August 14, 2024 • 54 mins
Join us today as we dive into the world of a US Army EOD Officer. Our guest Rich Stone does not disappoint.
TripWire and the KGRA DB Family are honored to have Rich in the studio as we discuss growing up on the east coast, college, ROTC and the path back to Fort Gregg-Adams, 4 times!!
Tune in for a great time with Veterans and Veteran stories!!
TripWire and the KGRA DB Family are honored to have Rich in the studio as we discuss growing up on the east coast, college, ROTC and the path back to Fort Gregg-Adams, 4 times!!
Tune in for a great time with Veterans and Veteran stories!!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Good afternoon. Everybody had set time again for trip Wire.
It is Wednesday afternoon at four pm, the fourteenth of August.
Where has the year gone by? The kg R A
family and myself and trip Wire are honored to have
mister Richard dick Stone here with us for our podcast today.
Rich how the hell are you, sir? Good? Good?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
How's it going?
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Good? Good? Thank you for joining us today. Really excited
about story time and us talking about you know, from
prior to the military, all going into you know, where
you're at now and what you're doing and you know,
sharing that with our audience. And I'm sitting in my truck.
I'm having problems with the computer, so just for this
(01:23):
for our audience, I'm using my phone, but with the
Virginia heat, I ain't sitting outside, so I'm using the
AC in the truck. But you look quite comfortable. Is
that your Is that your man cave you got there
that you're in.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah, this is the one room in the house that
that I get to decorate.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
So a lot is that? Does that not include the garage?
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Fifty fifty on the garage, depending on if the wife
is doing antiquing or not.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Got it? Awesome? Good deal, good deal. Well thanks again
for joining us. You know our our our return listeners
are listeners period or love to hear these stories from veterans.
I've been on kind of a kick. This is not
an eod eccentric type of of podcast, but it seems
(02:12):
like a bomb squad. Guys. You know that we're just
lining up like dominos getting ready to knock over. So
we knocked these knocked these shows out. It's awesome.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Oh yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
All right, where let's let's start with where are you
originally from? Where'd you grow up? And what led you
to the United States Army? And I'm not going to
tell anybody. I'm I'm gonna let the cat out. You
let the cat out of the bag. Okay. As far
as how you came into the Army, all.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Right, sounds good. So I grew up I was born
in New Jersey, but immediately pretty much moved to Pennsylvania.
Grew up Pennsylvania doing everything outdoors, cub Scouts, boy scouts, camping,
loving it. I knew from a really young age that
I wanted to join the Army, probably five or six.
(03:01):
That was just like the thing I wanted to do.
I was like I want to grow up. I want
to be an army man. I want to be out
in the woods, crawling around, getting moddy, doing all the
cool stuff that was just like my thing my whole childhood.
And moved back to New Jersey in twenty twelve ish,
I think twenty eleven, twenty twelve, just Pennsylvania got old
(03:25):
and we decided to move back in with my grandmother.
She was getting a little older in age. Decided to
help her out around the house or no, not twenty twelve.
Two thousand and two, Yeah, two thousand and two, two
thousand and three, yeah, wo making myself seem younger than
I am now, so good.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
We'll talk about that trauma later on the show. I've
received a lot of it. You know, as Gingers, we
seem to be uh we seem to find it when
we least expected. So there you go.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Yeah, absolutely, two thousand and two.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
You moved back to Jersey's he helping out grandma.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Yep, Yeah, moved back, moved back in with with grandma.
My parents too. We we helped take care of her
while she aged out and got older in life. Started
looking at options for the military. As I grew a
little bit older, two thousand and five, two thousand and
six ish, right when I was a sophomore junior in
high school, I was really looking at what I want
(04:23):
to do. Uh, my whole family prior prior military on
the on my father's side and my mother's side, but
most of them were Navy. So for some reason I
decided to break the tradition of going navy and decided
I wanted to join the Army. A lot of it
was probably from my dad talking about all the horror
stories of being on a boat for months at a time,
(04:45):
not seeing any land, just seeing straight water, and he
said it got to him. So that wasn't something that
I was about.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Yeah, that's I get understand that thanks a special kind
of person to be on a even a even an
aircraft carrier where there's spy thousand people who you're surrounded
by people, but to be out in the middle of
the ocean and not see land for a long time,
I can't imagine what kind of a mindset that leaves
you with, you know.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yeah, absolutely, my dad was on an aircraft care and
he was down at the bottom so didn't get to
see much of the top much. So that really steered
me away from want to join the Navy right off
the bat.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Yeah, not only out in the middle of the water.
But he doesn't get daylight very much either, A good
lord though.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
He told me a lot of good stories of what
would happen down in the hole.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
So yeah, I can imagine. I can imagine, Joe. So
when did you graduate? Graduate high school? As I I'm
going to start throwing questions out there based on what
you're bringing to the table, So when did you graduate
high school?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Graduate high school in two thousand and nine, and the
year prior, I had received an Army ROTC scholarship for
full four years to get my bachelor's so I went
ahead and signed that. So when I graduated high school,
I knew auto addically that I was going to go
to college for four years, do the ROTC program, and
(06:04):
then ohe the military at least four years to pay
back that college time.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Nice. Nice. So okay, high school two thousand and nine,
you said, right, I got term memory crap, So where
were you when nine to eleven happened?
Speaker 2 (06:24):
So nine to eleven I remember it. I was in
fifth grade and I was sitting in I remember the
teacher's name. I'm going to just leave it out for
you know, we don't out there, but remember it very vividly.
He was a great teacher, absolutely loved him. And I
just remembered kids started getting called out of class, and
I mean I was young, fifth grade. I don't remember
(06:45):
the age, but two thousand.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
And back in back in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Still yeah, yeah, still back in Pennsylvania. Kids started getting
called out of class. And then I think my mom
was working in the school doing like a book fair.
She would help out with it. She was able to
get in touch with me in my class and tell
me what had happened, and we went home for the day,
and then we just put on the news and I
remember just watching those old clips on those huge TVs,
(07:13):
nothing flat screen, of just the replays of what had happened.
And I already knew at that point that I had
wanted to join the army. And seeing those events and
then the months after of what had happened, like going
into Iraq, going in Afghanistan, still didn't change my mind.
It growing up as a teenager, it's still one hundred
percent what I wanted to do.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Wow, that's crazy. So I was actually I was at
seven eighty NINEVOD company down and what used to be
Fort Benning, Georgia. Married at the time, my ex wife
was she's from the Boston area. Calls me up and
I vividly remember saying to her on the phone, what
(07:53):
Jack Gass ran as Sessna into the twin towers? You know,
like maybe there was fog and he got disoriented or
whatever it is in a horrible accident. But nope, not
at all. Here we go enter twenty years of Iraq
and Afghanistan. But and I remember it was a little
bit before your time. I remember where I was when
(08:15):
the Space Shuttle exploded, when it to go, you know,
in the eighties. So yeah, it's funny how certain things
stick out in your mind. You'll never forget exactly what,
Like you can remember odors and smells of that day
and stuff of what's going on too. You know. You
just it's crazy how that happened.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Your mind just takes you right back to the scene.
Everything smells, sound, you can hear it everything.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Yeah, yeah, all right, So got the scholarship, went to college.
Which college you go to? Where'd you graduate from?
Speaker 2 (08:52):
So I went to two colleges, one strictly for the
ROTC program that was Rutgers University in East Brunswick, and
then I would do my actual classes for my bachelor's
and criminal justice down in Mammatus University and West Long
Branch about forty five fifty minutes apart, so I would
just commute back and forth, still living at my grandmother's
(09:15):
slash parents' house.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Yeah, I got you and everything, so everything was on track.
You got you got it all done in the four
years that you.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Yeah, so do an RTC. The whole time I was
in the RTC program, I thought I wanted to be infantry.
That was my number one thing. I always wanted to
be infantry. That was exactly what I wanted to do.
Going to the summer program l d act's Leader Development
Assessment Course that I did in twenty twelve, I put
(09:47):
infantry number one list or number one on my list,
is exactly what I wanted. But during that l DAC
that summer out in Fort Lewis, during the branch day,
I was walking around and I saw the EOD table
and I honestly didn't even know what EOD was at
the time. I hadn't really looked into it. I knew
what it was, but I was dead set on infantry,
(10:08):
So I didn't even consider anything else until I walked
up to the table when I saw the robot the
bomb suits set up and it just looked really cool.
I started talking. I don't even remember the recruiter's name,
started talking to him and really liked what he had
to say about the job and what it means and
the brotherhood that stands behind it. So I signed the
volunteer paperwork right there, which I didn't know at the time,
(10:31):
was gonna guarantee me a slot to go to EOD
school based on the I guess the little bit lack
of officers for that year, which then wound up being
a huge over strength number. Right, Yeah, so dead set
on infantry. And then fast forward to Fall semester twenty twelve. Yeah,
(10:52):
Fall twenty twelve, I find out that I didn't get
infantry and I got ordinance with EOD Select or EOD
pre Select, so I was I was a little devastated
at first. I was like, damn, I didn't get infantry.
That was what I wanted since I was little, That's
what I wanted to sleep outside, sleep in a hole
and you know, shoot guns and stuff. I was a
little I was a little tore up a little bit
(11:15):
at first, and then I just kind of said out, whatever, uh,
maybe this was meant to be. Let's let's roll with
it and just see what happens. And thankfully was the
greatest thing that could happen to me, not getting infantry
based on talking to some buddies that I graduated college
with and hearing the horror stories to uh me going
(11:36):
to you D school and that becoming the greatest thing
that I could have done for my army career.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah. Yeah, So so you got selected for the organs
core and infantry is in a different core, yep, So
share that with our our not all of our not
all of our viewers are our veterans, So would you
please share how that how that works in the army
based on the different cores in the army.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Okay, yeah, yeah, absolutely, So each different corps in the Army,
there's there's a bunch of them. You've got infantry, Armor, Ordinance, transportation, quartermaster,
so on and so forth. Those are just all your
different basically main categories of jobs, and then you've got
your your sub jobs that fall under those categories, and
(12:24):
each one represents a different function for the military, and
then that's based on your MOS military occupational specialty fits
into one of those cores, and then based on that
determines what units you're going to go into and what
your force structure looks like.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Right, so you got selected for Ordinance Corps. So what
I'm going to share with them is is that pre
selected for YOUO D school. Had you gone to you
D school and not made it through you D E school,
then what would what would you fall back on as
far as your career in the military.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
So if I would have failed, I would have fallen
back on being an ordnance officer, which a lot of
people think when they hear ordinance, they specifically think they
deal with the ammunition bombs. But the Ordnance Corp in
the Army does a lot of logistical work, a lot
of trucks, even though you would think Transportation Corps does
a lot of that. Ordnance also helps facilitate that with
(13:25):
all their mechanics and wheeled vehicle mechanics. So the Ordnance
Corps really does a lot more than just ammo and explosives.
