Speaker 1
So I went and started up the aircraft. We got permission to conduct starts not using the checklist while deployed. We were able to do them from memory with the caveat that the door gunner would be following along with the checklist open behind us so that if the first officer missed something, you know, they would speak up and be like, Oh, you forgot this check and then we would do it. So, yeah,
Speaker 1
Yeah, so luckily that's been things up a lot, actually. And I had the aircraft started. We had our countermeasures all good to go worked up and all within six minutes, which was almost unheard of. But yeah, six minutes ready to go. Pete came out. He got himself sorted in the seat, gave a quick update brief. So all that we knew at the time was that there was an attack up in Egglehock and they needed help go. That was it. We had no essay on enemy injuries, anything like that. It was a hate. We've been given a task. Go. So if you draw a straight line from Gao, which is where we were to Egglehock, it's a basically a two hour flight. The griffins don't have legs to be able to go two hours and then go somewhere to refuel, which would be Kedal. And Kedal to Egglehock is a 45 minute flight. So if you kind of draw a triangle, you know, Gao to the northwest is Egglehock two hours. And then you go Egglehock to Kedal. Kedal is east of Egglehock. That's about a 45 minute flight. And then if you go Kedal back to Gao, Kedal is north of Gao and that's about an hour 45 minute flight. So that's kind of just to orient everyone here. So we got authorized to go single ship from Gao to Kedal, which was where the griffins were going to have to refuel. So we actually had to go to Kedal for the griffins to refuel prior to going to Egglehock. And that was just because they didn't have the legs to do it. The legs meaning the fuel, they didn't have the fuel to do it. So the griffins took off first because they were ready first. Once Pete got in, we got our update brief, we taxied out, did our hover checks and off we went. So the griffins, by the time they got going, you know, they were probably five minutes ahead of us, maximum 10. And I went, you know, both to the wall, as they say. So I was pulling 95% for the whole way there and we got there half an hour ahead of them. So we made really good time getting there. And part of the reason we did that was so we could get a update brief prior to going to Egglehock because again we launched with very little information, right? So we landed, we took on a little bit of fuel, not full bags, just a little bit because at that time, our understanding was we were going to bring any patients we picked up back to Kedal because that was the closest medical facility. So we didn't want to waste time taking on all this fuel when we could use that time better and, you know, take on what we need and then send them over to the griffins when they landed and got there.