More night Shift

I am on night shift until the 16^th, and I have to say it has gotten pretty old. A few days ago I was called out to exploded battery at an area not to far from where I stay. It was one of those large 100lb ones they use for tractor trailers, a crazy big one. I got out there and did the cleanup, which was pretty easy since the giant battery broke over a cement pad. I went back to my room, undressed, washed up, and hopped into bed.

Literally the second my head hit the pillow….KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. I was called out again to the same spot. The mechanic, and I use that word loosely, that showed up to the spill took the old battery off and tossed it on the ground and left. If he had been there I would have kicked his ass. He was reporting to an exploded battery, you think he would have brought something to put it in. I was hesitant about laying back down in bed after the whole routine of cleaning up because I was afraid I’d get called out again.

Three days ago we had a “red alert drill.” They simulated that shit hit the fan pretty much. One part was a mortar hit a 50,000 gallon fuel bag, another part was a rock hitting a DFAC, and a contamination of the waste stream headed to the STP plant (shit plant). Of course I was called out to the shitter. Apparently that would be a big deal, fuel in the waste stream would kill all the “bugs” in the plant. To fix it would cost about a million dollars.

I was aware the drill was going to happen, I just didn’t know when. So I went though the day as if it was normal. My first stop in the afternoon was the Air Force Hospital, they have a small DFAC that I check everyday.

Apparently the military was not privy to upcoming drill, or that it was just a drill. As I pulled into the turn off for the hospital, I was greeted by a 130lb 5’3” blonde girl running at me at full speed in full body armor, locked and loaded. She was yelling, “Sir we are at red alert, please like get out of here!” I hit reverse so fast I patched out the tires. I then heard my radio blow up with people scrambling to get assembled. I then moved to the pump station I was called to and did a little fake routine, “the pump is now off, diverting sewage out of base, pump secure.” It was pretty exciting for a drill. Everything went well, and we joked around about the fact something like that would never happen; how the hell could fuel get into the waste stream? That is a one in a million chance.

Guess what happened the next day? Yeah you guessed it, fuel got into the waste stream and we were called out quickly. I thought it was a joke at first, but when I showed up to find the heads of the base all standing around I knew we were in some deep shit, literally. It was cool being able to walk right past men who were ranked so high and heads of KBR saying, “Excuse me, Environmental coming though.” It was cool being one of the guys running the show. We shut down the plant and directed the sewage to a near by town. However, the military being the geniuses’ that they are broke the pipe exiting the camp right over the canal stream that provides water to the camp and didn’t tell anyone until now. So by diverting the sewage I pretty much just created a giant cluster-fuck putting raw sewage into our drinking water. I didn’t feel so cool pushing past those bigwigs now. Luckily the amount wasn’t enough to hurt anything and even if it had been more the water purification would have been able to handle it fine, they turned water production off as a precaution.

We handled the situation pretty well, hell we just practiced it, I’d hope we do well. We prevented a few million dollars in tax payers’ dollars. The reason it happened was because a contractor the military hired dumped contaminated junk down a sewer station. The more I am here the more I dislike the military, but I’ll save that for my next blog, this one is kinda long.