But I would have fallen back on one of those
jobs and most likely ended up in a logistics unit,
probably Ford sport company, would have ended up being a
maintenance platoon leader and probably would not have had as
(13:47):
fun of a career as I could have had.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Well, thank god, do you survive tood school? Because that
sounds very boring. And I say that only because it's
the two of us talking on it. You know, if
I get I get some other veteran who's an organ
score logistics guy, I'm gonna be like, wow, that sounds fascinating.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Oh no, I have. I mean, I have complete respect
for every corn army they learning each one and stepping
outside of EOD and learning what everyone else did, spending
a little time in logistics that I'm sure we're going
to get into. I have respect for every single other
job and army. Each one has a lot of uniqueness
to it. That just wasn't something that I wanted to do, right,
(14:34):
I get it, but I get it still special?
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Yeah, absolutely agreed. Agreed. That's I mean a couple of
weeks back, maybe a month or so ago, now, I
interviewed an infantry guy that I think he did twelve
fourteen years and now he owns wack of black whack
could do brewery out in Colorado's brings you know a
(15:03):
lot of times it's what we take from the military
is just our management and leadership skills, and we try
to apply them in the civilian life, which at times
is difficult. We can get into that later, but you know,
there's a lot to bring from any type of position
that you had in any branch of the service, regardless
of your mos, there are invaluable lessons learned.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So oh yeah, absolutely, I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
All right, So, graduated college. Where'd you go? Did you
knock out ocs in between semesters or what'd you do?
Speaker 2 (15:39):
So? Graduated college, commissioned in May of twenty thirteen, and
I got selected to go teach at it's called LTC
Lead Leaders Leaders Training Course, I think Fort Knox, Kentucky.
It was a program under the ROTC program that say
a student joined their second or third year, they go
(16:02):
to this LTC camp for thirty days and it catches
them up to speed on basic soldier skills and then
they go back to their college and they're all caught
up with the rest of their class. So I went
there for I was there for maybe forty days, and
then came to Fort Lee which is now Fort greg
Adams in Virginia, went there and started my Basic Officer
(16:25):
Leadership course in September of twenty thirteen. Graduated that right
around Christmas, No, it was right after Christmas.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I remember.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
We came back from Christmas break and graduated, and then
I started Phase one eot E School right there at
Fort Lee, which Fort greg Adams now started right there
Phase one eot E School, which then many years later
went back to go teach at, which was an awesome
experience as well. We'll get into graduated phase one. I
(16:58):
think going through Phase one I tapped one or failed
one test. Other than that, smooth sailing, everything was. It
was making a lot of sense to me. I always
had a grown up I was very mechanical and want
to take things apart and figure out how it worked.
My parents would always come outside of the garage and
I had the radio and five hundred pieces and I'm
(17:20):
seeing how it all fits back together. So a lot
a lot of that stuff kind of came naturally to
me and really interested me. So I was interested to
learn a lot about it. So it was it was difficult,
but definitely I think doing a lot of that stuff
growing up definitely helped me figure things out. A lot quicker.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Oh, it's great, that's fantastic. So you graduated Phase one
and then off to Eglin Air Force Base for EOT school.
How was that experience in uh? Uh? Did you start
with a surface class or an underwater class or a
water class A Navy class?
Speaker 2 (17:59):
No, started with the surface class. Started in March of fourteen. Yeah,
started in March or fourteen, started in a surface class
and continued with that class all the way until Id's.
(18:20):
The ID division is where I double tapped my first
test and ended up rolling into another surface class, two
classes behind my original class. So we graduated about a
month different.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Got you? Got you?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Graduated, graduated Phase two EOD school in December fourteen and
was able to go on Christmas break in between, and
then showed up to Fort Campbell in January fifteen, first
duty station as a EOD platoon leader with the forty
nine A COOD company.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Nice. How'd you like Campbell? Did you go to air school?
Speaker 2 (19:02):
I did so. It was the second time I went
to aerosault school. The first time I went, I was
in college and I ended up rolling down a hill
and busting my knee up and I couldn't finish the
thee It was the six mile up march halfway through,
couldn't finish it. So got to go back when I
was an actual platoon leader at for Campbell, and there
(19:23):
was a big push at the time to have all
the EUD companies one hundred percent air so qualified they
wanted to get the banners on their company guide ons.
So I was able to go with like ninety percent
of my platoon, which made it absolutely enjoyable. Just having
everyone else around you that's going through the same amount
of torture and pain and they're all still trying to
(19:46):
laugh about it. Cracking those jokes that all the EOD
people seemed to make in the worst situations possible just
really helped me carry through and made it a breeze.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Yeah, that's great. The U. I'm just I was just
doing the math and in my head. So in a
couple of months, you're ten years out of school.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
Yeah yep, ten year yeah wow yeah yeah, get an
old on us.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Yeah, you know, I got to bust your chops because
you're much more youthful than I am, So I just
I have to mess with you. Yeah, I'm that. I'm
that contankerus old man in the office. So oh and
by the way, I want to I want to share
with the our viewers that you know this this relationship
is because we currently work together right now here at
(20:33):
UH at Port Greg Adams.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
So, uh, I stare at each other over the cubicle wall.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Yeah, well, tall people can do that. There are a
lot of leprechauns running around the office area, so you know,
they can't see over the partition walls and stuff, and
it's it's comical. So uh airssault. Yeah, I did it
in uh when the hell did I do it? I
did it in four two thousand and four. Okay, did
(20:59):
you know it because we got or oh, yeah, did
it at Campbell We got back from I think it
did it in February two, which was lovely that the
temperatures were loved. Yeah, that was a great time back then.
So we got back from seventy ninth, got back from
Baghdad in April of four. That was an election year.
(21:19):
So not only are we doing VIPs backstop in pre
deployment training up, but I at the time was working
on my team leader certification picking up staff sergeant and
then became a team leader. Prior to going to Afghanistan
in May of five, so you're back just over a
year and then you know, we did the six month
(21:41):
tour in Afghanistan, you know five, So yeah, Ariosalt it
was good. I enjoyed it. I liked jumping on the
helicopters attached to a rope, so it was cool.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Yeah, yeah, it was fun. Had a good time.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, they were, they were screaming at us back then.
They're like, don't you dare do the Hollywood stuff, you
know where you kick off from the aircraft and then
you fast track it all the way down the rope
until you're like ten meters off the ground and then
then apply the brakes. Right, people still did it. Yeah,
people still did it. But whatever.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Did they have? They have the point system when you
went like if you had a uniform deficiency, you would
get a point and you can only get a certain
amount of points. Oh no, no, no, no, oh man, I
got on my first day max you could get. You
got what I got, So you could have get forty
(22:36):
points before you get removed from the course. And it
was our first day there, day zero or negative one whatever.
The first day is. Yeah, they're coming around doing uniform
inspections and they're giving people five points off or having
a button unbuttoned, or ten points off if they're if
they're not wearing their belt or something. So one of
(22:57):
the their assault instructors comes up to me and looks
up at me and take tells me to take my
PC off. And I cut the liners out of the
inside of my my hat. It sits better on my head,
and it's a lot better in the summertime. It's a
lot cooler because it's less material. Right, So I popped
down my cap and he goes, unauthorized uniform modification. That's
(23:20):
forty points And I was like what And I was like,
what does that mean. It's like that means you can't
get any more points the whole time you're here. I
was like, oh, yeah, to change that hat the next
day and was able to ride it out the whole
time after that, thankfully.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah, no, they didn't. They didn't have the points system
back then. But I mean back then, everybody was doing
that whole battle of you know, we're in a school,
we're doing aursalt a, we wearing brains, we wearing PCs,
you know, that type of stuff. So it just every
I'm sure every class does their own thing, and you know,
in different time frame, has their own problems with whatever
(23:59):
it's school. But you know, I do remember, I do
remember that they told us that that was the twelve
twelve toughest days of the middle of the Army, right
there with the assault school.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So yeah, I do remember hearing that. Yeah, the I
remember them joke. I remember them talking about the obstacle
course and I'm like, it can't be that hard. It's
an obstacle course. I've done it a million times. And
then they don't tell you about all the physical physical
torture before that. No, and then your whole trying to
get up over something and your your whole body is
(24:32):
just completely smoked and tired, and it's totally different than
doing it on a on a fresh day.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Yeah, well I was, so, I was like two hundred
and thirty pounds. You know, I was one of the
soldiers that always got tape because I'm a big dude
in here. You there, yep, yep, I got you, I
got you right, Okay. So I was one of those
dudes that that always had to do the tape at
(25:00):
for a PT test, even though I'd score in the
you know, between two eighty and two ninety and they
put me at the top of the of the sliding
wall and they've got this five foot three, five foot four,
five foot nothing a female soldier on belat for me. Uh.
That was interesting because she's trying to, you know, trying
(25:20):
to stop me from sliding down the wall, and oh
my lord, it was not good. And then we did
the fast rope and I landed on the guy below
me that went right before me because I came down
faster than he did because I was heavier than he was. Anyway,
all these good stories some times. Yeah, so Campbell's your
(25:40):
first duty station? What, uh what kind of mission were
you guys? Yeah, having Campbell so I mean you're you're
obviously there for fourteen, You're you're obviously there for Fort Campbell,
So what do you what were you doing for permission?
Out of that unit? There was what was your area
(26:02):
of support?
