Panhandle reservists honored for role in hazardous Iraq mission
By Associated Press
Published June 12, 2004
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE - A transport crew that dodged Iraqi missiles while refueling helicopters and avoiding collisions with other aircraft has won an Air Force Reserve award for the most distinguished flight of 2003.
The Maj. Gen. Thomas E. Marchbanks Jr. Memorial Award was presented Friday to nine reservists from Duke Field at this Florida Panhandle base.
The reservists from the 711th Special Operations Squadron made the hazardous flight on April 2, 2003, in an MC-130E Combat Talon I, a four-engine transport that can double as a tanker. The plane has special radar and other gear designed to let it fly behind enemy lines at low level at night without being detected.
Lt. Col. Raymond Pijma, the plane's electronic warfare officer, said nothing seemed unique about the mission before the crew took off.
"We plan the same way," Pijma said. "Some of our objectives may be more important than others, but, you know, a mission is just a mission to me."
That changed while the crew was refueling several Army MH-47 Chinook twin-rotor helicopters with special forces troops aboard. They were on their way to the Thar Thar Palace northwest of Baghdad.
When the plane, another MC-130E ahead of it and the helicopters came under fire, the other Combat Talon dispensed flares to deflect an anti-aircraft missile.
The flares temporarily blinded Maj. Bruce R. Taylor, the aircraft commander, and his crew but they managed to take evasive action to avoid the missile or running into the lead Combat Talon. A second missile was launched to the left rear of Taylor's plane, but he decided to press on although he had a Chinook attached to each of two refueling hoses.
"If we would have broke up our formation, we probably wouldn't have finished the mission," Taylor said. The missile shot was a close miss.
The mission also took the crew dangerously low in poor visibility over the Al Jazirah desert.
