'Fire in the hole:' JB MDL EOD team keeps citizens safe here, abroad Published June 1, 2010 By Dan Cosgrove Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst volunteer JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX- LAKEHURST, N.J -- There's a scene in the movie "The Hurt Locker" in which an Explosive Ordnance Device technician prepares a robot and walks up to an improvised explosive device. With his multi-tool, he dismantles the IED and a much-larger, secondary device he finds. Later in the movie, this same technician takes off his protective gear, climbs into an explosives-rigged car and renders it safe. While these types of actions may make for tension on the big screen, they also tend to make real EOD technicians' eyes roll. As members of the 514th EOD Flight operating out of JB MDL will tell you, everything they do is directed toward minimizing drama. Safety is emphasized and built into just about every task they perform. "All the way through school, one of the ways you fail a test, one of the ways you fail an evaluation, is by not adhering to those safeties," said Master Sgt. Chris Klob, 514th EOD technician. "(Rendering explosives safe) takes a long time. Calls can last hours. You're trying to gather information, things aren't exactly clear, you're loading your robots with tools, you're sending them back and forth. It's a more drawn-out, tedious process than Hollywood can commit to in a two-hour film." That isn't to say the job's not fraught with danger. EOD technicians across all four branches have sustained and continue to sustain casualties in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM and Operation IRAQI FREEDOM. But EOD technician, Master Sgt. Richard Jamison points out, are trained well. "I would feel a lot safer taking care of an IED than if I were to climb a pole and work on high electricity," said Jamison, who handles program maintenance for the 514th EOD Flight and is the only full-time member. "We're trained for our jobs. We have tools that allow us to do things. We have robots, and if we can't use the robot, we use the bomb suit. We try to do things as remotely as possible. "We try to use more of a soft approach. Because of the nature of what happens, if we use too heavy handed an approach, we may accomplish the bomber's job," Jamison said. "You get your hands into everything," Jamison said. "Rappelling, ruck marches, there's base support where we're covering the base and the local populous in some instances. (EOD units) are the hazardous-device countermeasure support for the Secret Service." EOD airmen receive training on fighter planes' weapons systems to handle explosive ordnance on downed planes, for example hung bombs and jammed guns, Jamison said the 514th doesn't typically support fighter planes, but worked on planes diverted from Atlantic City and hung flares of C-17 Globemasters here. Jamison, who has been in the military since 1978, said the 514th has supported the last three U.S. presidential inaugurations, the World Economic Forum, the United Nations General Assembly and the G8 Summit. "If Barack Obama were to come here today, sometime prior to his arrival our EOD team would be sweeping things," Jamison said. "They'd be looking at the route he'd be on. They'd be looking at where he's going to stand, where he's going to arrive. Before his airplane lands, there's a truck or car with an EOD guy who runs up and down the runway." Klob, who works for the U.S. Department of State as a civilian, said members of the 514th can get tasked to support dignitaries and events just about anywhere in the world. Jamison and Klob are sitting in the break room of the EOD shop shared by the 514th and the active-duty 87th EOD Flight. Klob points out some of the mementos hanging on the walls, from places like Moscow, Holland and Pittsburgh. "It makes for an interesting existence when one day you're in your flak vest and armor, working on an IED or UXO here in the local area, then two days later you're in a suit with the Secret Service someplace, protecting the President," Klob said. "And," Jamison adds, "(as an EOD technician) you get to blow stuff up." FIRE IN THE HOLE! It's Saturday around 2:30 p.m. and four members of the 514th drove to McGuire's range to satisfy a monthly demolition requirement. Jamison packs together half-pound sheets of Flex-X - a flexible explosive reminiscent of silly putty. Holes are poked into the explosive and a metal clip is attached. Jamison and Senior Airman Phillip Young head to the far end of the range, where they insert a blasting cap into the explosive's clip. The blasting cap is linked to wires running the length of the range below ground. Back at the near end of the range, Senior Master Sgt. Frank Bruno, corrections officer in his civilian life, tests the line. Jamison and Young return to the near end of the range, where Bruno holds a box-shaped device which sends a charge through the underground wires to the blasting cap. "Fire in the hole!" Bruno shouts three times with everything he has, alerting anyone unseen in the vicinity. The range is surrounded by nothing but forest and a nonresidential section of a busy street. Bruno holds down the "charge" button, and in a few seconds a light indicates the box is charged. He presses a button to release the charge. The range's far end, buttressed by a cement-wall structure, is rocked by an ear-drum-jarring blast and an upheaval of upward-traveling, gray smoke. Two more Flex-X packs are detonated. The crew then bundles three thermite grenades together. An outdated, artillery shell is partially buried in sand at the range's center. The bundle is then nestled on top of the shell. The thermite, once activated, generates a sphere of sparkling light too bright to look at directly. When the reaction dies down, it melted a hole the diameter of a soccer ball through the metal. The crew members clean up, pack their gear and head back to the shop for their next training commitments. IT TAKES A SPECIAL KIND EOD is