Speaker 2 (26:04):
So Fort Campbell it's I guess unique in its own
ways because it's got five at the time, I think
it's less now. Back then twenty fifteen, there were five
separate EOD companies that were not only training up for
combat deployments because we were still in Iraq and Afghanistan
at the time, among other things, doing support to Secret
(26:27):
Service for we call them zips, going out and providing support,
helping out Secret Service with stuff, Providing support for local
law enforcement if they find any sort of military ordinance,
or conducting training courses classes identification of like UXO's or
(26:48):
unexploded ordinances. We used to teach that a lot, not
only a Fort Campbell but also later on when I
got to be a company commander out in Alaska, just
responsible for a whole bunch of different things. While I
was at Fort Campbell, I had a lot of cool
opportunities for my career. Got to be an eighty platoon
leader the whole time I was at Fort Campbell up
(27:09):
until we got back from a deployment. Got to go
on a ton of itps, doing a lot of cool things,
seeing a lot of cool stuff. Those were always very
fun and enjoyable. See what else. I got to go
down to Fort Jackson and do what we call the
backstop mission, which is yeah, covering response areas for locations
(27:34):
where there's not companies providing support. That was a pretty
cool opportunity because it was my first experience in working
right away from like the rest of the unit and
you know, my company commander, so seeing how I could
do on my own, and I think that definitely helped
playoff doing that backstop mission because there's just myself and
(27:54):
two teams. We were there for three and a half
months just on our own, and that was a really
really good training opportunity to teach me how to manage
stuff on my own and manage at my level, not
always having to rely on like my boss being in
the same location as me.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Right right, Yeah, those backstop missions for our audience, the
backstop missions are you were there with two teams as
a platoon leader and you're covering down on Fort Jackson's
area of operation or area of responsibility. I think is
more important. I think is more accurately said. Yeah, that's
because their units are currently forward deployed to either Iraq
(28:33):
Afghanistan at the time, and that's why you're covering down
for them. Yep. I just wanted to throw that out
there for our audience. So, so, how how many years
did you stay at Campbell as a pl.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
So was at Campbell until August of twenty sixteen, so
all twenty fifteen and then building up I want to
say February March. It was right when I had gotten
back from the Jackson Backstop mission, got told that there
was going to be a platoon in the company that
(29:07):
was deploying to Syria and Turkey that was not my platoon.
My platoon was going to go to Africa to do
some HMA missions, and then the third platoon was going
to stay back here as the rear detachment, right, gotcha.
So all of our train up and build up was
(29:28):
geared towards going to Africa, whereas the other platoon was
geared up going towards doing a deployment in support of
conventional forces and special forces Syria and Turkey right now.
So we did all our train up, did all of
our online certifications to do the HMA missions in Africa,
and then three to four weeks before that original platoon,
(29:52):
or three to four weeks before we were getting ready
to go. What's going on about it?
Speaker 1 (30:03):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Go ahead, got it? I'm sorry, I'll be right there. Okay, okay, sorry,
if you're fine. About about three weeks before we were
(30:27):
set to go to Africa, the one platoon had already
left to go to Syria and Turkey, and we got
told that the two other platoons and the company headquarters
was also going to Iraq to support that same deployment.
Uh so all of our training last minute changed to
going to do an h m A stuff to going
to Iraq, which I thought was cool because I was like, cool,
(30:51):
I get to deploy as a platoon leader. This is awesome.
Read platoon leader, let alone a neo D platoon leader
is an awesome job to have, especially in a deployment byronment.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Right.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
I got super excited that everyone was going. Was going
through my divorce at the time, so didn't really wasn't
leaving anything back here, no kids at the time, so
I was excited to go and get to do the
job for real in a in a combat environment.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Yeah, yeah, I get it. So for our audience, would
you explain what HM.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Is so humanitarian? It's going to locations that have unexploded
ordinance or other things and teaching local identification on it
so that way they don't get a they don't wind
up blowing themselves up or getting hurt injured, and just
spread the awareness so everyone knows, hey, this thing looks weird,
(31:46):
let's not mess with it. It's probably could explode. So
just spread the awareness to make sure especially children. A
lot of children are wind up getting themselves hurt looking
at things that wind up looking like toys. So just
getting that awareness out there to keep people safe.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, which is a very important aspect of the job.
I mean, you know, absolutely perfect timing, your your that's
your son, Yes, is that correct? Your son? Yeah? Yeah, Okay,
he's uh, he doesn't have red hair, he's he's got
all blonde. What's going on there? Rich? Uh. We talked
(32:21):
about that at work. We were I was a towhead
when I was a kid too, so I get it. No, yeah,
but that's I'm glad he came into Gotta check with dad,
Gotta check with dad. That's awesome. So, but it is,
I mean, it is important to get back to it.
The h m A. The humanitarian is very important as
an aspect of what we do. You know, because local nationals,
(32:45):
specifically children, they don't know what they're messing with. Uh.
You know, these these items that are out there for
war uh. And Africa I think per capita, you know,
for the geographics is the most landmine laden continent in
the in the world. So and you know, I think
not that it's a competition, but I think some of
(33:05):
those countries felt like it was a competition as far
as how many landmines they could put out. So it's
just horrible. Yeah, it's horrible what happens to those children
over there.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
So yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of people don't think
of that, like the after effects of a war, a conflict.
They don't think about forty fifty years later, people are
still getting hurt or getting killed from things that were
left over from that. So I think it's great that
these organizations are going out there to clean stuff up
and help spread the awareness.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah. Well, and I'm sure you've heard of this, but
I'll share it with our audience. In the last twenty
thirty years, based on being EOD and knowing what I
know and the things I've done with my career, you
pay more attention to those articles that come up about
some farmer in one country in Europe that was you know,
(33:57):
till in his field and kicked up a gurnade and
it blew up on him, and the grenade, the grenades
from World War two, you know, those types of things.
So it happens. It happens more than people give it
credit to or or understand, you know, or that they
see right?
Speaker 2 (34:13):
So yeah, absolutely, all.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
Right, So Iraq, and let's start out with when did
you guys get to Iraq? How long was that deployment?
And let's go from there on the timeline of a
bridge Stone. I'm sure what was it, first lieutenant, second
lieutenant alert Stone at the time, first lieutenant.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was first lieutenant Dick Stone is what is what
the guys call me, guys and girls called me, which
I was totally behind and supported. I thought it was awesome.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Yeah, because your your grandfather's Richard, right, isn't it Rick? Correct? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yeah, So I'm the third and my grandfather he went
by Dick when he was in the Navy and growing
up and getting old. So I kind of do it
as a as an honor to him, and I think
it's also funny and hilarious at the same time.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Exactly. That's just because we're EOD and we do these things.
So right, so let's let's when did you guys you
went to Baghdad or where in Iraq did you go
for your deployment?
Speaker 2 (35:11):
So initially in August we flew to uh to Spain
first for a day or two. Then we ended up
in Kuwait, and then from Kuwait we ended up in
urbial Uh and that was where the company headquarters ended
up remaining the rest of the deployment. Initially they came
(35:33):
to other bases in Iraq with US, but we'll discuss
that later. Going back in the memory bank here, uh see,
I spent a little bit in our biel getting ready
and getting getting set to go to where we knew
we were going. We knew we were going to I
or Michaelatoon, and the company headquarters was first going to
(35:55):
a base called KR West or QR West Airfield q
West a lot of people know as it used to
be a US air base back in the early days
of Iraq. And then at some point it got turned
over to the Iraqi military, I think around twenty twelve
ish twenty thirteen maybe, and then when things kicked off
(36:16):
with ISIS and they're a big push to conquer Iraq,
the Iraqi Army was forced to flee out of Q
West and ISIS took it over, and their big plan
was to demolish everything. They ripped up plumbing lines, electrical,
they ripped up everything. And then I think July time frame,
(36:38):
July August to sixteen, the Iraqi Army was able to
take the base back or the land and then the
piles of rubble everywhere, and then we got to Iraq
and that was one of our goals was to go
to q West and clear any explosives that we could
find IDs and just make sure that it was a
safe area to rebuild as a aging area or airbase
(37:01):
to eventual plan to conquer Iis through the zool.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
Gotcha got you? So that that's uh, that's that's interesting.
So both of both my times of Bagdad were prior
to the Sofa Agreement, So US government was still in
control of the judicial and other things in the country
at the time when I was there. So I'm sure
things were much different when you were there at that
(37:29):
time in your in your career, so and and how
long were you in that how long were you in
that rank?
Speaker 2 (37:37):
We came back in April, so it was a nine
month deployment or just shy of no, I think it
was full nine months. Yeah, uh, great, great deployment. Thankfully,
no one in the platooner company was killed. We did
have a couple injuries, one serious injury not in my platoon,
(37:57):
but affected us because he had he stepped on an
id and wound up ripping all the skin off his
arm and blowing part of his butt cheek off. But
he's doing fine now out of the military. Is still
still a hilarious guys love him to death. Still, one
of my team leaders had to go up and cover
(38:18):
that team leader that had gotten injured and flown back home.
So I had the opportunity to run for a couple
of weeks, as I had gotten my team leaders certification
prior to deployment by a couple of months, so I
was able to run a couple of missions as a
team leader when all my teams were out fragged out
doing missions, or if I only had one team there
(38:38):
and the team leader was beat from running three four
days missions, I was helping cover down for him. And
great experience because at the time, well yeah, I guess
out throughout their whole career, but the officers east side
of the house don't really get the opportunity to do
the real job of a team leader. Some do, some don't.
(38:58):
I'm just thankful, through the unfortunate circumstances that I was
able to get that real world experience and actually get
to do the job that everyone trains to do going
through you D school.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Right, Yeah, that's awesome, that's awesome. And I'm sure that
you have counterparts that didn't have didn't didn't get to
the opportunity to have that exposure as and run as
a team leader like you did.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
So yeah, yeah, so I've just everything worked out right place,
right time, I guess, And that's great. Really happy I
got that opportunity. I'm really happy with everyone that I
got to work with on that deployment. My my platoon,
they they did awesome work. We got to cover the
full spectrum of EO D stuff. We got to cover
(39:46):
conventional munitions, improvised munitions, we got to cover chemical munitions.
