101st Airborne was sent to provide relief in Florida after Hurricane Andrew

On August 24, 1992, Hurricane Andrew struck southern Florida with extreme devastation. Three days later, President Bush committed U. S. Army support for the storm ravaged state. On September 2, the 101^st Airborne Division deployed ten CH-47D Chinook helicopters to Opa-Locka Airport to assist in the relief efforts. I was a part of this mission and in many ways, it helped change my life.

7^th Battalion, 101^st Aviation Regiment (Liftmasters) sent a task force of Chinooks comprised of elements from all three companies in the battalion so that each unit had enough personnel and equipment to continue their mission as part of the rapid deployment force (RDF). This was important as we had just returned from the Gulf War the year prior and international events were heavy on everyone’s minds. We arrived at the Opa-Locka airport to a near chaos situation with the situation just barely being managed as food and equipment were arriving faster than the support effort could be coordinated. A hangar at the east side of the airfield had been converted into a makeshift warehouse and we were billeted in a vacant shop area in the back corner of the hangar.

The first thing we noticed was that there wasn’t an immediate need for the Chinooks as no cargo had been allocated for shipment and the areas of need for delivery were not yet identified. This left us with the uncomfortable situation of having rushed to the scene and waiting for something to do. We were watching all these volunteers arriving and working from dawn to dusk unloading trucks, sorting supplies and trying to bring some organization to everything while we were just sitting there with nothing to do. After correctly determining that it might be a while before we were actively involved as a unit, I inquired if we could assist in the volunteer effort on our free time with our command leadership and they said we could do what we wanted when we were not working on a mission.

I had noticed that there was a forklift that was being under-utilized and I asked one of the volunteer coordinators if I could assist as a forklift operator. (in one of my previous careers I had been a forklift operator/warehouseman.) I was given a resounding yes and started my contribution to the volunteer effort. I would guess that there were in excess of 100 volunteers unloading and sorting supplies, and there was a steady stream of semi tractor-trailers with all kinds of cargo. Almost all the trucks were owner-operators who volunteered their trucks and donated their time and fuel to haul the loads from all points in the USA. It was incredibly moving to see what people were doing to try any help others they didn’t know.

For the next couple of days, I spent the majority of my waking hours on the forklift loading and unloading trucks. The rest of the task force equally spent a lot of time in the volunteer effort alongside the local people coming in to work the warehouse. Two of the coordinators, a local banker and his wife, a school teacher, did something incredible for the task force, they asked us to come over to their home for lunch, use the pool and to wash all our clothing. They had noticed that while we had cots and food and a place to sleep with facilities, there was no laundry facility available to us on the airport. So they took twelve of us to their home (in Miami Lakes, a very posh Miami neighborhood) where there seemed to be an endless buffet and a wonderfully refreshing pool for us to swim in. I wish I could recall the names, maybe one day I will and edit this to give them full credit. This lady washed and dried clothes while hosting a dozen soldiers for at least eight consecutive hours after a week of 12-hour shifts at the hangar sorting supplies. She and her husband were magnificent and it was a gesture that I will always remember.

The task force was in Opa-Locka for 26 days and during that time, a fellow pilot, Kevin Ballard and I went to the Miami school where this same lady taught fifth grade. It was a show and tell and we wore our flight suits and survival vests and other flight gear. The children were quite excited with the visit and the teacher treated us to lunch at a local restaurant before we returned to the flight line.

I’d say it took the better part of a week for sufficient coordination was made to utilize our equipment. Some of the first missions included flying to Homestead Air Force Base (AFB) which was close to ground zero as far as hurricane damage went. The destruction was epic and I clearly remember a hangar that had been stripped down to the I-beam superstructure and the remains of a C-130 inside that wasn't evacuated before the storm hit. We flew essential items, food, water, diapers and the like into the town of Homestead at a makeshift Landing Zone (LZ) near what had been their downtown. Only a few buildings survived in Homestead as the majority of homes in the area were either mobile homes or modular homes and neither tolerated the wrath of the storm. The damage resembled tornado damage only the area of destruction was miles wide instead of a few hundred yards. I saw less damage in war-torn Sarajevo, it was overwhelming.

