The Sandbox

The Sandbox is what aircrews sometimes call the numerous nations that are part of Southwest Asia, but especially Iraq and Afghanistan. Preparing to fly to any nation in the Sandbox can be tricky, because they all have their particular issues, but as you may guess, Iraq and Afghanistan present the biggest challenges.

The jet we flew into Germany yesterday had already departed with another crew and we were assigned another jet to fly to the Sandbox. This flow of keeping the jets moving with fresh crews is the responsibility of the Stage, a mostly thankless job mostly staffed by volunteer reservists from across the air force. They assign crews to jets using some kind of sophisticated process involving throwing darts at a board or pulling names from a hat, but once we are assigned to a jet, it is usually until death do us part. Heaven forbid if a jet limps in with a laundry list of maintenance write-ups, but if we are paired as a crew to that jet, we may wait a week for it to be fixed so we can fly it.

Once we get a good jet, we are alerted by the Stage, and a crew bus picks us up. One of the major problems we face is getting the crew bus to pick us up at the allotted time; more than one flight has been delayed in the past because of a late crew bus. After stopping at the commissary for in-flight meals, we must attend briefings, pick up our equipment, and preflight the jet for departure.

Flying in Europe is slightly more complicated than flying in the states, mainly because there are such a large number of airplanes flying in such a congested area. Sometimes EuroControl will dictate a different takeoff time, called a slot time, which we must abide by to avoid saturating ATC with too much air traffic. But once we leave Western Europe behind, it is usually smooth sailing, at least until we reach Southwest Asia, where for some reason, very few people like us.

It is our goal to confuse and deceive those people so that we can safely provide the necessary equipment and vital supplies to our fellow men and women with boots on the ground so they can do their jobs. To that end, we routinely fly training missions back home to practice our tactical maneuvers so that when we get to the Sandbox, we know exactly how to avoid a potentially hostile situation. They are out to get us and we are out to avoid them, and perhaps even have a little fun while we’re doing it.

The C-17 is such a fantastic airplane to fly, especially when we “go tactical” in the Sandbox. We almost have license to steal, since we’re sometimes given wide latitude about how to arrive at a Sandbox airbase. During yesterday’s approach, I flew a tactical approach like the space shuttle returning to earth, coming in so steep that all that was visible on the ADI, or attitude director indicator, was the color brown, which represents the ground. I didn’t even have to push the throttles up until I was two miles from the runway.

After we land, we want to offload our cargo as quickly as possible and be on our way, since we have more opportunities to avoid hostile eyes when we’re airborne than sitting on the ramp. So it is not unusual to have pilots helping push pallets in the back in an effort to keep our ground time as short as possible. The sooner we depart Sandbox airspace, the sooner we can let our guard down and relax.

One of the main reasons why I enjoy my job is that I am able to support the soldiers, airmen, and Marines who must deploy to Iraq, Afghanistan, or other nations in the Sandbox. I especially enjoy when I am able to fly troops back home after a deployment and see their families and loved ones waiting for them as we arrive. One day this war will end and our troops will be able to shake the sand from their boots for the last time. And I hope to be there to fly the last of them home. Until then, I’ll be back once a month or so, flying the line, so they will always have a lifeline to home.