We even got to cover some radiological stuff that was
left over from the air base. So we got to
cover that full, full spectrum of the operations, which was
pretty awesome. So we got the experience it all, which
was great, and Aaron had a great time. No one
(40:08):
got in any serious trouble, which was the most important
thing besides you know coming back all.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
Yeah, well, you know, it's uh, the coming home thing
is always it doesn't apply unless you're actually you know,
like got a Nellis Air Force Base but what happens
in Vegas stays in Vegas. That's you know, what happens
when we get home, stays off the freaking off the
blot or should That's the way we need to try
and do it right. So yeah, because we do blow
(40:37):
off a lot of steam. So okay, So you had
the one deployment and then where were you in your
in your career and how where do we go from
here with with this the timeframe for you on active duty?
Speaker 2 (40:51):
So came back from deployment and got promoted to captain
just basically an auto promotion. Didn't you know, get a
DUI didn't killing anybody. So made the made the promotion
list and got promoted to captain. And after that immediately
went to work at the eu D Battalion there at
Fort Campbell short term until I went to eu D
(41:13):
Captains Career Course. Got to go to the first billeted
u D Captains Career Course, so it wasn't just the
regular logistics and it was coded as the u D
Career Course.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
From there I got and that was a I want
to say, eight month long career course. It was pretty
long course. It was full PCs And where was that
at that was also back at Fort Lee Fort gerg Adams,
So I've been to I've been to Fort Lee a
lot for Yeah, I knew there real well. Anyway, going
(41:48):
through career course, uh, it was kind of hit or
miss based on if you're going to go to an
eu D unit after that, if you're going to go
to a logistics unit. Well, it was called the u
D Captain's Career Corps. We got quite a few months
of basic logistics blocks of instructions, so learning how other
logistics officers do logistation work, and then we would break
(42:12):
off after that and do the EOD specific career course
focused course material. So coming out of it, we were
still a fully certified logistics officer, so we could still
go to a logistics unit, but coming out of career course,
I had orders to go to Alaska Joint Base Almador,
(42:34):
Richardson and Anchorage, which the wife fully supported. She was
super excited to go to Alaska, which made the whole
thing a lot easier. I didn't have the sun at
the time, it was just us, so we were like,
let's do it. Let's go to Alaska. It'll be an
awesome experience. Thought I was going up to take command
of a seven to sixteenth DoD company there at Fort
(42:57):
Richardson or Joint Base Almador. Richardson got there only to
find out that there was already another captain waiting to
take command, and the administrative side of the army had
not realized that he was waiting there. So for a
year and a half while he was in command at
the U D Company, I got to work in a
(43:18):
logistics unit a CSSB, and I got to do a
couple different things. It was like a shotgun blast in
the face having to learn how to do logistics work
when I've never experienced it before. So I was learning
a lot from the enlisted that I got to work with,
(43:41):
and the junior officers, the second lieutenant's first lieutenants that
had been to Bullock and had spent some time in
a logistics unit. I learned a lot from them, coming
out of just doing EOD work my whole career, come
in there having to teach me a lot, which was great.
I ended up doing that for a year and a
half and then it was my time to take command
(44:03):
of the EOD company there at Fort Richardson. Took command
of that company in December of twenty nineteen, which two
weeks before that is also when we had our son,
which was perfect timing. Let's take company command at the
same time we have a toddler, or not a toddler,
a newborn, so timing. But I was always up in
(44:27):
time for work, never slept through an alarm because I
was just always awake. So right, but it worked out.
One funny joke about that real quick is right. When
I took command, we went to a thirty day training
in Fort Johnson, Louisiana, used to be called Fort Polk.
(44:49):
I went there three weeks after take command, and it's
a called the Joint Redness Training Center. It's known for
being extremely realistic training. You're not getting a lot of sleep,
so everyone was getting four hours of sleep a night,
probably a little less, but I was getting three four
hours of uninterrupted sleep, not having a baby waking up crying,
(45:09):
so I was. I was a shaper and always super energetic,
and everyone's everyone's dragging ass and real tired. So that
was kind of a that was a funny experience.
Speaker 1 (45:18):
Well, I don't know when they stopped teaching it, Uh
you know, eod, I mean, you know, I guess maybe
I got immersed into it in three. But uh, the
four hours is the norm for when you're when you're
an EOD guy. So you know, I mean if they
if they didn't, if your company wasn't ready or you're yeah,
(45:38):
you're your guys on your company weren't ready to handle
the only the four hours of sleep down there at
j RTC, then I feel for them. I you know,
that's that's that's rough for them when they haven't been
training for it to begin with. Yeah. Yeah, So so
you did thirty days down there and then rotated back
to Alaska. That must have been fun, right in the
(45:59):
middle winter. You guys leave the frozen tundra up north
and then come down here to Louisiana, which is probably
what in the sixties and maybe seventies eighties.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Yeah, it was. So we left I think it was
like negative seventeen, negative twenty degrees. We left Alte got
to Fort Polk Fort Johnson now and it was eighty
two eighty three degrees. He immediately because we're one hundred
degree temperature change, we're dying.
Speaker 1 (46:27):
At good Lord. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
But had a great rotation training rotation. All the guys
and girls that went with me had great time, no
one got injured, everyone had fun, which was good, and
still got some good training out of it. Came back
and spent the full eighteen months in company command. During
(46:55):
that time, got to do a lot of amazing things.
No deployments out of it, but did get to do
a lot of work with law enforcement, the Anchorage Police Department,
bomb Squad, the FBI, got to do a ton of
cross training and just just building that camaradity with with
those outside organizations outside of the Army that still do
(47:15):
the same job. And it's I think that's just the
greatest experience of getting able to work with all these
agencies as well.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
Sure, sure, good deal.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Yeah, finished out Company command, Uh, amazing, amazing time and command.
I would go to meetings in Alaska and I would
hear other company commanders great complain moan about having to
come in on the weekend doing all this crazy stuff
and having a you know, reprimand people this and that.
I I didn't have to do any of that. So
(47:46):
either everyone was real good at hiding it from me
and I did a terrible job, or I know that
it was I had. I had an amazing group of people,
guys and girls. They were they were outstanding. My job easy.
I could have not existed and the company would have
been absolutely fine. They they were just it was. It
(48:08):
was if it was a sewing machine, if it was
running smooth the entire eighteen months. No, it was just
it was great, amazing experience. Never dealt with any of
the any of that going up on the weekends picking
up you know. Yeah, craziness.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
Well, not that I'm gonna left the cat out of
the bag about myself. But you know, if if who
is now Colonel Cousins, he was a captain at the
time and the commander of our unit back you know
three when we went to Bagdad, if he had heir,
I probably would have gave him a lot of great hair.
But he doesn't have any hair, so and I can't
even say that he lonched his hair because of me either,
So you know, it is, it is what it is.
(48:48):
But okay, see you finished up in Alaska, then, I mean, so,
uh when did you actually get off active duty?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Uh? So, while I was in Alaska before I took command,
I ended up getting into a car accident and broke
my hip in a couple of places. So I was
able to do company command still was able to still
do the physical requirements even with not completely healing the
way that I should have gained a little bit of
(49:18):
weight from it, and just going through all the nonsense
of that, still able to do a nice successful command
go to all the training. Then I PCs back to
Fort Lee or Fort greg Adams here back in Virginia
and went to go teach at the Phase one EOD
school there in Fort Ly, and that was that was awesome,
(49:42):
And that was where I ended up getting med boarded
and medically retired and officially got what's up buddy? One
second along was done? Okay, I know officially retired in
February of twenty three. Yeah, and uh yeah, it was
(50:02):
just shy of ten years in the army.
Speaker 1 (50:05):
Yeah, but it was so. And then so now this
coming February will be two years out, two years off.
Speaker 2 (50:12):
Yeah, yeah, two years and it's I remember like this yesterday.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Yeah. Well we'll compare, we'll compare all those answers in
different age categories and how things transpired. We'll do more
of that when we get through the office tomorrow. So yeah,
but so the v as v A taking care of you.
Everything good with the v A.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
Sorry, yeah, I gotta say the the Richmond VA here
in Virginia, they're they're they're outstanding, the great facility. The appointments,
obviously they're they're a little hit or miss on if
you can get one. But every time I've gone for
for an issue or or anything, it's always been a
positive experience. I never felt like I was getting tossed
(50:56):
to the wayside. Yeah, I know that's not the case
for a lot of other I've heard horror stories from
from my dad of a bunch of ones that he's
been to, and he's this one is terrible, it's disgusting
this and that. So very very fortunate that the one
here is is a nice facility.
Speaker 1 (51:13):
Gotcha, I think he uh, I think he pilled for
something and ran for the hills. Yeah, we'll be all right. Yeah,
Dad's distracted. I've always wanted to play with this, right, Yeah,
that's awesome. Well, good deal. So you're still we're still
(51:34):
here at for Greg Adams. We're we're working on the
on the training side to help Army EO D for
the next for now currently but then also for the
next ten to twenty years type stuff. As far as
what we're doing and uh, it's great to meet you.
When I started working here a month ago, it's great
(51:54):
to meet you. And I'm glad that we've been able
to spend this time on the show to get to
know you more and for our listeners to get to
know you more, because there are amazing veterans out there
all over the place, and that's why we have this show,
is to share their stories. So as we get close
to wrapping up, what's one great phrase or you know
(52:18):
quote that you that you lived your life, buyer that
you that you use on a regular basis.
Speaker 2 (52:24):
Me, I got it perfect. I say it to myself
every day. While I'm not in a position of leadership
right now, I guess being a dad, we'll call it
position of leadership in a way. Never uh never ask
somebody to do something that you're not willing to do yourself.
That was that was instilled on me by my parents
(52:45):
growing up, going through college R. O. T. C. My instructors,
great instructors. They instilled that that don't ever ask anyone
to do anything that you're not willing to do yourself.
And I told myself that every single day in the Army.
Still tell my solve that almost every day now, and
I think that's that's definitely helped me out and made
(53:06):
me have a successful warming career.
Speaker 1 (53:09):
That's great. Love it, that's fantastic, and that's the sign
of a good leader too. Absolutely, so you're still there,
can I hear me? Yep, yeah, I got you, Just
making just making sure at the end of this we
didn't fall I didn't fall plat on my face and
lose everybody. But again, thank you, really appreciate your time here.