There were also some poor decisions made in the relief effort. Some of these were made in the choice of cargo that was selected for us to haul from the fairgrounds in West Palm Beach to Homestead. For this mission, we had several Chinooks (At least 3 and it could have been up to 5) and we were making turns from the fairgrounds to a LZ in Homestead, pretty regular Chinook work hauling external and internal loads. External loads were preferred because they allowed us to make the most use of blade time and personnel. Apparently, there was insufficient heavy cargo to assemble to make legitimate external loads or whoever was coordinating the loads did not understand the physics of external loads. This is how I ended up with a center hook load that consisted of three pallets of things like diapers, and Cheetos. The loads were properly wrapped in Army pallet wraps designed for these hauls but the loads were so light that while flying we had to restrict the airspeed of this load to about 45 knots. Our route was along the west side of the Dade county urban areas along railroad tracks that bordered the swamps. As we flew south with this light load, the load started to come apart in the air. I left a glittery trail of Cheetos bags and diapers along the swamp. At least the gators there had something to amuse them. Due to this unintended distribution of snacks, I was dubbed the “Cheeto Bandito” by my fellow pilots.

I celebrated my thirty-fourth birthday in Opa-Locka which in itself was no big deal. I think I had a Tuna Casserole MRE for my birthday dinner. One of the things you had to do as an Army pilot was an annual evaluation. This required me to have a proficiency check ride as a Night Vision Goggle Pilot-in-Command and an Instrument evaluation with the Instrument Flight Examiner (IFE) who was part of our task force. So pilot training was worked into real missions when possible and other training missions were flown when required. 

I had to complete requirement in my birth month and it was unclear if we would leave Florida before the month ended. Since I needed the eval, we planned an instrument training flight to West Palm Beach and back. We had to fly outside of the Miami area as parts of the instrument navigation aides were still out of commission so we flew to where operational equipment was available. We encountered some difficulties as the commercial air traffic into West Palm Beach was heavy do to limits on flights to Miami. 

One of the requirements for the instrument check ride is a precision instrument approach. We had selected the Instrument Landing System (ILS) runway 09 approach to West Palm Beach. At first we had trouble getting Air Traffic Control (ATC) to work us in, this required us to wait about thirty minutes, so we completed other training tasks such as a holding pattern until we were finally cleared for an approach at the airport.  I established our approach on the ILS glide slope at the standard approach speed of 90 knots for a helicopter. We were almost immediately requested to speed up the approach due to traffic spacing and I had the pleasure of completing the approach at 135 knots (normal speed was 90 knots). It wasn’t pretty and it kept me busy computing the changes in the approach plan but I managed to get the job done and we landed without incident.

One of the benefits of taking an instrument check ride, is you normally get a good meal. It seems the IFE’s make a practice of flying to different airfields and while refueling with the fixed base operator (FBO) they borrow the FBO loaner car and get something to eat at a local restaurant. Getting the car is usually pretty easy when the FBO is refueling a Chinook and 800 gallons of Jet-A gives them a nice profit. When they make the IFE happy, he comes back with more business. We had lunch a local restaurant that had the unique distinction of all the waitresses were modeling lingerie. I didn’t mind, but mostly I was interested in a good meal but a free floor show never hurt.

I think the best side benefit of the deployment to Opa-Locka was getting to know some of my fellow pilots a bit better. Two of the pilots, Kevin Ballard, and Dan Davidson, had brought guitars with them. Kevin played bass and Dan lead. When things were slow, it wasn’t unusual to see then jamming together, even though they had no amps. They were playing country music and while not a big country fan, I did enjoy the distraction. In 1992, we didn’t have cell phones and the internet, and most of us didn’t bring much of any electronics to the field or deployment. I learned that Kevin and Dan were trying to put a band together, they had another guitar player in the unit (Jim Housand) who wasn’t there and they needed a drummer. I had played drums in high school and was fair to middling at best but I offered my services and they agreed to let me have a shot. Out of boredom and wanting to practice a bit, I whittled a pair of drumsticks from pallet splinters and began to sit in with Dan and Kevin. This was the start of the “Red River Band” named after a local river near Fort Campbell and we soon changed the band name to something more fitting: “A Wing and A Prayer.”

We recovered back to Fort Campbell September 28th and it wasn’t but a few days later that our band started practicing in a recreation center at Fort Campbell. We practiced there because they had drums we could use, but I soon purchased a set at a local pawn shop for $400 and we practiced in Kevin’s garage after that. We played about five paying gigs at local bars such as Maria’s Ranch, The Hole and Western Sound. I earned enough at make up the money that I paid for the drums. As with many things, this band was a fleeting moment in an ever-changing life. I left for Degree Completion in the autumn of 1993, Kevin joined the 160^th Special Operations Task Force and Jim became an Instructor Pilot then left he service not tool long after I left Fort Campbell for Germany.

There are two legacy items I took away from my deployment for Hurricane Andrew

• My Humanitarian Service Medal (the medal I am most proud of earning) 
• The experience of having played in “A Wing and A Prayer” 

I finally played some music like I’d always wanted to play, even if it did lean to rock and these guys were country.

Part of how this narrative came to be was Jim looking me up on the Internet in early 2016, thanks Jim.