Air Force Combat Comm Clip on CNN

Ha-ha, this was my old job back in the 90's "Combat Communications" is mainly all about setting up initial communications in an empty field, and keeping yourselves protected and sustained until the "rest of the troops" get there. It's basically packing up equipment on pallets (radios, food, tents, weapons, etc.), loading them in a truck/plane, taking them somewhere, and setting it all up so that communications is in place when everyone else shows up ("First in, last out"). Then living there in a dirty tent for a while. Then eventually packing it all up and taking it back again. atriot:

Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com

...if you look at the 1:42 mark, it looks like they still have the same tropo-scatter radios as when I was there:

Me in 1990's


CNN clip from 2012:

 

Not inside those tents, sleeping with 10 guys who hadn't showered in a week :help: Good thing we always took gas-masks with us

...I don't know what mask the guy is wearing in the pic from the 2012 clip (looks like a paint-ball mask or something), we had old-school charcoal-filter gas-masks like this:

 

Yes and no. It was a great experience and I'm proud to have been a part of it. However Combat Comm was a rough life, and I don't think I would have wanted to make a career of it. Maybe if I was fixed comm instead of mobility I might have thought about staying in the "Chair Force" P), but once you are in "the Mob" it's hard to get out Were / are you in the AF as well?