(53:31):
That wraps up this episode of Tripwire this week. Guys.
Much love to Richard Stone and his family. Much love
to all the veterans out there. We'll catch you the
same time at four pm Eastern next Wednesday. God blessed,
stay strong, and God bless America.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Take care.
Good afternoon. Everybody had set time again for trip Wire.
It is Wednesday afternoon at four pm, the fourteenth of August.
Where has the year gone by? The kg R A
family and myself and trip Wire are honored to have
mister Richard dick Stone here with us for our podcast today.
Rich how the hell are you, sir? Good? Good?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
How's it going?
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Good? Good? Thank you for joining us today. Really excited
about story time and us talking about you know, from
prior to the military, all going into you know, where
you're at now and what you're doing and you know,
sharing that with our audience. And I'm sitting in my truck.
I'm having problems with the computer, so just for this
(01:23):
for our audience, I'm using my phone, but with the
Virginia heat, I ain't sitting outside, so I'm using the
AC in the truck. But you look quite comfortable. Is
that your Is that your man cave you got there
that you're in.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah, this is the one room in the house that
that I get to decorate.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
So a lot is that? Does that not include the garage?
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Fifty fifty on the garage, depending on if the wife
is doing antiquing or not.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Got it? Awesome? Good deal, good deal. Well thanks again
for joining us. You know our our our return listeners
are listeners period or love to hear these stories from veterans.
I've been on kind of a kick. This is not
an eod eccentric type of of podcast, but it seems
(02:12):
like a bomb squad. Guys. You know that we're just
lining up like dominos getting ready to knock over. So
we knocked these knocked these shows out. It's awesome.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Oh yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
All right, where let's let's start with where are you
originally from? Where'd you grow up? And what led you
to the United States Army? And I'm not going to
tell anybody. I'm I'm gonna let the cat out. You
let the cat out of the bag. Okay. As far
as how you came into the Army, all.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Right, sounds good. So I grew up I was born
in New Jersey, but immediately pretty much moved to Pennsylvania.
Grew up Pennsylvania doing everything outdoors, cub Scouts, boy scouts, camping,
loving it. I knew from a really young age that
I wanted to join the Army, probably five or six.
(03:01):
That was just like the thing I wanted to do.
I was like I want to grow up. I want
to be an army man. I want to be out
in the woods, crawling around, getting moddy, doing all the
cool stuff that was just like my thing my whole childhood.
And moved back to New Jersey in twenty twelve ish,
I think twenty eleven, twenty twelve, just Pennsylvania got old
(03:25):
and we decided to move back in with my grandmother.
She was getting a little older in age. Decided to
help her out around the house or no, not twenty twelve.
Two thousand and two, Yeah, two thousand and two, two
thousand and three, yeah, wo making myself seem younger than
I am now, so good.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
We'll talk about that trauma later on the show. I've
received a lot of it. You know, as Gingers, we
seem to be uh we seem to find it when
we least expected. So there you go.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Yeah, absolutely, two thousand and two.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
You moved back to Jersey's he helping out grandma.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Yep, Yeah, moved back, moved back in with with grandma.
My parents too. We we helped take care of her
while she aged out and got older in life. Started
looking at options for the military. As I grew a
little bit older, two thousand and five, two thousand and
six ish, right when I was a sophomore junior in
high school, I was really looking at what I want
(04:23):
to do. Uh, my whole family prior prior military on
the on my father's side and my mother's side, but
most of them were Navy. So for some reason I
decided to break the tradition of going navy and decided
I wanted to join the Army. A lot of it
was probably from my dad talking about all the horror
stories of being on a boat for months at a time,
(04:45):
not seeing any land, just seeing straight water, and he
said it got to him. So that wasn't something that
I was about.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Yeah, that's I get understand that thanks a special kind
of person to be on a even a even an
aircraft carrier where there's spy thousand people who you're surrounded
by people, but to be out in the middle of
the ocean and not see land for a long time,
I can't imagine what kind of a mindset that leaves
you with, you know.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yeah, absolutely, my dad was on an aircraft care and
he was down at the bottom so didn't get to
see much of the top much. So that really steered
me away from want to join the Navy right off
the bat.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Yeah, not only out in the middle of the water.
But he doesn't get daylight very much either, A good
lord though.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
He told me a lot of good stories of what
would happen down in the hole.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
So yeah, I can imagine. I can imagine, Joe. So
when did you graduate? Graduate high school? As I I'm
going to start throwing questions out there based on what
you're bringing to the table, So when did you graduate
high school?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Graduate high school in two thousand and nine, and the
year prior, I had received an Army ROTC scholarship for
full four years to get my bachelor's so I went
ahead and signed that. So when I graduated high school,
I knew auto addically that I was going to go
to college for four years, do the ROTC program, and
(06:04):
then ohe the military at least four years to pay
back that college time.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Nice. Nice. So okay, high school two thousand and nine,
you said, right, I got term memory crap, So where
were you when nine to eleven happened?
Speaker 2 (06:24):
So nine to eleven I remember it. I was in
fifth grade and I was sitting in I remember the
teacher's name. I'm going to just leave it out for
you know, we don't out there, but remember it very vividly.
He was a great teacher, absolutely loved him. And I
just remembered kids started getting called out of class, and
I mean I was young, fifth grade. I don't remember
(06:45):
the age, but two thousand.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
And back in back in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Still yeah, yeah, still back in Pennsylvania. Kids started getting
called out of class. And then I think my mom
was working in the school doing like a book fair.
She would help out with it. She was able to
get in touch with me in my class and tell
me what had happened, and we went home for the day,
and then we just put on the news and I
remember just watching those old clips on those huge TVs,
(07:13):
nothing flat screen, of just the replays of what had happened.
And I already knew at that point that I had
wanted to join the army. And seeing those events and
then the months after of what had happened, like going
into Iraq, going in Afghanistan, still didn't change my mind.
It growing up as a teenager, it's still one hundred
percent what I wanted to do.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Wow, that's crazy. So I was actually I was at
seven eighty NINEVOD company down and what used to be
Fort Benning, Georgia. Married at the time, my ex wife
was she's from the Boston area. Calls me up and
I vividly remember saying to her on the phone, what
(07:53):
Jack Gass ran as Sessna into the twin towers? You know,
like maybe there was fog and he got disoriented or
whatever it is in a horrible accident. But nope, not
at all. Here we go enter twenty years of Iraq
and Afghanistan. But and I remember it was a little
bit before your time. I remember where I was when
(08:15):
the Space Shuttle exploded, when it to go, you know,
in the eighties. So yeah, it's funny how certain things
stick out in your mind. You'll never forget exactly what,
Like you can remember odors and smells of that day
and stuff of what's going on too. You know. You
just it's crazy how that happened.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Your mind just takes you right back to the scene.
Everything smells, sound, you can hear it everything.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Yeah, yeah, all right, So got the scholarship, went to college.
Which college you go to? Where'd you graduate from?
Speaker 2 (08:52):
So I went to two colleges, one strictly for the
ROTC program that was Rutgers University in East Brunswick, and
then I would do my actual classes for my bachelor's
and criminal justice down in Mammatus University and West Long
Branch about forty five fifty minutes apart, so I would
just commute back and forth, still living at my grandmother's
(09:15):
slash parents' house.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Yeah, I got you and everything, so everything was on track.
You got you got it all done in the four
years that you.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Yeah, so do an RTC. The whole time I was
in the RTC program, I thought I wanted to be infantry.
That was my number one thing. I always wanted to
be infantry. That was exactly what I wanted to do.
Going to the summer program l d act's Leader Development
Assessment Course that I did in twenty twelve, I put
(09:47):
infantry number one list or number one on my list,
is exactly what I wanted. But during that l DAC
that summer out in Fort Lewis, during the branch day,
I was walking around and I saw the EOD table
and I honestly didn't even know what EOD was at
the time. I hadn't really looked into it. I knew
what it was, but I was dead set on infantry,
(10:08):
So I didn't even consider anything else until I walked
up to the table when I saw the robot the
bomb suits set up and it just looked really cool.
I started talking. I don't even remember the recruiter's name,
started talking to him and really liked what he had
to say about the job and what it means and
the brotherhood that stands behind it. So I signed the
volunteer paperwork right there, which I didn't know at the time,
(10:31):
was gonna guarantee me a slot to go to EOD
school based on the I guess the little bit lack
of officers for that year, which then wound up being
a huge over strength number. Right, Yeah, so dead set
on infantry. And then fast forward to Fall semester twenty twelve. Yeah,
(10:52):
Fall twenty twelve, I find out that I didn't get
infantry and I got ordinance with EOD Select or EOD
pre Select, so I was I was a little devastated
at first. I was like, damn, I didn't get infantry.
That was what I wanted since I was little, That's
what I wanted to sleep outside, sleep in a hole
and you know, shoot guns and stuff. I was a
little I was a little tore up a little bit
(11:15):
at first, and then I just kind of said out, whatever, uh,
maybe this was meant to be. Let's let's roll with
it and just see what happens. And thankfully was the
greatest thing that could happen to me, not getting infantry
based on talking to some buddies that I graduated college
with and hearing the horror stories to uh me going
(11:36):
to you D school and that becoming the greatest thing
that I could have done for my army career.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah. Yeah, So so you got selected for the organs
core and infantry is in a different core, yep, So
share that with our our not all of our not
all of our viewers are our veterans, So would you
please share how that how that works in the army
based on the different cores in the army.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Okay, yeah, yeah, absolutely, So each different corps in the Army,
there's there's a bunch of them. You've got infantry, Armor, Ordinance, transportation, quartermaster,
so on and so forth. Those are just all your
different basically main categories of jobs, and then you've got
your your sub jobs that fall under those categories, and
(12:24):
each one represents a different function for the military, and
then that's based on your MOS military occupational specialty fits
into one of those cores, and then based on that
determines what units you're going to go into and what
your force structure looks like.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Right, so you got selected for Ordinance Corps. So what
I'm going to share with them is is that pre
selected for YOUO D school. Had you gone to you
D school and not made it through you D E school,
then what would what would you fall back on as
far as your career in the military.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
So if I would have failed, I would have fallen
back on being an ordnance officer, which a lot of
people think when they hear ordinance, they specifically think they
deal with the ammunition bombs. But the Ordnance Corp in
the Army does a lot of logistical work, a lot
of trucks, even though you would think Transportation Corps does
a lot of that. Ordnance also helps facilitate that with
(13:25):
all their mechanics and wheeled vehicle mechanics. So the Ordnance
Corps really does a lot more than just ammo and explosives.
