The TDY from H-E Double-Hockey Sticks

This is Departure from the latest happenings but came to my mind while driving in the middle of the night in the middle of noware New Mexico as Danny slept on our way to Alabama the weekend before last (that's a story for later). Hang on, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

This TDY took place back in 1980 when I was a young USAF Staff Sergeant assigned to a mobile training team at Lackland AFB in San Antonio, TX. For you civilians, TDY is Air Force (and Army)-speak for Temporary Duty. The Navy and Marines call it TAD (Temporarily Assigned Duty). It's one of the very few things they do that makes more sense than what we do so I'll give them that much. I never did figure out what the Y was for anyway.

I worked for an outfit called BISS (Base and Installation Security Systems). We called it Because I Said So. Our job was to travel the country and teach members of the local Security Police Squadron how to respond to the alarms generated by bad guys trying to overrun the base. Supposedly they woud disturb sensors buried in the ground outside the base perimeter or hanging on the fences (the sensors, not the bad guys) thus illuminating little lights on a display panel.

Our three-man team was to go to Fairchild AFB in Spokane, WA to give said training. Easy-peasy lemon-squeezy. A quick commercial flight to Spokane and we'd be in business. Not so fast, Buckwheat. I think a guy on the team had just dumped the girl who made our flight arrangements which were thus: San Antonio to Dallas, Dallas to Amarillo, Amarillo to Denver, Denver to Billings, MT, Billings to Missoula, and finally, Missoula to Spokane. She must have been REALLY ticked off.

After hopping from city to city ALL BLEEDING DAY, we were on our way from Billings to Missoula when the captain informed us that Missoula was fogged in so we would be going on to Spokane. Oh, drat! We would miss out on another take-off and landing, decreasing our chances to crash and burn, shucks. Twenty minutes later we landed in MISSOULA! The idiot pilot decided he could land and let off the ONE passenger that was going there. He (the passenger) got off and we taxied to the end of the runway to take off, but NO, it was too foggy! We waited for an hour. No dice, just fog.

Mr. pilot then informed us that it was now too late to take off so we would all get to spend the night in beautiful downtown Missoula. By the time we got our luggage and to the motel, it was 11:30PM. The sidewalks had been rolled up at 9:00 so there wasn't anything open at ALL. This was in the land before time, Circle K, and Waffle-House. The airline crew managed to convince the cook at the motel's restaurant to feed us so we wouldn't faint. by the time we got to our rooms all three TV stations had signed off for the night so we went to bed.

The next morning they fed us breakfast then took us to the airport where it was still so foggy that all the airplanes were flying over us and none could take off from where we were. Around noon they told us that the fog wasn't going to lift so we had options. Outside were two busses. Bus A would take us to Spokane, or Bus B would take us to Billings where we could get on a plane that would fly OVER Missoula and take us to Spokane.

Since we had had so very much fun already, we dicided the day was shot anyway so why not see more of Montana and ride back to Billings. So we did and we saw where the buffalo roam and the deer and the antelope play for SIX HOURS! At last we got to Billings, baorded the plane and flew to Missoula. Yes boys and girls, the fog had lifted so we were right back in beautiful Missoula. I vowed to hijack the plane if necessary to get us to Spokane but it took off without incident and got us to our destination only TWO DAYS after we left San Antonio.