JAFFY
Joseph Andrew Foxx stands five feet nine inches tall and weighs 168 lbs. Joseph Andrew Foxx, “Joe” to his friends, “Jaf” or “Jaffy” to his fellow crewdogs, “Joey” to his mom, is a Staff Sergeant in the United States Army. He’s been a Soldier for just over eight years and has been a crewmember on the Army’s CH47D Chinook helicopters for six of those eight years. He’s logged a thousand and change hours of flight serving his country in eleven different countries across the globe. He’s now flying through the skies of his twelfth, Afghanistan.
“Hey Kevin!” he called up to his crew chief who was sitting atop the aft rotor head some 22 feet above steel beach, pre-formed steel pieces that have been interconnected and laid out to form an aircraft parking area. The PSP is used by engineers to hastily set up a temporary runway and has been around since the Second World War. Steel beach has been there for almost three years. “Hurry up! Pre-flight in twenty-minutes,” Jaf yelled.
Kevin, his face barely lit by a flashlight precariously laying on the spar of the rotor head, looked down from his perch, straddling one of the three rotor blades at the point that it connects to the rotor head, with a quart can of oil in one hand and a funnel in the other he replied, “I’m on the last one. Be done in a jiff Jaf.” He chuckled knowing how much his flight engineer hated him saying that. They’ve been crewing together as a team for a little over six months and Kevin was glad he was assigned to old Jaffy. He knew a lot and though he was a hard ass, he shared what he knew with his chief. Jaf had high standards and held him to more than some of the other crew chiefs were held to, but their aircraft also had a reputation as the best in the unit. At least among the senior pilots it did.
“All set Jaffy,” Kevin announced as he stepped up onto the ramp and into the illuminated cabin of their aircraft. Jaf was looking through the logbook making sure all of the scheduled maintenance inspections had been completed.
“You lock wire the plugs to standard Kev?” he asked his young crew chief.
“Yep,” replied the cocky 19-year-old six feet tall native of Upper Michigan. “Best damn lock wire job you’ve ever seen.”
Handing his crew chief the logbook, Jaf said, “six pack?”
“You’re on.”
“Make sure the book is straight, I’ll be right back,” and Jaf, flashlight in hand, climbed up the side of the fuselage, deftly stepping in the small inlaid steps that led the way to the top of the large Chinook, to check the lock wire job.
“Gottdammit!” the flight engineer’s voice could be heard from above.
Standing at the base of the steps with his one-piece desert tan flight suit tied around his waist Kevin grinning broadly said, “And none of the cheap shit, I want green bottles.”
“Yeah, well you’ll have to wait ten months, but I owe ya. Good job Kevin,” Jaf said as he stepped back down onto steel beach.
“Ten months? Make that nine months Jaffy. In nine months from yesterday I’ll be back home with my baby! I’m gonna take Julie out for a night on the town and then back to my place for a little hanky panky and then…”
“Don’t kid yourself Kevin, you wouldn’t know what to do with a woman. You Canadians’ idea of a night on the town is the drive thru at Sonic for a chilidog and then to the lake to watch the submarine races. Only problem is, you’re really looking for some damned submarines to bet on,” Jaf joked with him.
“I’m not from Canada, I’m from Michigan. Upper Michigan,” Kevin said with an exaggerated tone of pride in his voice, standing a little taller, chin up and chest out.
“Its OK Kevin, your secret is safe with me. I know you swam that great lake, which one was it? And snuck into the US undetected though I don’t know how a skinny guy like you made it all that way. Wasn’t the water cold?” he chided him.
“Ha, ha Jaffy,” was all Kevin could come up with. “What’re you gonna do when we get back Jaf? You got big plans in NINE months from now?”
“I guess I’m going to spend a fortune on green bottles of beer for all the six packs I’ll owe you. C’mon, Vince and Larry will be here in a few for pre-flight.”
Grabbing one of the blade ropes to turn the large 375 lb rotor blades into position so as to remove said ropes prior to their flight Kevin asked, “why do you call all the pilots ‘Vince and Larry’? I don’t even think we have a Vince or a Larry in the unit.”
“Well Kev, back when you were still just a sparkle in your momma’s eye and your daddy took her to the lake to watch the submarine races, we used to have these public service announcements on TV reminding us to buckle our seatbelts when driving. They used a pair of crash test dummies named ‘Vince’ and ‘Larry’ to get their point across, so am I.”
And they both laughed as they finished prepping their beloved aircraft for the mission.
“Rub her belly?” asked Jaf.
“Yep,” replied his crew chief. “Rubbing her belly” was something Jaf did prior to every flight. It took Kevin two months to build up enough nerve to ask his flight engineer why he performed the strange ritual. “You take care of her chief, and she’ll take care of us,” was his reply. It wasn’t until a few weeks later that Kevin discovered that his flight engineer was actually cleaning the Doppler antennae located on the belly of the aircraft. He felt kind of foolish, but prior to their next flight asked if he could have the honors and Jaf let him. He found that though he was cleaning the antennae, he felt that he actually was rubbing her belly and wondered if all crewdogs were superstitious.
“She ready Jaf?” asked the pilot-in-command as he walked up to the aircraft carrying a bulging green helmet bag over his right shoulder and a brown leather Jepson case stuffed full with maps and IFR sectionals in his left hand.
“Yes sir.”
“OK, let’s knock out the pre-flight, then we’ll brief on the ramp. Take-off is at first light,” the PIC said. And so the mission day began. Sgt Hook out.
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