But I would have fallen back on one of those
jobs and most likely ended up in a logistics unit,
probably Ford sport company, would have ended up being a
maintenance platoon leader and probably would not have had as
(13:47):
fun of a career as I could have had.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Well, thank god, do you survive tood school? Because that
sounds very boring. And I say that only because it's
the two of us talking on it. You know, if
I get I get some other veteran who's an organ
score logistics guy, I'm gonna be like, wow, that sounds fascinating.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Oh no, I have. I mean, I have complete respect
for every corn army they learning each one and stepping
outside of EOD and learning what everyone else did, spending
a little time in logistics that I'm sure we're going
to get into. I have respect for every single other
job and army. Each one has a lot of uniqueness
to it. That just wasn't something that I wanted to do, right,
(14:34):
I get it, but I get it still special?
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Yeah, absolutely agreed. Agreed. That's I mean a couple of
weeks back, maybe a month or so ago, now, I
interviewed an infantry guy that I think he did twelve
fourteen years and now he owns wack of black whack
could do brewery out in Colorado's brings you know a
(15:03):
lot of times it's what we take from the military
is just our management and leadership skills, and we try
to apply them in the civilian life, which at times
is difficult. We can get into that later, but you know,
there's a lot to bring from any type of position
that you had in any branch of the service, regardless
of your mos, there are invaluable lessons learned.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So oh yeah, absolutely, I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
All right, So, graduated college. Where'd you go? Did you
knock out ocs in between semesters or what'd you do?
Speaker 2 (15:39):
So? Graduated college, commissioned in May of twenty thirteen, and
I got selected to go teach at it's called LTC
Lead Leaders Leaders Training Course, I think Fort Knox, Kentucky.
It was a program under the ROTC program that say
a student joined their second or third year, they go
(16:02):
to this LTC camp for thirty days and it catches
them up to speed on basic soldier skills and then
they go back to their college and they're all caught
up with the rest of their class. So I went
there for I was there for maybe forty days, and
then came to Fort Lee which is now Fort greg
Adams in Virginia, went there and started my Basic Officer
(16:25):
Leadership course in September of twenty thirteen. Graduated that right
around Christmas, No, it was right after Christmas.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I remember.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
We came back from Christmas break and graduated, and then
I started Phase one eot E School right there at
Fort Lee, which Fort greg Adams now started right there
Phase one eot E School, which then many years later
went back to go teach at, which was an awesome
experience as well. We'll get into graduated phase one. I
(16:58):
think going through Phase one I tapped one or failed
one test. Other than that, smooth sailing, everything was. It
was making a lot of sense to me. I always
had a grown up I was very mechanical and want
to take things apart and figure out how it worked.
My parents would always come outside of the garage and
I had the radio and five hundred pieces and I'm
(17:20):
seeing how it all fits back together. So a lot
a lot of that stuff kind of came naturally to
me and really interested me. So I was interested to
learn a lot about it. So it was it was difficult,
but definitely I think doing a lot of that stuff
growing up definitely helped me figure things out. A lot quicker.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Oh, it's great, that's fantastic. So you graduated Phase one
and then off to Eglin Air Force Base for EOT school.
How was that experience in uh? Uh? Did you start
with a surface class or an underwater class or a
water class A Navy class?
Speaker 2 (17:59):
No, started with the surface class. Started in March of fourteen. Yeah,
started in March or fourteen, started in a surface class
and continued with that class all the way until Id's.
(18:20):
The ID division is where I double tapped my first
test and ended up rolling into another surface class, two
classes behind my original class. So we graduated about a
month different.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Got you? Got you?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Graduated, graduated Phase two EOD school in December fourteen and
was able to go on Christmas break in between, and
then showed up to Fort Campbell in January fifteen, first
duty station as a EOD platoon leader with the forty
nine A COOD company.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Nice. How'd you like Campbell? Did you go to air school?
Speaker 2 (19:02):
I did so. It was the second time I went
to aerosault school. The first time I went, I was
in college and I ended up rolling down a hill
and busting my knee up and I couldn't finish the
thee It was the six mile up march halfway through,
couldn't finish it. So got to go back when I
was an actual platoon leader at for Campbell, and there
(19:23):
was a big push at the time to have all
the EUD companies one hundred percent air so qualified they
wanted to get the banners on their company guide ons.
So I was able to go with like ninety percent
of my platoon, which made it absolutely enjoyable. Just having
everyone else around you that's going through the same amount
of torture and pain and they're all still trying to
(19:46):
laugh about it. Cracking those jokes that all the EOD
people seemed to make in the worst situations possible just
really helped me carry through and made it a breeze.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Yeah, that's great. The U. I'm just I was just
doing the math and in my head. So in a
couple of months, you're ten years out of school.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
Yeah yep, ten year yeah wow yeah yeah, get an
old on us.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Yeah, you know, I got to bust your chops because
you're much more youthful than I am, So I just
I have to mess with you. Yeah, I'm that. I'm
that contankerus old man in the office. So oh and
by the way, I want to I want to share
with the our viewers that you know this this relationship
is because we currently work together right now here at
(20:33):
UH at Port Greg Adams.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
So, uh, I stare at each other over the cubicle wall.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Yeah, well, tall people can do that. There are a
lot of leprechauns running around the office area, so you know,
they can't see over the partition walls and stuff, and
it's it's comical. So uh airssault. Yeah, I did it
in uh when the hell did I do it? I
did it in four two thousand and four. Okay, did
(20:59):
you know it because we got or oh, yeah, did
it at Campbell We got back from I think it
did it in February two, which was lovely that the
temperatures were loved. Yeah, that was a great time back then.
So we got back from seventy ninth, got back from
Baghdad in April of four. That was an election year.
(21:19):
So not only are we doing VIPs backstop in pre
deployment training up, but I at the time was working
on my team leader certification picking up staff sergeant and
then became a team leader. Prior to going to Afghanistan
in May of five, so you're back just over a
year and then you know, we did the six month
(21:41):
tour in Afghanistan, you know five, So yeah, Ariosalt it
was good. I enjoyed it. I liked jumping on the
helicopters attached to a rope, so it was cool.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Yeah, yeah, it was fun. Had a good time.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, they were, they were screaming at us back then.
They're like, don't you dare do the Hollywood stuff, you
know where you kick off from the aircraft and then
you fast track it all the way down the rope
until you're like ten meters off the ground and then
then apply the brakes. Right, people still did it. Yeah,
people still did it. But whatever.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Did they have? They have the point system when you
went like if you had a uniform deficiency, you would
get a point and you can only get a certain
amount of points. Oh no, no, no, no, oh man, I
got on my first day max you could get. You
got what I got, So you could have get forty
(22:36):
points before you get removed from the course. And it
was our first day there, day zero or negative one whatever.
The first day is. Yeah, they're coming around doing uniform
inspections and they're giving people five points off or having
a button unbuttoned, or ten points off if they're if
they're not wearing their belt or something. So one of
(22:57):
the their assault instructors comes up to me and looks
up at me and take tells me to take my
PC off. And I cut the liners out of the
inside of my my hat. It sits better on my head,
and it's a lot better in the summertime. It's a
lot cooler because it's less material. Right, So I popped
down my cap and he goes, unauthorized uniform modification. That's
(23:20):
forty points And I was like what And I was like,
what does that mean. It's like that means you can't
get any more points the whole time you're here. I
was like, oh, yeah, to change that hat the next
day and was able to ride it out the whole
time after that, thankfully.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah, no, they didn't. They didn't have the points system
back then. But I mean back then, everybody was doing
that whole battle of you know, we're in a school,
we're doing aursalt a, we wearing brains, we wearing PCs,
you know, that type of stuff. So it just every
I'm sure every class does their own thing, and you know,
in different time frame, has their own problems with whatever
(23:59):
it's school. But you know, I do remember, I do
remember that they told us that that was the twelve
twelve toughest days of the middle of the Army, right
there with the assault school.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So yeah, I do remember hearing that. Yeah, the I
remember them joke. I remember them talking about the obstacle
course and I'm like, it can't be that hard. It's
an obstacle course. I've done it a million times. And
then they don't tell you about all the physical physical
torture before that. No, and then your whole trying to
get up over something and your your whole body is
(24:32):
just completely smoked and tired, and it's totally different than
doing it on a on a fresh day.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Yeah, well I was, so, I was like two hundred
and thirty pounds. You know, I was one of the
soldiers that always got tape because I'm a big dude
in here. You there, yep, yep, I got you, I
got you right, Okay. So I was one of those
dudes that that always had to do the tape at
(25:00):
for a PT test, even though I'd score in the
you know, between two eighty and two ninety and they
put me at the top of the of the sliding
wall and they've got this five foot three, five foot four,
five foot nothing a female soldier on belat for me. Uh.
That was interesting because she's trying to, you know, trying
(25:20):
to stop me from sliding down the wall, and oh
my lord, it was not good. And then we did
the fast rope and I landed on the guy below
me that went right before me because I came down
faster than he did because I was heavier than he was. Anyway,
all these good stories some times. Yeah, so Campbell's your
(25:40):
first duty station? What, uh what kind of mission were
you guys? Yeah, having Campbell so I mean you're you're
obviously there for fourteen, You're you're obviously there for Fort Campbell,
So what do you what were you doing for permission?
Out of that unit? There was what was your area
(26:02):
of support?
