Continuing my Story.
March 2005 - May 2007
CW4, Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 223rd Aviation Regiment, 110th Aviation Brigade
Fort Rucker, Alabama
This phase of the memoirs, of my story, is when it gets boring - as in hard to write. Technical. Stale. Routine. Sedentary.
Perhaps the correct word, alludes me.
I was shaped into a proficient multi-tool. Groomed and developed out of field necessity, To take this assignment as a school-house instructor, to think I would excel and be content - only half of that statement was true. I always, excelled. I was not, content.
And to make matters worse, I was not a good golfer.
Working 9 to 5 was never, would never, be fulfilling, and I would always try to catch that adrenaline soaked dream again.
So I used this period of time to earn my Bachelor of Science in Professional Aeronautics (BPSA) from Embry Riddle Aeronautical, satellite campus. I received my degree in March of 2007.
That's what my degree, says.
I like the word, satellite.
This is the narrative I asked Grok to help me with. It's in the third party. Pretend it's my funeral.
CW4 Four JW MacDonald endured an assignment at Fort Rucker, Alabama that he largely tolerated rather than enjoyed. After completing the OH-58D Instructor Pilot Course and the resident Total Army Instructor Training Course, he served as the Flight Leader / Track Chief for the OH-58D(R) Helicopter Maintenance Test Pilot Course, and as a Directorate of Evaluation and Standards (DES) designee.
He supervised and conducted 160 hours of flight instruction and 240 hours of ground instruction.
For the Record, this time is logged as Instructor Pilot time, not maintenance, not maintenance evaluator.
He amended, edited, and was published, the OH-58D(R) Maintenance Test Flight Manual and the Aircrew Training Manual for maintenance, with additional experience based input.
He developed the course Program of Instruction that allowed technical warrant officers to attend the academic and flight orientation phases of said, course.
Training days were half-spent in a classroom static environment with cut-open aircraft components discussing valves and ports and pressures, materiel and design, temperatures, schematics, switchology, power, protection, and connecting the dots between what we do in the cockpit and what aircraft and components are responding with.
The other half day was spent on the flight line dynamic environment conducting ground runs and flights, visualizing the components and systems, we just fondled.
He received two Officer Evaluation Reports during this tour, both of which were rated Above Center of Mass and recommended his promotion below the zone to Chief Warrant Officer Five.
In addition to becoming a redundant cog in the machine, while at Fort Rucker, he conducted two military and two civilian maintenance test pilot evaluations which ensured continued support to aircraft maintenance requirements at Fort Rucker.
Towards the latter part of this assignment, he was sent TDY (Temporary Duty) to Fort Wainwright, Alaska, where he conducted a maintenance test pilot’s annual proficiency and readiness evaluation and three maintenance initial validations.
That squadron had moved, was moving, from Wheeler Army Airfield, Hawaii, to Fort Wainwright, Alaska starting May 2006, as part of Army Aviation restructuring.
.. 6th Squadron, 17th Cavalry Regiment. Fort Wainwright, Alaska.
.. Sniff, Sniff.
Do you smell, what I, smell.
#Aircav
And bold move, Cotton - Hawaii to Alaska.
As if the Magic Eight Ball said:
It is certain
It is decidedly so
Without a doubt
Yes, definitely
You may rely on it
As I see it, yes
Most likely
Outlook good
Yes
Signs point to yes
I used that TDY to unofficially interview with the 6th Squadron, 17th Cavalry Commander Lieutenant Colonel Nick Snelson. Nick was an enormous - ginormous, man with shiny black boots.
Daddy's, new, home.
The Executive Officer of 6/17th Cavalry was Major David Barber. The same then Lieutenant Barber that I befriended on the flight line of Camp Comanche, Bosnia in Command of the Air Traffic Controllers.
The Squadron Standardization Pilot (SIP) was CW4 Tim Mayhak. The same Tim, the albino CW2, from 1988 and my Warrant Officer Entry Course. The, infiltrator. The spy.
Tim and I would later occupy this coveted, large, (ginormous) over-the-flight-line windowed office, desks side by side of each other, one with "SIP" and one with "MTFE" placards, and our Junior Warrants dug that shit up.
Lieutenant Colonel Chris Carlile, my Battalion Commander at Fort Rucker, gave me my two, immaculate, Officer Evaluations. He would later become the Commander of CCAD - Corpus Christi Army Depot. He would even later, hire me in the civilian world and send me to Kuwait, Army Prepositioned Stockage Five (APS5), because I simply had not been to Kuwait enough.
I left Fort Rucker with 2,773.2 hours, updated combat time of 410.6 hours, and imminent danger time of 222.9.
I left
#FortRucker, I'm going to
#FortWainwright now.
Goodbye.