Somewhere Between 30-40 Thousand Feet

On Sunday, September 23, 2007, the kids and I dropped Ty off at Dulles Airport to catch his flight to Houston, Texas, where his journey with KBR would begin before he headed into Iraq. This was Ty's view from the airplane on his flight to Houston, somewhere between 30-40 thousand feet off the ground, absolutely beautiful. Looks like you're dancing on the clouds.

After he arrived in Houston, they transported him from the airport to the LaQuinta Hotel where he had his own room for the duration of his stay. KBR covered all expenses while Ty was in Houston; his flights, his lodging, his transportation to and from the hotel to the DPC Center, his food, etc.

He spent a total of 12 days in Houston, 10 of which were spent going through processing at the DPC Center. Much like joining the military, he stood in endless lines doing paperwork after paperwork the first full day he was there, which was Monday, September 24, 2007. On Tuesday, he stood in endless lines again, but for medical purposes this time, blood pressure checks, physicals, extensive bloodwork.

His days would begin as early as 3:30am, having to get up in time to be picked up by the bus at 5:00am, and would end as late as 11:00pm-midnight. The rest of the week, including Saturday, consisted of classes he had to take on safety, what to do in a hostage situation, how to use the gas masks, etc. He watched videos on how they live over there and how the camps are set up basically to be like their own small town.

He met people several from all over the world that were going over for various jobs; food service, lifeguards, maintenance supervisors, fellow truck drivers, etc. And yes, you read that right, I said lifeguards. You name it, they need it over there. Apparently our military gets recreational time, which they most certainly deserve, one of which is swimming. They are required to have a lifeguard by the pool, therefore, if you have the experience that is needed, you can go to Iraq for one year, making $84,000 - TAX FREE, watching hot military men swim to relax and cool off. Apparently I am in the wrong line of work. :)

This is David. Ty hit it off with him immediately. He is ex-military as well. I believe he had just gotten out of 8 years in the Navy approximately 20-21 days before he headed to Houston for his training and then onto Iraq to be a maintenance supervisor, where he will get paid a lot more than what he did while he was actually serving our country, which I tend to find incredibly disheartening but I'll keep my opinions to myself. That's not what this blog is for.

Then on Monday, October 1, 2007, he received the necessary shots in order to go overseas and then waited for his plane ticket the rest of the week. KBR processed approximately 450 people that particular week and only had so many seats on so many flights per day and Ty's flight did not leave until Friday, October 5, 2007 at approximately 3:45pm.

He then flew to London, England, where he caught the next flight into Dubai, arriving at 8:00pm Saturday, October 6, 2007. He lost a total of eight hours on the flight and was basically enroute for about 20 hours. Needless to say, he had some serious jetlag. He was transported from the airport in Dubai to a hotel where he stayed until 2:00am Monday, October 8, 2007.

At that time he flew out of Dubai and into Baghdad, and from Baghdad was flown right onto Camp Anaconda, where he will stay for approximately 2-3 weeks in training, taking more classes and learning to drive the armoured trucks. He gets the unfortunate opportunity to listen to our military annihilate insurgents every night because they are trying to rush the fences/gates into Camp Anaconda. Needless to say, they never get very far before being blown to bits, but nevertheless, they still try. When will they ever learn...

From there he will get his permanent station which is still unknown and will remain unknown until that time. He has taken pictures of Dubai and Camp Anaconda but has not had internet access to email me the pictures. When he does, I will post them on here as soon as possible for everyone to see.

If you have any questions, please feel free to leave them in the comment section and I'll respond to them as soon as I can.