Speaker 2 (26:04):
So Fort Campbell it's I guess unique in its own
ways because it's got five at the time, I think
it's less now. Back then twenty fifteen, there were five
separate EOD companies that were not only training up for
combat deployments because we were still in Iraq and Afghanistan
at the time, among other things, doing support to Secret
(26:27):
Service for we call them zips, going out and providing support,
helping out Secret Service with stuff, Providing support for local
law enforcement if they find any sort of military ordinance,
or conducting training courses classes identification of like UXO's or
(26:48):
unexploded ordinances. We used to teach that a lot, not
only a Fort Campbell but also later on when I
got to be a company commander out in Alaska, just
responsible for a whole bunch of different things. While I
was at Fort Campbell, I had a lot of cool
opportunities for my career. Got to be an eighty platoon
leader the whole time I was at Fort Campbell up
(27:09):
until we got back from a deployment. Got to go
on a ton of itps, doing a lot of cool things,
seeing a lot of cool stuff. Those were always very
fun and enjoyable. See what else. I got to go
down to Fort Jackson and do what we call the
backstop mission, which is yeah, covering response areas for locations
(27:34):
where there's not companies providing support. That was a pretty
cool opportunity because it was my first experience in working
right away from like the rest of the unit and
you know, my company commander, so seeing how I could
do on my own, and I think that definitely helped
playoff doing that backstop mission because there's just myself and
(27:54):
two teams. We were there for three and a half
months just on our own, and that was a really
really good training opportunity to teach me how to manage
stuff on my own and manage at my level, not
always having to rely on like my boss being in
the same location as me.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Right right, Yeah, those backstop missions for our audience, the
backstop missions are you were there with two teams as
a platoon leader and you're covering down on Fort Jackson's
area of operation or area of responsibility. I think is
more important. I think is more accurately said. Yeah, that's
because their units are currently forward deployed to either Iraq
(28:33):
Afghanistan at the time, and that's why you're covering down
for them. Yep. I just wanted to throw that out
there for our audience. So, so, how how many years
did you stay at Campbell as a pl.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
So was at Campbell until August of twenty sixteen, so
all twenty fifteen and then building up I want to
say February March. It was right when I had gotten
back from the Jackson Backstop mission, got told that there
was going to be a platoon in the company that
(29:07):
was deploying to Syria and Turkey that was not my platoon.
My platoon was going to go to Africa to do
some HMA missions, and then the third platoon was going
to stay back here as the rear detachment, right, gotcha.
So all of our train up and build up was
(29:28):
geared towards going to Africa, whereas the other platoon was
geared up going towards doing a deployment in support of
conventional forces and special forces Syria and Turkey right now.
So we did all our train up, did all of
our online certifications to do the HMA missions in Africa,
and then three to four weeks before that original platoon,
(29:52):
or three to four weeks before we were getting ready
to go. What's going on about it?
Speaker 1 (30:03):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Go ahead, got it? I'm sorry, I'll be right there. Okay, okay, sorry,
if you're fine. About about three weeks before we were
(30:27):
set to go to Africa, the one platoon had already
left to go to Syria and Turkey, and we got
told that the two other platoons and the company headquarters
was also going to Iraq to support that same deployment.
Uh so all of our training last minute changed to
going to do an h m A stuff to going
to Iraq, which I thought was cool because I was like, cool,
(30:51):
I get to deploy as a platoon leader. This is awesome.
Read platoon leader, let alone a neo D platoon leader
is an awesome job to have, especially in a deployment byronment.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Right.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
I got super excited that everyone was going. Was going
through my divorce at the time, so didn't really wasn't
leaving anything back here, no kids at the time, so
I was excited to go and get to do the
job for real in a in a combat environment.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Yeah, yeah, I get it. So for our audience, would
you explain what HM.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Is so humanitarian? It's going to locations that have unexploded
ordinance or other things and teaching local identification on it
so that way they don't get a they don't wind
up blowing themselves up or getting hurt injured, and just
spread the awareness so everyone knows, hey, this thing looks weird,
(31:46):
let's not mess with it. It's probably could explode. So
just spread the awareness to make sure especially children. A
lot of children are wind up getting themselves hurt looking
at things that wind up looking like toys. So just
getting that awareness out there to keep people safe.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, which is a very important aspect of the job.
I mean, you know, absolutely perfect timing, your your that's
your son, Yes, is that correct? Your son? Yeah? Yeah, Okay,
he's uh, he doesn't have red hair, he's he's got
all blonde. What's going on there? Rich? Uh. We talked
(32:21):
about that at work. We were I was a towhead
when I was a kid too, so I get it. No, yeah,
but that's I'm glad he came into Gotta check with dad,
Gotta check with dad. That's awesome. So, but it is,
I mean, it is important to get back to it.
The h m A. The humanitarian is very important as
an aspect of what we do. You know, because local nationals,
(32:45):
specifically children, they don't know what they're messing with. Uh.
You know, these these items that are out there for
war uh. And Africa I think per capita, you know,
for the geographics is the most landmine laden continent in
the in the world. So and you know, I think
not that it's a competition, but I think some of
(33:05):
those countries felt like it was a competition as far
as how many landmines they could put out. So it's
just horrible. Yeah, it's horrible what happens to those children
over there.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
So yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of people don't think
of that, like the after effects of a war, a conflict.
They don't think about forty fifty years later, people are
still getting hurt or getting killed from things that were
left over from that. So I think it's great that
these organizations are going out there to clean stuff up
and help spread the awareness.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah. Well, and I'm sure you've heard of this, but
I'll share it with our audience. In the last twenty
thirty years, based on being EOD and knowing what I
know and the things I've done with my career, you
pay more attention to those articles that come up about
some farmer in one country in Europe that was you know,
(33:57):
till in his field and kicked up a gurnade and
it blew up on him, and the grenade, the grenades
from World War two, you know, those types of things.
So it happens. It happens more than people give it
credit to or or understand, you know, or that they
see right?
Speaker 2 (34:13):
So yeah, absolutely, all.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
Right, So Iraq, and let's start out with when did
you guys get to Iraq? How long was that deployment?
And let's go from there on the timeline of a
bridge Stone. I'm sure what was it, first lieutenant, second
lieutenant alert Stone at the time, first lieutenant.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was first lieutenant Dick Stone is what is what
the guys call me, guys and girls called me, which
I was totally behind and supported. I thought it was awesome.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Yeah, because your your grandfather's Richard, right, isn't it Rick? Correct? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yeah, So I'm the third and my grandfather he went
by Dick when he was in the Navy and growing
up and getting old. So I kind of do it
as a as an honor to him, and I think
it's also funny and hilarious at the same time.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Exactly. That's just because we're EOD and we do these things.
So right, so let's let's when did you guys you
went to Baghdad or where in Iraq did you go
for your deployment?
Speaker 2 (35:11):
So initially in August we flew to uh to Spain
first for a day or two. Then we ended up
in Kuwait, and then from Kuwait we ended up in
urbial Uh and that was where the company headquarters ended
up remaining the rest of the deployment. Initially they came
(35:33):
to other bases in Iraq with US, but we'll discuss
that later. Going back in the memory bank here, uh see,
I spent a little bit in our biel getting ready
and getting getting set to go to where we knew
we were going. We knew we were going to I
or Michaelatoon, and the company headquarters was first going to
(35:55):
a base called KR West or QR West Airfield q
West a lot of people know as it used to
be a US air base back in the early days
of Iraq. And then at some point it got turned
over to the Iraqi military, I think around twenty twelve
ish twenty thirteen maybe, and then when things kicked off
(36:16):
with ISIS and they're a big push to conquer Iraq,
the Iraqi Army was forced to flee out of Q
West and ISIS took it over, and their big plan
was to demolish everything. They ripped up plumbing lines, electrical,
they ripped up everything. And then I think July time frame,
(36:38):
July August to sixteen, the Iraqi Army was able to
take the base back or the land and then the
piles of rubble everywhere, and then we got to Iraq
and that was one of our goals was to go
to q West and clear any explosives that we could
find IDs and just make sure that it was a
safe area to rebuild as a aging area or airbase
(37:01):
to eventual plan to conquer Iis through the zool.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
Gotcha got you? So that that's uh, that's that's interesting.
So both of both my times of Bagdad were prior
to the Sofa Agreement, So US government was still in
control of the judicial and other things in the country
at the time when I was there. So I'm sure
things were much different when you were there at that
(37:29):
time in your in your career, so and and how
long were you in that how long were you in
that rank?
Speaker 2 (37:37):
We came back in April, so it was a nine
month deployment or just shy of no, I think it
was full nine months. Yeah, uh, great, great deployment. Thankfully,
no one in the platooner company was killed. We did
have a couple injuries, one serious injury not in my platoon,
(37:57):
but affected us because he had he stepped on an
id and wound up ripping all the skin off his
arm and blowing part of his butt cheek off. But
he's doing fine now out of the military. Is still
still a hilarious guys love him to death. Still, one
of my team leaders had to go up and cover
(38:18):
that team leader that had gotten injured and flown back home.
So I had the opportunity to run for a couple
of weeks, as I had gotten my team leaders certification
prior to deployment by a couple of months, so I
was able to run a couple of missions as a
team leader when all my teams were out fragged out
doing missions, or if I only had one team there
(38:38):
and the team leader was beat from running three four
days missions, I was helping cover down for him. And
great experience because at the time, well yeah, I guess
out throughout their whole career, but the officers east side
of the house don't really get the opportunity to do
the real job of a team leader. Some do, some don't.
(38:58):
I'm just thankful, through the unfortunate circumstances that I was
able to get that real world experience and actually get
to do the job that everyone trains to do going
through you D school.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Right, Yeah, that's awesome, that's awesome. And I'm sure that
you have counterparts that didn't have didn't didn't get to
the opportunity to have that exposure as and run as
a team leader like you did.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
So yeah, yeah, so I've just everything worked out right place,
right time, I guess, And that's great. Really happy I
got that opportunity. I'm really happy with everyone that I
got to work with on that deployment. My my platoon,
they they did awesome work. We got to cover the
full spectrum of EO D stuff. We got to cover
(39:46):
conventional munitions, improvised munitions, we got to cover chemical munitions.
We even got to cover some radiological stuff that was
left over from the air base. So we got to
cover that full, full spectrum of the operations, which was
pretty awesome. So we got the experience it all, which
was great, and Aaron had a great time. No one
(40:08):
got in any serious trouble, which was the most important
thing besides you know coming back all.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
Yeah, well, you know, it's uh, the coming home thing
is always it doesn't apply unless you're actually you know,
like got a Nellis Air Force Base but what happens
in Vegas stays in Vegas. That's you know, what happens
when we get home, stays off the freaking off the
blot or should That's the way we need to try
and do it right. So yeah, because we do blow
(40:37):
off a lot of steam. So okay, So you had
the one deployment and then where were you in your
in your career and how where do we go from
here with with this the timeframe for you on active duty?
