Military Learning Center » Haiti

Rebuilding new focus for U.S. troops in Haiti

Angel — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 19:34:21 +0000

Almost three months after a devastating earthquake ripped through Haiti, the 3,000 American troops there have shifted their focus from distributing food and providing medical care to helping the Haitians rebuild and return to their homes.

Navy’s Haiti duties winding down

Angel — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 14:08:49 +0000

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Even though the Navy and the Marine Corps were all but finished with their missions here in early March, local officials said the real work in Haiti is only just beginning.

The Military Sealift Command hospital ship Comfort had discharged its last patient. The Seabees, Navy divers and Army engineers charged with reopening the wrecked port were making their final repairs. While the dock landing ship Carter Hall was ordered home to Norfolk, Va., on March 1, the other ships of the Bataan Amphibious Ready Group and the troops of the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, which spent a month delivering food and supplies, were on station awaiting orders back to the U.S.

Still, as Navy Secretary Ray Mabus used a visit March 1 to praise sailors and Marines for what he called an “astounding” performance, commanders and nongovernmental organizations agreed there was much more to be done.

“NGOs have to have a buy-in to stay here not for weeks or months, but years,” said Col. Gareth Brandl, commander of 22nd MEU, stationed in the district of Carrefour, south of the capital.

For example, Wally Amudson, director of the Adventist Development and Relief Agency, said aid groups somehow would have to help relocate about 70,000 displaced Haitians now living in temporary tent cities. One problem is that 80 percent of Haitians in Port-au-Prince were renters, officials said, so they have little power to clear away wreckage and rebuild their former homes.

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Read the full story in Navy Times on newsstands Monday and online for subscribers at NavyTimes.com.

621st tackled security ‘nightmare’ after quake

Angel — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:31:55 +0000

Tech Sgt. Thomas Tully had trouble getting his head around what he would say when he stepped off the plane in Haiti.Barely 48 hours had passed since an earthquake had virtually leveled Port-au-Prince, the capital of the island nation, and chaos reigned.Planes from every country imaginable were at the airport, parked at different angles. Cars and people were everywhere.“As far as security goes,” he said, “it was a nightmare.”Tully was one of 26 Security Forces airmen from the 621st Contingency Response Wing at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., responsible for security at the airport during the first days after the Jan. 12 earthquake.It was a tremendous undertaking for such a small team, but Tully and his fellow airmen quickly got to work.The local police at the Port-au-Prince airport, which became the hub for relief supplies and workers flowing into the country, were used to handling up to 25 civilian flights a day, Tully said. After the earthquake, they were overwhelmed by as many as 150 flights a day.“We came up with a plan,” Tully said. “We knew we’d have 13 bodies per shift and divvied it up.”Working 12-hour shifts, the airmen manned the gate and entry-control point, and patrolled the five-mile perimeter of the airport and its airfield.“Ultimately we understand it’s a humanitarian mission,” said Capt. Brian Loveless, a flight commander with the 621st who was on the team. “Our primary goal is to make sure the relief supplies are mission number one. Our job was to make the ramp safe; the foot traffic, the vehicle traffic on the flight line was a big problem, and the airport took a lot of damage.”The key for the airmen, especially because they only had 13 working each shift, was to stay mobile, Loveless said.“What we had to do was find the hole, find the weak spots in the perimeter, post people there and control pedestrian traffic,” he said. “The good thing about this airfield, there’s a lot of reaction distance for us. We’re able to observe, and there’s a lot of time and distance on our side so we can still react when needed.”The experience was eye-opening, Loveless said.“We saw a lot of suffering; injured people, dying people were brought to the gate,” he said. “But our airmen did a very good job of overcoming that and being professional and taking care of situations that they are not used to doing.”Many of the Haitians who crowded at the gate and entry-control point were hungry and thirsty; others were wounded, and still others were hoping for jobs, Loveless said. Some of the job-seekers had typewritten resumes, while others had scribbled their qualifications on pieces of cardboard, Tully said.“In your mind, you want to help these people, but if you help one you have to help them all,” Loveless said.Early on, many Haitians were desperate to get on flights going to the U.S., Loveless said.“Often times, we’re running in full kit after those people,” he said. “There have been some foot races, local nationals hiding in cargo boxes, jumping the fence, large crowds, civil disturbances at the gate.”The airmen saw their fair share of celebrities, too, Loveless said.“Oftentimes, when celebrities come, it creates a security challenge,” he said.One celebrity, who Loveless and Tully politely declined to name, arrived at the airport — virtually unannounced —and started handing out $50 bills, which whipped the crowd into a frenzy.“We understand … everyone wants to help, and we understand there’s an appropriate way to do that,” Loveless said.Amid the devastation and suffering they saw, the airmen also found humor in their daily shifts.Tully told the story of a truck driver whose vehicle was being searched at the gate.“There was a padlock on the back on the door of the trailer,” he said. “One of the guys asked the [driver] to unlock the padlock. He got out, picked up a rock and smashed it.”The airmen kept the rock and named it “The Key.”On another occasion, as the airmen were preparing to put concertina wire over a hole in one of the perimeter walls, two Haitians jumped the wall, landing right in front of the airmen.“It was almost like a Mexican standoff,” Tully said, laughing.After about two weeks, reinforcements arrived.“Follow-on forces have taken over for us,” Tully said. “We’ve fallen back and we’re doing security for our own [621st] assets. Now we have our cops focusing only on that, and the cops that have come in as follow-on have taken over everything else.”Ë