one of a handful of Air Force careers that are entirely voluntary. After basic training, hopefuls head to Lackland Air Force Base near San Antonio, where they put in long hours studying. If they excel there, they are brought to Naval School Explosive Ordnance Disposal at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida. There, for nine months, they learn about nearly every conceivable explosive and undergo intense training. Jamison said Nav School EOD usually has a 40-to-60 percent failure rate. Instructors there take great pains to simulate the stressful situations technicians in the field face, he said. Thorough background checks further thin the field of candidates. Graduates receive the EOD Badge, or "Crab," and are accepted as full-fledged members of the EOD community, but their training doesn't stop. Reserve of the 514th EOD Flight are assigned a year of active duty with the 87th Air Base Wing. "It's hard for us to do everything we need to do to get them from a three level out of school to a five level," Klob said. "Its better they be here on active duty where they can get that day-in-day-out, every-day-of-the-week experience responding to local calls." Following their active-duty time, new members of the unit fulfill the traditional reservist commitment of one weekend a month and two weeks a year, Klob said. They also undergo weeks of tactics and combat-skills training prior to a deployment. CMSgt. O'Connor, whose civilian job is with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said members of the 514th see between 130 and 150 missions in their six-month deployments. "Some people don't even have a clue (Air Force EOD) is even here," Jamison said. "It's kind of funny and it's kind of frustrating. We'll operate outside the wire day in and day out (while deployed in a combat zone). Our Humvee breaks down, and the guy in the tow truck that comes out to get us gets written up like Audie Murphy." A LOT TO PACK IN During their training weekend, 514th members have to pack in a month's worth of training. Jamison has each member's training schedule, appointments and requisite paperwork lined up when they arrive, Klob said. Sometimes they can take care of Web-based training prior to the weekend, Klob said. As explosives, particularly IEDs, are ever evolving, so too must the Airmen constantly sharpen their skills. During the weekend they work with their tools, their equipment, their robots. One weekend might center on aircraft weapons systems, the next month might focus on IEDs, the next on chemical explosives, Klob said. "We run through a lot of practice problems, with a huge variety of conventional and improvised explosive devices, Young said. "Sergeant Jamison will set up a problem you might see in Iraq or Afghanistan and you'll have to go through your procedures." As part of his "spin-up" training prior to a scheduled deployment to Kuwait, Young goes on 15-mile rucks - a team-building exercise in which servicemembers travel long distances wearing gear plus 50 to 75 additional pounds. The flight will run night operations, O'Connor said, to simulate the problems EOD technicians face in Iraq and Afghanistan. "When you take away the daylight, it makes it much more difficult. We run night operations so folks will become familiar with their equipment, understand the limitations of their equipment at night." During the training weekend, the flight also has two or three members on standby, to respond to local calls on and off base. MULTI-FACETED JOB How EOD personnel respond to possible explosives depends on the threat to people and property. They may wear different gear depending on the type of explosive. "Every scenario's different," Jamison said. "You might have something that should be simple, but is suddenly complicated because of corrosion or something like that." "Or a security situation deteriorating rapidly," Klob added. EOD also performs post-blast analysis, attempting to piece back components to determine what was used in the attack, how it was triggered and who triggered it, Jamison said. Because IEDs in the war zones are sometimes "come-ons" - blasts designed to draw coalition forces to larger IED setups - they respond to blasts cautiously. WE ARE FAMILY All four services have EOD technicians. All go to the same schools and generally receive the same training, Klob said, the one exception being the Navy's underwater capability. All four perform similar missions in combat zones, he said. "We all like each other," Klob said. "You get EOD guys from any branch together and it's like a big, reunion party." "If an Army unit were to come through to go do something, and they check into the EOD shop here, we would take care of them," Jamison said. "And they would do the same for us. It's kind of a brotherhood." A DOSE OF REALITY People sign up for the EOD career field for a variety of reasons. Many like the prospect of saving hundreds or thousands of lives over the course of a career. Some are adrenaline junkies. Others are drawn to state-of-the-art equipment, tools, robotics, vehicles and gear. For others still, it's simply the lure of blowing things up. Members of the 514th EOD Flight like to meet and interview people interested in signing up with them. "They see what movies show them, they hear what the recruiter tells them and they have this preconceived idea of what it is to actually do this job," Klob said. "We like to dispel them of any myths and explain the commitment they'll have to give in order to be a part of our team. "You understand you're going to be operating outside the wire. We work in extreme heat, in 90-pound suits. Sometimes we work in extreme cold. You understand the time commitment. We have experienced casualties. Is that something you and your loved ones are prepared for?" Klob said. "At the same time, if they're looking at movies and think that's what their going to do every day, that's not entirely accurate either. You're not going to be running down to an IED with wire cutters."