Speaker 2 (40:51):
So came back from deployment and got promoted to captain
just basically an auto promotion. Didn't you know, get a
DUI didn't killing anybody. So made the made the promotion
list and got promoted to captain. And after that immediately
went to work at the eu D Battalion there at
Fort Campbell short term until I went to eu D
(41:13):
Captains Career Course. Got to go to the first billeted
u D Captains Career Course, so it wasn't just the
regular logistics and it was coded as the u D
Career Course.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
From there I got and that was a I want
to say, eight month long career course. It was pretty
long course. It was full PCs And where was that
at that was also back at Fort Lee Fort gerg Adams,
So I've been to I've been to Fort Lee a
lot for Yeah, I knew there real well. Anyway, going
(41:48):
through career course, uh, it was kind of hit or
miss based on if you're going to go to an
eu D unit after that, if you're going to go
to a logistics unit. Well, it was called the u
D Captain's Career Corps. We got quite a few months
of basic logistics blocks of instructions, so learning how other
logistics officers do logistation work, and then we would break
(42:12):
off after that and do the EOD specific career course
focused course material. So coming out of it, we were
still a fully certified logistics officer, so we could still
go to a logistics unit, but coming out of career course,
I had orders to go to Alaska Joint Base Almador,
(42:34):
Richardson and Anchorage, which the wife fully supported. She was
super excited to go to Alaska, which made the whole
thing a lot easier. I didn't have the sun at
the time, it was just us, so we were like,
let's do it. Let's go to Alaska. It'll be an
awesome experience. Thought I was going up to take command
of a seven to sixteenth DoD company there at Fort
(42:57):
Richardson or Joint Base Almador. Richardson got there only to
find out that there was already another captain waiting to
take command, and the administrative side of the army had
not realized that he was waiting there. So for a
year and a half while he was in command at
the U D Company, I got to work in a
(43:18):
logistics unit a CSSB, and I got to do a
couple different things. It was like a shotgun blast in
the face having to learn how to do logistics work
when I've never experienced it before. So I was learning
a lot from the enlisted that I got to work with,
(43:41):
and the junior officers, the second lieutenant's first lieutenants that
had been to Bullock and had spent some time in
a logistics unit. I learned a lot from them, coming
out of just doing EOD work my whole career, come
in there having to teach me a lot, which was great.
I ended up doing that for a year and a
half and then it was my time to take command
(44:03):
of the EOD company there at Fort Richardson. Took command
of that company in December of twenty nineteen, which two
weeks before that is also when we had our son,
which was perfect timing. Let's take company command at the
same time we have a toddler, or not a toddler,
a newborn, so timing. But I was always up in
(44:27):
time for work, never slept through an alarm because I
was just always awake. So right, but it worked out.
One funny joke about that real quick is right. When
I took command, we went to a thirty day training
in Fort Johnson, Louisiana, used to be called Fort Polk.
(44:49):
I went there three weeks after take command, and it's
a called the Joint Redness Training Center. It's known for
being extremely realistic training. You're not getting a lot of sleep,
so everyone was getting four hours of sleep a night,
probably a little less, but I was getting three four
hours of uninterrupted sleep, not having a baby waking up crying,
(45:09):
so I was. I was a shaper and always super energetic,
and everyone's everyone's dragging ass and real tired. So that
was kind of a that was a funny experience.
Speaker 1 (45:18):
Well, I don't know when they stopped teaching it, Uh
you know, eod, I mean, you know, I guess maybe
I got immersed into it in three. But uh, the
four hours is the norm for when you're when you're
an EOD guy. So you know, I mean if they
if they didn't, if your company wasn't ready or you're yeah,
(45:38):
you're your guys on your company weren't ready to handle
the only the four hours of sleep down there at
j RTC, then I feel for them. I you know,
that's that's that's rough for them when they haven't been
training for it to begin with. Yeah. Yeah, So so
you did thirty days down there and then rotated back
to Alaska. That must have been fun, right in the
(45:59):
middle winter. You guys leave the frozen tundra up north
and then come down here to Louisiana, which is probably
what in the sixties and maybe seventies eighties.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Yeah, it was. So we left I think it was
like negative seventeen, negative twenty degrees. We left Alte got
to Fort Polk Fort Johnson now and it was eighty
two eighty three degrees. He immediately because we're one hundred
degree temperature change, we're dying.
Speaker 1 (46:27):
At good Lord. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
But had a great rotation training rotation. All the guys
and girls that went with me had great time, no
one got injured, everyone had fun, which was good, and
still got some good training out of it. Came back
and spent the full eighteen months in company command. During
(46:55):
that time, got to do a lot of amazing things.
No deployments out of it, but did get to do
a lot of work with law enforcement, the Anchorage Police Department,
bomb Squad, the FBI, got to do a ton of
cross training and just just building that camaradity with with
those outside organizations outside of the Army that still do
(47:15):
the same job. And it's I think that's just the
greatest experience of getting able to work with all these
agencies as well.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
Sure, sure, good deal.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Yeah, finished out Company command, Uh, amazing, amazing time and command.
I would go to meetings in Alaska and I would
hear other company commanders great complain moan about having to
come in on the weekend doing all this crazy stuff
and having a you know, reprimand people this and that.
I I didn't have to do any of that. So
(47:46):
either everyone was real good at hiding it from me
and I did a terrible job, or I know that
it was I had. I had an amazing group of people,
guys and girls. They were they were outstanding. My job easy.
I could have not existed and the company would have
been absolutely fine. They they were just it was. It
(48:08):
was if it was a sewing machine, if it was
running smooth the entire eighteen months. No, it was just
it was great, amazing experience. Never dealt with any of
the any of that going up on the weekends picking
up you know. Yeah, craziness.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
Well, not that I'm gonna left the cat out of
the bag about myself. But you know, if if who
is now Colonel Cousins, he was a captain at the
time and the commander of our unit back you know
three when we went to Bagdad, if he had heir,
I probably would have gave him a lot of great hair.
But he doesn't have any hair, so and I can't
even say that he lonched his hair because of me either,
So you know, it is, it is what it is.
(48:48):
But okay, see you finished up in Alaska, then, I mean, so,
uh when did you actually get off active duty?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Uh? So, while I was in Alaska before I took command,
I ended up getting into a car accident and broke
my hip in a couple of places. So I was
able to do company command still was able to still
do the physical requirements even with not completely healing the
way that I should have gained a little bit of
(49:18):
weight from it, and just going through all the nonsense
of that, still able to do a nice successful command
go to all the training. Then I PCs back to
Fort Lee or Fort greg Adams here back in Virginia
and went to go teach at the Phase one EOD
school there in Fort Ly, and that was that was awesome,
(49:42):
And that was where I ended up getting med boarded
and medically retired and officially got what's up buddy? One
second along was done? Okay, I know officially retired in
February of twenty three. Yeah, and uh yeah, it was
(50:02):
just shy of ten years in the army.
Speaker 1 (50:05):
Yeah, but it was so. And then so now this
coming February will be two years out, two years off.
Speaker 2 (50:12):
Yeah, yeah, two years and it's I remember like this yesterday.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Yeah. Well we'll compare, we'll compare all those answers in
different age categories and how things transpired. We'll do more
of that when we get through the office tomorrow. So yeah,
but so the v as v A taking care of you.
Everything good with the v A.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
Sorry, yeah, I gotta say the the Richmond VA here
in Virginia, they're they're they're outstanding, the great facility. The appointments,
obviously they're they're a little hit or miss on if
you can get one. But every time I've gone for
for an issue or or anything, it's always been a
positive experience. I never felt like I was getting tossed
(50:56):
to the wayside. Yeah, I know that's not the case
for a lot of other I've heard horror stories from
from my dad of a bunch of ones that he's
been to, and he's this one is terrible, it's disgusting
this and that. So very very fortunate that the one
here is is a nice facility.
Speaker 1 (51:13):
Gotcha, I think he uh, I think he pilled for
something and ran for the hills. Yeah, we'll be all right. Yeah,
Dad's distracted. I've always wanted to play with this, right, Yeah,
that's awesome. Well, good deal. So you're still we're still
(51:34):
here at for Greg Adams. We're we're working on the
on the training side to help Army EO D for
the next for now currently but then also for the
next ten to twenty years type stuff. As far as
what we're doing and uh, it's great to meet you.
When I started working here a month ago, it's great
(51:54):
to meet you. And I'm glad that we've been able
to spend this time on the show to get to
know you more and for our listeners to get to
know you more, because there are amazing veterans out there
all over the place, and that's why we have this show,
is to share their stories. So as we get close
to wrapping up, what's one great phrase or you know
(52:18):
quote that you that you lived your life, buyer that
you that you use on a regular basis.
Speaker 2 (52:24):
Me, I got it perfect. I say it to myself
every day. While I'm not in a position of leadership
right now, I guess being a dad, we'll call it
position of leadership in a way. Never uh never ask
somebody to do something that you're not willing to do yourself.
That was that was instilled on me by my parents
(52:45):
growing up, going through college R. O. T. C. My instructors,
great instructors. They instilled that that don't ever ask anyone
to do anything that you're not willing to do yourself.
And I told myself that every single day in the Army.
Still tell my solve that almost every day now, and
I think that's that's definitely helped me out and made
(53:06):
me have a successful warming career.
Speaker 1 (53:09):
That's great. Love it, that's fantastic, and that's the sign
of a good leader too. Absolutely, so you're still there,
can I hear me? Yep, yeah, I got you, Just
making just making sure at the end of this we
didn't fall I didn't fall plat on my face and
lose everybody. But again, thank you, really appreciate your time here.
(53:31):
That wraps up this episode of Tripwire this week. Guys.
Much love to Richard Stone and his family. Much love
to all the veterans out there. We'll catch you the
same time at four pm Eastern next Wednesday. God blessed,
stay strong, and God bless America.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Take care.
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