"Numb, a valium child, bored by meaningless collisions
A lonely stretch of headlight, diamonds trapped in black ice
A mirror cracked among the white lines"

-Marillion, Lords of The Backstage

07 Jan, 2006, Camp Stasa

Weather: 29-31 degrees, very light wind, with some snow and sleet

Qualified:

             "Fast Mover" Macomb County, Gear Ok, Breakdown OK, 28 minutes, 8/10 AR15, second attempt

             "Eagle" Macomb County, Gear OK, Breakdown OK, 28 minutes, 10/10 AR15, fourth attempt

             "Weapon M" Wayne County, Gear OK, Breakdown OK, 34 minutes, 10/10 AR15, second attempt

    Coordinator: Weapon M. Witnesses: Tin Man, Super Six, Jester, Chuckwagon, other witnesses from ECVM. Note: Weapon M checked by Tin Man.

    RSO: Weapon M, Chuckwagon, Fast Mover

    Medic: Chuckwagon

    Suport: Chuckwagon

    Injury report: None except slight aggravation of previous Achilles tendon pull, Weapon M. No medical attention required.

   What a way to start the year! Freezing rain paralyzed the roads, especially I-75 and I-69, leaving multiple accidents all along the sides of these roads. Early reports indicate that no less than five militia persons did not make it to training due to the ice on the roads, with possibly two or more of them involved in weather-related collisions. We understand, so far, that none of our folks were injured. Kudos to all the emergency workers along the road. I also went into a spin on I-75 and ended up in a ditch. I recovered, dropped it into 4-wheel drive, and crawled the rest of the way to training. (By my estimation, I was over halfway there at the time, so that was the call.) If you ever hear reports of freezing rain or ice storms, do not go to training. It is not worth death or injury. Nor is it worth totaling your vehicle. The problem here was that there were no reports of freezing rain, and most people were caught by surprise.

    StandonGuard and I arrived at around 10AM, and there was already a crew on hand. Hopefully, they had made it in before the freezing rain. One true die-hard, Tin Man, had stayed overnight. This is not a bad idea, especially in winter, where you can check out your cold-weather gear.

    There were also two new guys, Fast Mover and Eagle, ready to try Level One. The road was a horrible combination platter of ice, mud, and puddles. Truly, truly, the walk portion of Level One would be a festival of ankle pain. Truly, it was.

    Four people were shooting for Level One: The new guys, myself, and StandonGuard. Everyone's gear checked out. (Thanks to Tin Man for checking my gear and helping with the inspections.)

              

Fast Mover, Weapon M, Eagle, and StandonGuard                                       Ice, puddles, mud, and snow. Yuck.

 

    Fast Mover and Eagle shredded the two-mile walk under horrible road conditions in a mere 28 minutes. StandonGuard finished in 33 minutes and I followed closely behind at 34. For a sloppy, icy, muddy road, these are all good times.

    More folks trickled in, and pretty soon, a decent crew of a dozen or so was on hand. For the weather and road conditions, this was an impressive turnout.

   Everyone did the weapons breakdown and reassembly part, with StandonGuard getting a class on the Daewoo .223 (with a little bit of interest from some of the other folks).

   Fast Mover and Weapon M did the shooting qualification in the first couple of tries (my group was okay, but it was a little to the left. I HATE being on the left, even if it's just a little...). Eagle had to get a bite to eat, then he qualified okay. StandonGuard, using an unfamiliar rifle, did not have much luck, but he will work on this. (Note: StandonGuard is a Canadian, a student at The University of Windsor. As such, there are things he cannot own or do. However, he has what gear he can legally own, and comes over to The US to train and hopefully qualify with some of our gear. This gives us hope for our Canadian brothers and sisters, whose participation is encouraged.)

Above: A rare display of caliber-riffic unity, as 3 out of 4 .223 users qualified.

    The magnificent Chuckwagon showed up, and we cleaned him out of hot dogs. Seriously, it is truly and awesomely cool to have somebody come out and provide a hot meal on a freezing, icy, cold, wet sort of day. Just chuck in a few bucks to cover the cost of the grub, and you are all set. It's a good deal, and it makes a good time even better.

    After grub time, there was some more shooting, and that's when "Eagle" qualified. Sometimes, just taking a few minutes and getting something in your stomach can make the difference. Chuckwagon also had a co-worker (I wish some of MY coworkers would show up) come out to the range and get some valuable shooting time in with his very sharp-looking AK. It will be fun to watch his shot groups grow tighter and tighter....

     

  Super Six then assigned Jester to point, and they headed out on patrol, looking for enemy bears or terrorist infiltrators or something. Always worthwhile to practice your signals, and your tactical movement. The ECVM guys also rolled in with this movement.

    

Left, Jester on point.                                                                               Cpl Punishment and Super Six

   Jester's vehicle had some weather-related extraction issues, but Cpl Punishment and a good tow strap (Tin Man, they did secure your strap, check with Jester) did a fine job, and prevented six from having to secure the tractor. Because if you can drive a tank, you can drive a tractor.

 

 

   Hey, we had a good day. Two new qualifiers, and one old re-qualifier (Go Me! Go Me! Yayyy, Lee!), mostly everybody survived the freezing rain, even after a wild spin-out and ditch dive. Mr. Stasa seems to be doing well. It was good to see everybody. I hope to see you all at the big winter overnight training on Feb 10-12, Snow Dog 2006. (We have moved this to the 2nd weekend, due to the Super Bowl.)

   Come on out and get involved. We are still working on some sort of Table of Organization and Exercise. (Team leaders, squad leaders, and especially Super Six, please get a hold of me on this, thanks.) The Militia Field Day in April looks to be hopefully the best ever, and you can contribute ideas and suggestions on this if you want.

  Again, come on out. You are the militia, all of you.

 

-Weapon M

 

 

Hey I found my pictures from this Operation....HI ! Everyone it's ChuckWagon here. All I really have to add is a little bit about persistence and pictures of the roadside service call that were performed. I have been inviting people I work with and even customers that I have contact with for YEARS I've had one coworker come out and now one of my customers (here after refered to as E.) . All you can do is be polite and keep inviting if they seem to be interested.  As it was what worked with E, was he wanted to go to a range where he would be allowed to load more than one round at a time into his rifle. He was also a little interested I think in any pointers he could get regarding AK's and other military style rifles.

 I tell many of my customers that have expressed any interest in hunting camping or shooting about what I do nearly every month for 5 years now, out in the woods with the militia. Sure I have gotten some of those looks before and some comments too. Most people with negative comments usually speak from a media fed perspective. This I can easily counter ,.by pointing out the positive press we have gotten in the past few years. Additionally I can call upon the relationship I have with the customer. This especially when speaking to a customer I have known for a while and say something like "Our group is nothing like that,  I would have nothing to do with a group that supported or permitted that kind of behavior" But all you can do is be consistent be truthful and be positive. You can't change anyone's mind for them all you can do is supply them with better information and show them what kind of a person you are. They will if they want to, reformulate an opinion based on the evidence, if they are logical rational people.

 

Well here are the much anticipated roadside pictures. As Lee mentioned before the road was wet and somewhat frozen but as often happens the heat of the day softens up the road or in this case the field/ roadside and trucks can find there way in to some real muck

 

It was one of those kind of days. Sort of gooey...

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