EVAC. Represent.

Soaking wet all day! Yuck!

I have been in the Army 7 years. Not all at once, of course, since I foolishly got out of the Army for 3 years. (Turns out being a beach bum in San Diego does not pay the bills.) Anyhow, for 7 years I have been a medic. And as a medic, I have always had the pleasure of being in the Evacuation Platoon.

 

Well, when I was with the Combat Engineers, I wasn't necessarily considered EVAC. But when there are only 10 medics responsible for all the medical coverage for an entire battalion, you become an EVAC/TREATMENT hybrid. Like a TREVAC or an ETREAT. But since then, I have been strictly EVAC. Represent.

 

Anyway, the point I'm eventually going to make is that for 7 years I have been intimately involved with the Army's worst vehicle ever produced: the Field Litter Ambulance, or FLA.

 

 

These trucks are the biggest POS the Army has ever given me (over and over again) the pleasure to work with. First off, I have never seen one that was newer than a 1980's model. And not even a late model, these things are nearly as old as me. Secondly, if I don't have to jump 1 of my 8 FLAs once a week, a miracle has happened. They're falling apart. All of them.

 

Today I gave a class those in the CSH who do not deal with these beasts on the regular: in the pouring rain. They always say, It ain't training if it ain't raining. I try to never utter that sentence, but the rest of my Army counterparts love saying it.

 

It's hard to get people motivated to hoist 200lb people by hand into these vehicles in the pouring rain. I seem to find myself giving these sorts of classes frequently. Somehow in these past 7 years, an invisible stamp has been put on me that will forever link me to this damned vehicle. When do I get my chance to sit in the TREATMENT tent and stay dry or warm or cool? I'm always in the field doing the lifting or sweating or on the fly mechanic work.

 

But I'm really not bitter. I love being in the EVAC family. I always have. We are where the hard work happens and I'm proud of my Soldiers.

 

7 years with the FLA... and I probably have 7 more ahead of me!