Predators send video feeds to help in Haiti

Angel — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 22:21:55 +0000

Six Predators started flying missions over Haiti from a Puerto Rican airport Jan. 27, marking the first time the Air Force’s unmanned RQ-1s have flown humanitarian missions or operated out of a civilian airport.The Predators have flown two round-the-clock orbits over Port-au-Prince, feeding full-motion video of roads and buildings, devastated by the Jan. 12 earthquake, to service members, relief organizations and Haitian officials.“We have focused a lot on roads and infrastructure because they want to see what is intact,” said Maj. Jeff Bright, the 432nd Air Expeditionary Wing detachment commander during a Jan. 28 telephone interview from Puerto Rico.The Air Force didn’t receive approval from the Federal Aviation Administration until Jan. 25. Predators and MQ-9 Reapers had never before received FAA approval to operate out of a civilian airport.Brig. Gen. Darryl Burke, the Air Forces Southern vice commander acting as the Air Component Coordination with Joint Task Force-Haiti, said the Predator’s Haitian flights represent a historic first that could further debate regarding remotely piloted aircraft operations inside the U.S.“Today, the Air Force team proved remotely piloted aircraft can operate safely alongside civilian, military and international air traffic during a large-scale air relief campaign,” he said in a statement.About 50 airmen make up 432nd’s detachment which deployed from Creech Air Force Base, Nev., to Puerto Rico on Jan. 18.The airmen stationed at Aeropuerto Rafael Hernandez outside Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, maintain the Predators and fly the aircraft during take offs and landings. Pilots and sensor operators at Creech fly the rest of the mission, similar to how it’s done in Afghanistan and Iraq.Predator operations in Haiti have not affected those in Afghanistan, Bright said. The crews and aircraft came from the formal training unit at Creech.“This is an open deployment. We are going to be here as long as we are needed,” Bright said.The hardest part of the deployment thus far has been receiving approval from the FAA, the detachment commander said. Service officials have been in discussions with the FAA about operating at civilian airports for years, but saving lives in Haiti served as a motivator to move this mission along, Bright said.“There have been some very difficult roadblocks but we have been able to overcome them all,” he said.FAA officials have mandated certain restrictions such as limiting take offs and landings to day-light hours and posting an airmen outside to maintain a visual of the Predators during those events.The Air Force declassified the feeds from the Predators to allow relief organizations such as the Red Cross, U.S.A.I.D. and the United Nations to have access to them. Having live video feeds rather than still imagery from a Global Hawk or a U-2 — which have also flown over Haiti — allows commanders to move quickly to different regions of Port-au-Prince depending on need, Bright said.“The beauty is that the full motion video is live so if you are looking at something that might not be so important you can say let’s move on or … you can stay there longer,” he said.

AFSOUTH officials guide Air Force Haiti relief effort

Angel — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:38:13 +0000

Airmen from across the United States are participating in the Haitian earthquake joint relief effort while the as Air Forces Southern members guide the effort from hundreds of miles away in the Arizona desert.

