!

Entryway/Foyer

Room #1--Exam/Mike's Room.

Room #2-Supply and Administration.  Also, my room.

Happy Valentine's Day everybody!  It was a beautiful sunrise this morning over the waste treatment ponds here at Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan.  Our clinic and our living CONEXes have arrived and are in the process of being put into place.  Our clinic floor was slightly damaged by unknown causes, so will have to be fixed before we can move into it.  Our two room living CHU has been placed "generally" where it is going to be located and they are planning on running temporary generator power to it in the next week or so.  Once they do, we will move operations to there, living in one side and working in the other.  Should be a definite step up from where we are now.  We have been seeing patients in our living quarters inside the tent for a little while now.  It's a little tight squeezing  two people and gear, AND clinic into a 16' x 8' area, but we are managing.

Our living area.

Our temporary clinic area.

Looking in from the front door of the tent.  We are all 

the way back by the back wall.  Notice the tarps 

people have put up to section off their little areas.

Me working on a guy's foot.

As I had previously posted, we got an amazing amount of rain in a few days.  Most of the time it rains for a day or two, and the ground is porous enough to soak it all up almost before puddles form.  However, we received too much rain too quickly.  All that rain mixed with all the fine dirt made a bunch of mud and made movement on the base difficult for a few days.  Cleanup has been ongoing since the rains ended, even causing a few tents to be condemned and torn down.  The pictures below illustrated just how much mud there was around some of these tents.  The mud ring is over a foot high!

Ok, one last picture.  This one is of the waste treatment pond that Kandahar is known (infamous?) for.  It is a little juvenile, but it's funny.  

Read the signs......

Some General Pictures from KAF and BAF

Sunrise at Bagram.

Small village outside the wire at Bagram.  Only about half of the 

windows in the buildings have glass in them.

The above photo reads:
In the summer of 2003, this crossing only existed as a jump across the ditch with a steep climb up the road.  One sunny afternoon wile CJCMOTF LTC Tom Berg and CSM Kevin Kamps were executing this crossing, they noticed a slightly exposed metal ring in one of the footholds created by many soldiers wanting to cross the street en route to the original Viper tent village.  Having previously attended a landmine class (and having paid attention), they stopped movement on the gravel walkway and alerted Base Ops.  The entire intersection was cordoned off, stopping Disney traffic for over 30 minutes, and EOD was brought in to unearth the potential mine.  The mission was successful and EOD dug up........an unopened can of Russian tuna fish.  Not long after, the bridge was constructed and named "Tuna Bridge" in honor of this event.

EOD is Explosive Ordinance Disposal
Disney one of the main roads at Bagram, and is heavily traveled.

Ok, can anyone see the problem with this picture?  Remember, 

this truck is full of diesel fuel.

Lonely road on the far southwest side of KAF.

Controlled detonation (I hope) of a land mine taken from above road.

Canadian drone launcher and recovery system.  The drone gets 

sling-shotted from the device on the right.  When it is time for 

recovery, the drone flies into the wire hanging from the boom on

the left, gets caught in midair and goes into a controlled spiral, 

landing at the bottom.

Sunrise over KAF.  

The last four pictures were all taken within a few feet of each other, 

on the southwest corner of KAF.

Porches

I had mentioned in a previous post that we are back living in a tent city again.  As you may remember, we spent a week living in the transient billeting at Ali Al Salem, Kuwait.  The big difference between KAF and Ali's respective camps is that KAF is a "permanent" home to most of its residents, whereas Ali is only a rest stop on a person's way to somewhere else..  Several of the people around us have put porches on the fronts of their tents. These porches range anywhere from very basic to very elaborate.  Some of them even have electricity ran to them for lighting.

Basic tent with no breezeway or porch.

Tent with a breezeway and a raised platform to keep mud 

from being tracked in.  This happens to be my tent.

Nice canopy and outside sitting area.  Note the large grill

on the left side of the photo.

I believe this one is made from part off a parachute.

Getting a little more engineered now.  There are always a bunch

of people sitting in this one.  It was pouring down rain tonight 

and they were sitting inside nice and dry.

This is one of the ones that has power ran to it.  The floor is made 

from steel treadplate.  I have no idea where they got that much

steel.  

This one is the most elaborate of all the porches here in the Southpark complex.  The guys are

understandably proud of it.  As you can see, they have a walk out so they can sit on top of the

bunker in their chairs and sun.  Other interesting points are the dartboard and upper deck with

its parachute canopy.  Seriously, where are these guys getting all of the wood and the parachutes??