Page 10 - RSDG Year of 2013

8 EAGLE AND CARBINE
the neighbouring Regional Command East. The pair of American Blackhawks are tasked, they still retain their ‘Pedro’ nickname, now a call sign, from their organisation’s service during the Vietnam war.
Afghans appear at the scene. From the headquarters building the senior officers and from the barracks blocks around a hundred soldiers approach. There is real danger of miscalculation, misinterpretation of what has happened and what should happen now. The Australian soldiers keep the Afghans away from their own casualty so they move to their own. An Afghan ambulance speeds up and the attacker is taken away. Moments later the Bushmaster protected mobility vehicles, from the Squadron’s Australian platoon, arrive and form a protective box around the patrol.
In the Squadron Medical Treatment facility the Medical Officer, Major Amanda Sands, her senior nurse Major Jo D’Arcy and Combat Medical Technicians led by Corporal Dallyn are preparing the trauma room and the two litters within it to receive casualties. They have received the MISTAT, a tabulated casualty report, which gives the team enough information to prepare themselves. There is the noise of a vehicle arriving at the trauma bay doors, and suddenly the quick reaction force soldiers move the injured man into the room for treatment.
From the operations room comes direction to a sec- ond Quick Reaction Force to clear the Emergency Helicopter Landing Site a few hundred meters north of the camp. SCOTS DG soldiers in our FOXHOUND protected mobility vehciles take a small team and an Improvised Explosive Device Detection Dog with his Royal Army Veterinary Corps handler to make sure the HLS is safe and to guide in the American Pedro helicopters with a coloured smoke grenade as they are seen approaching.
Afghan National Army Officer Cadets under training
Corporal Barr commands his FOXHOUND
In the operations room a, ‘wheels down’ time is received and the casualties are re-loaded into vehicles for an onward move to the French Military Hospital at Kabul International Airport. Fifty-seven min- utes have elapsed from the first rounds being fired to ‘wheels up’. Around fifty members of the squadron, multi-national and across eight cap badges, have been directly involved in the procedure. The team is com- plex and multi disciplinary, its ability to deliver slick drills has been the product of training and conceptual development as individuals, small teams and finally as a sub unit. The training has taken place over the course of the preceding seven months in Germany, the UK, New Zealand and Australia.
Overall the Qargha Squadron comprised around a hundred and seventy individuals from three national armies. From the UK the command and control and half the combat soldiers come from A Squadron. A composite Australian Platoon under the command of Mr Joel Sloane provided the other half of our combat strength, they hail from 5 Battalion Royal Australian Regiment and 2 Cavalry Regiment based in Darwin and Adelaide. Combat Support is from 5th Regiment Royal