Air Force officials have an integral role in the relief efforts, from reopening the Toussaint L’Ouverture Airport in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and dedicating hundreds of hours of flight time to airlift aid into Haiti, to help maximize efficiency of airfield operations and providing emergency medical care to Haitian citizens in need.
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Relief effort will be felt throughout fleet

Angel — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 19:20:02 +0000

As the Navy’s unprecedented response to Haiti’s post-earthquake humanitarian crisis entered its third week, the sudden spike in operational tempo showed no sign of slowing. More warships, Military Sealift Command and Maritime Administration vessels were on station or en route to help answer a desperate call for supplies and medical help.The large fleet presence raised two big questions that Navy officials said they could not publicly address as the Haiti mission unfolded:How will it affect deployments? And what will it cost?As Navy Times went to press Jan. 22, the U.S. had committed some 30 Navy, Coast Guard, MSC and MarAd ships to its Haitian task force, serving as lily pads for helicopters, helping to restore Port-au-Prince’s shattered harbor or evacuating Americans. Some of the vessels were called up from a reserve status, as with the hospital ship Comfort, so the duration of their missions would not have much effect for other units.But each day a Navy warship spent off Haiti was a day another ship had to take its place elsewhere in the world, or a day it couldn’t prepare for its previously scheduled Navy tasking.To read the rest of the story, pick up the next issue of Navy Times which hits newsstands Monday.

Specially trained officers support Haitian relief efforts

Angel — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:09:00 +0000

Responding to and supporting post-earthquake relief efforts in Haiti is expected to be the one of the most challenging humanitarian operations in the history of the National Security Preparedness directorate, according to Col. Michael Hare, NSEP director.

Colonel Hare, who oversees Air Forces Northern Region’s Emergency Preparedness Liaison Officer program, said three EPLOs – Air Force Reserve officers assigned to respond to natural and manmade disasters in the United States — are now onsite at facilities set up in the Southeast Region to support Haitian earthquake relief efforts.
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Major trapped in rubble of Port-au-Prince hotel

