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| Harry & Jim in Sedona, AZ in 2013 |
Many of you knew "Squirrel" Miller, a consumate ditty bop in the air, crazy as hell on the ground, and utterly unpredictable on TDY. He, as did others of his specialty, saved my ass many times during my 7 1/2 years at the 6985th. I will miss him forever!
Most of you have your own yarns about Squirrel's shenanigans, but I have one most of you are unaware of: We were to fly a coordinated out of Eielson = 4 tankers and two RCs. The temperature was 55 below zero, hydraulics were leaking faster than we all could replenish them, and we were severely delayed. In the end, we were launched with a waiver to the -50F takeoff minimum. Sadly, we lost one of our tankers; it went down, into the Tanana River, immediately after takeoff, killing all aboard. We were forced to abbreviate the coordinated sortie, and had to divert and RON at Elmendorf (which did not have ground equipment to service the 135s) due to continued low Temps and the crash investigation at Eielson. Further compounding this "cluster f--k" was the fact that President Ford had stopped over at Elmendorf on his way to the far east. There is the background, and I know you all "get the picture."
Naturally, we had a "beer light," so my crew and I made it to the club after securing the classifieds. Our sanitized "pickle suits" smelled of JP4 exhaust and sweat, we wondered around dumbfounded, and most of us were tired and lost -- until we found the bar. There, one of the stool hugger asked with dismay, "Who the hell are you guys??!" Without missing a beat, Squirrel looked around furtively and said very secretly, "We are a special forces team here to protect the President."
Needless to say, we didn't buy many of our own rounds following that.