By Steve Vogel
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 29, 1999; Page J03
The devastation of Hurricane Mitch is carrying elements of the Maryland
National Guard to Central America to assist with disaster relief.
Members of the 29th Aviation Brigade deployed to Chilanguera, El
Salvador, to provide airlift support for Task Force New Hope, the joint
U.S. military effort assisting the country with its recovery from the October
hurricane.
The unit will spend five months flying missions including transporting
passengers and VIPs, supplying camps and remote sites, evacuating the
sick and conducting search-and-rescue operations if any aircraft go down.
"The hurricane devastation in Central America continues to severely affect
lives throughout the region, and President Clinton's action to use the
U.S.
military to deliver humanitarian aid is making a significant contribution
to
their recovery," Gov. Parris N. Glendening (D) said in a statement before
the unit's departure.
Lt. Gen. James F. Fretterd, Maryland's adjutant general, said: "Helping
our
neighbors to the south is a win-win proposition for our National Guard.
The people of Central America are receiving the support they so
desperately need to recover from this terrible disaster, while the Guard
gets a great training opportunity in return."
Three UH-1 "Huey" helicopters from the brigade were loaded April 21
onto an Air Force C-5A at Phillips Army Airfield at Aberdeen Proving
Ground in Harford County. The aircraft departed with the helicopters and
21 crew members the following day, and family members were on hand to
see them off.
The deployment was delayed a week when the original April 15 airlift had
to be postponed because C-5 aircraft were diverted to Europe to carry
supplies for NATO military operations in the Balkans.
The 29th Aviation Brigade is headquartered at the Edgewood area of
Aberdeen. Members who are deploying come from all over the state,
including Montgomery, Howard and Anne Arundel counties.
Five members of the unit will remain in El Salvador for the entire
deployment; the remainder will serve 21-day rotations. Three more Hueys
will be sent to El Salvador midway through the mission to replace those
operating now.
The contingent includes one husband-and-wife team, who will take turns
deploying so that one parent can be home to care for their children,
according to Capt. Drew Sullins, spokesman for the Maryland Guard.
"We are proud of the role Maryland citizen-soldiers will [play] as part
of
this mission and confident the experience that the men and women of the
29th Aviation Brigade gain during the deployment will bring added benefits
to Maryland during future emergencies that may arise at home," Glendening
said.
The 29th Aviation Brigade is part of the 29th Infantry Division (Light),
a
famed unit that landed at Normandy on D-Day and now is a National
Guard division with units drawn from Maryland, Virginia and four other
states.
The division has sent troops on a number of high-profile missions in recent
years. In 1997, an infantry company from Leesburg deployed to Bosnia
for six months, keeping watch over the disputed town of Brcko. In 1995,
a
battalion drawn from elements in Virginia and Maryland was sent to the
Sinai for a six-month peacekeeping tour as the U.S. contribution to a
multinational force.
In January, 177 members of the division's 629th Military Intelligence
Battalion, from Laurel, will deploy to Bosnia for 270 days.
There also has been speculation in recent weeks that A-10s from the
Maryland Air National Guard will be sent to Kosovo. The Pentagon has
been considering sending more of the slow-flying, tank-killing aircraft
to
bolster NATO operations, and Maryland would be one candidate to
participate.
As of early this week, the Maryland Guard had not received any orders to
mobilize.
A contingent of A-10 crew members returned last month from a
deployment enforcing the "no-fly" zone over southern Iraq, a fact that
officials say makes it less likely--but not impossible--that the Maryland
A-10 crews would be sent overseas again so soon.
Va. Soldiers Drove at Summit
A contingent of Army soldiers from Fort Eustis, Va., is leaving the District
today after a three-week assignment that was a bit out of the
ordinary--providing transportation for the delegations of more than 40
nations that participated in the NATO summit last week.
"This really is a once-in-a-lifetime mission," said Lt. Col. George
Washington, the commander of the soldiers' parent unit, the 6th
Transportation Battalion.
The 450 soldiers from the battalion began training for the mission in
February and deployed to the District on April 8 to familiarize themselves
with Washington area streets and traffic patterns.
"The first day was a nightmare, trying to figure out the roads," said Sgt.
1st
Class Kenneth Drasdovic, a platoon commander. "But after two days, they
had it down."
Soldiers from the battalion set up a command post in an office at the D.C.
Armory, overseeing the summit transportation operation from there.
A fleet of 390 vehicles, many of them late-model luxury cars including
Mercedes-Benzes and Cadillacs, carried dignitaries to and from meetings
and hotels.
"Everybody's getting spoiled. When they go back home, they're all going
to
want to get new cars," Drasdovic said.
The soldiers wore pressed, green Class B uniforms as they provided a taxi
service for summit delegates. Parking lots at the armory became a staging
area for the fleet of cars and minivans, all of which had the special NATO
license plates needed for access to downtown areas restricted during the
summit.
This week, the drivers were back to the more humdrum vehicles--driving
trucks and watercraft on routine transportation missions. "A lot of the
soldiers won't realize they made history until five years go by," said
Maj.
Douglas Normura, the operations officer.
Military Matters appears every other week. Steve Vogel can be reached
at vogels@washpost.com via e-mail.
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