Angel — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 19:46:21 +0000

Every time Peggy Bourland watches another survivor get rescued from under a collapsed building in Haiti, she asks the same question: “Why can’t it be my husband?”Air Force Maj. Ken Bourland is trapped under Hotel Montana in Port-au-Prince after a Jan. 12 earthquake leveled the island nation’s capital. Bourland, a career UH-1 Huey pilot, is the Caribbean desk officer at Southern Command headquarters in Miami.Bourland, 37, had flown into Haiti from the Dominican Republic the morning of the earthquake with Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, deputy director of U.S. Southern Command. He sent his wife an e-mail with “Wow Haiti” in the subject line just minutes before the earthquake hit at 5 p.m. He told her he had arrived safely and described how moved he was by the poverty he had already seen on the streets.Peggy Bourland quickly replied to her husband’s e-mail, then moved on to finding cartoons for their sons to watch on television. Flipping through the channels, she saw a news report about the earthquake. She didn’t think much of it at first, assuming it was a report on an earlier California earthquake. Then she saw “Haiti” come up on the screen.“I just stood there in shock at first so I went back to the computer and I e-mailed Ken and asked him if this was for real — ‘it just said on the news that you all had an earthquake.’ And when he didn’t respond back I replied again and said ‘please, tell me you are OK,’ ” Peggy Bourland said in a telephone interview from the family’s home in Weston, Fla.Peggy Bourland and her family have been waiting by the phone since then, waiting to hear that Ken Bourland has been pulled alive from the rubble.Bourland was staying was on the second floor of the hotel. He was preparing to go to a dinner at the U.S. Embassy at the time of the earthquake, Peggy Bourland said. She was told another airman traveling with the general had gone to her husband’s room to borrow a dinner jacket.The airman, whose name Peggy Bourland couldn’t remember, was one of the five other members of U.S. Southern Command traveling with Keen and Bourland. All five, also staying in the hotel, escaped. Keen, outside the hotel at the time of the earthquake, is now overseeing U.S. military aid as commander of Joint Task Force Haiti.The survival of the five team members and other guests at Hotel Montana gives Peggy Bourland and her family hope, but it’s mixed with guilt and disappointment.“I am very blessed and thankful for the people and their families that they are finding, but I just want it to be my husband,” she said. “It is exciting that they are alive, but it is disappointing that it’s not Ken.”At least 200 are still trapped inside Hotel Montana. The earthquake has killed at least 200,000, according to an estimate by the European Commission.Peggy has been told that a team of 20 from the Defense Department is looking for her husband along with other search-and-rescue teams at Hotel Montana. Those teams also include members of the 82nd Airborne Division and the Fairfax County (Va.) Task Force Urban Search and Rescue Team.A representative of SouthCom and an Air Force liaison officer update the Bourlands two or three times a day on the search efforts.Bourland’s mother, father and sister have joined Peggy, the couple’s three sons and her mother and father in Weston. Ken and Peggy Bourland have two young sons — Charley, 3, and Andrew, 16 months. Peggy Bourland’s son, Chance Anderson, 14, also lives with the couple.The family celebrated Charley’s birthday Jan. 10 — a day early — so his dad could be at the party before he left on his flight for the Dominican Republic. It was the last time Peggy Bourland saw her husband.The two met six years ago and have been married for five. He asked his wife to marry him a year after they met on a blind date. Ken Bourland proposed Nov. 10, 2004, at a Marine Corps ball in Myrtle Beach, S.C. He had returned three months earlier from a deployment to Iraq with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 167, which he was assigned to as part of an Air Force exchange program.“They gave him a hard time about that. We were the only Air Force people at the Marine Corps Ball,” Peggy Bourland said. “One of our first dates was at the Marine Corps Ball a year earlier … and maybe he did some thinking while he was over in Iraq.”Ken Bourland’s sister, Kellie Bourland, said her brother grew up in Birmingham, Ala., wanting to fly and join the Air Force just like their father. Ken Bourland graduated 15 years ago from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he earned an Air Force commission. Bourland started out as a maintenance officer before he transferred to pilot training.“He always had that love for flying and even took hang gliding lessons in high school,” said Kellie Bourland, who last spoke to her brother Jan. 10.Kellie Bourland and Peggy Bourland said they hoped Bourland’s extensive military training will help him survive without food or water.“He’s a military guy. … He kind of thinks things out. He knows he has to stay calm,” Peggy Bourland said. “I really feel in my heart that is what he is doing. He is just waiting and trying to figure out ways to keep himself alive. I kind of think of him as my Survivorman.”

Dover Reserve crew delivers communications team, equipment to Haiti

Angel — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 18:36:57 +0000

Airmen from the 326th Airlift Squadron, here, delivered the Joint Communications Support Element to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, aboard a C-17 Globemaster III during the early morning hours of Jan. 16.

On the way to Haiti, the Air Force Reserve aircrew stopped at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla., to load up the JCSE personnel and equipment.

“We were prepared to do what we needed for this mission and there are more crews back at Dover on standby ready to be called upon,” said Capt. Jim McCann, the C-17 aircraft commander.
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Gators deliver Marines, aid to Haiti

Angel — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 18:14:54 +0000

LEOGANE, Haiti — About 120 Marines with Battalion Landing Team 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marines, landed via helicopters in Haiti on Tuesday morning, securing a landing zone and a water distribution point in this town west of Port-au-Prince.Marines created a perimeter here, with hundreds of Haitians watching just a few feet away. U.S. troops also linked up with U.N. officials in the area.The Marines, flying aboard CH-53E Super Stallions with Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron 461, came in from the amphibious assault ship Bataan, which arrived with the other ships of its amphibious ready group Monday.The flights began just before 10 a.m., and by 12:20 p.m., the last helicopter landed in Haiti.“We were warmly welcomed by the locals. They were supportive, and exchanged greetings. We provided them with food and water. Indeed the maritime relief support to Haiti is now well underway,” said Capt. Thomas Negus, commanding officer of the Bataan ARG, on the ship’s official Facebook page.Another amphibious ship that arrived with Bataan, the dock landing ship Gunston Hall, sent small boats to deliver food and medicine to a Haitian coast guard station, according to a Navy announcement.“The ship provided rice, dry spaghetti, bottled water and other dry goods, as well as approximately $20,000 worth of much-needed medical supplies to organizations already providing care. Some of the material included thermometers, surgical lights, syringes, medications and bandages,” according to the Navy.