He didn’t know why but the bomb hadn’t detonated. But it was clear that at the end of the piece of string leading away through the maize field was a Taliban bomber trying to kill British soldiers. The bomber had tugged the string so hard the switch had been pulled out of the ground. It was an unbelievable stroke of luck. The switch that was meant to allow the current to flow was composed of two metal washers attached to two pieces of wire and a gentle pull on the string should have brought the washers together. The bomb would have caused carnage had it detonated. Anyone not killed instantly would have been blasted into the canal, and given all the kit they were carrying, would have probably drowned.
Chappy got his team sorted and began his brief: ‘We are going to do a horseshoe isolation because we’re not going to be able to cross the canal. You will be looking for some kind of string or wire, probably going off somewhere into one of the compounds beyond the maize field, at least that’s where I’d be if I was them. The threat is coming from our left, we don’t have to worry about the right flank. The infantry will be providing us with cover, using small arms and the armoured vehicles. If they see any movement in those compounds they’ll fucking smash them. Questions?’ Everyone seemed happy, although a little tense.
Chappy turned to me. ‘Kim, my team will lead – I’ll put Malley up front. He can find anything. My concern is who’s on the end of the command wire and where?’
He was right to be concerned – his men would be focusing on the ground and their spatial awareness would be severely curtailed. So they would be dependent on the professionalism of others for their safety.
The searchers set off and headed into the maize field, which was like entering a waist-high jungle. The crop was still damp with morning dew and the cloying soil stuck to the soldiers’ boots, making progress cumbersome. Chappy pushed up to 150 metres from the compounds before turning ninety degrees right. He continued searching for another 50 metres and then he found the kite string. It was either a brilliant piece of planning or amazing luck.
He beckoned me forward. ‘Kim, what do you reckon? Command wire?’
I made a quick assessment. ‘Yep, definitely. Well done. Good find.’
The rest of the team moved back to approximately 30 metres beyond the device and hopefully out of the immediate danger zone. I pulled a few of the maize stems out of the ground to create a working area, dropped down flat onto my stomach and got to work. The wet earth felt cold but not uncomfortable beneath my chest as I examined the kite string, which needed to be cut, and like most things in the EOD world any form of cutting is best done remotely.
I always carried with me a specialist firing device, about the size of a hip flask, containing a detonator and a length of shock tube. I laid the det next to the string and then paid out the shock tube. At the other end of the shock tube was a striker, like a mouse trap, which when fired would light the shock tube and cause the detonator to explode and cut the string. It was all done in a matter of minutes and with the device now isolated there was no way the Taliban were going to be able to detonate the bomb.
With the search successfully completed, Chappy made his way back to the road and established the ICP behind the lead Mastiff while under the watchful gaze of the infantry, who had their weapons directed towards the compounds. I was conscious of the time the clearance was taking. The longer the convoy was stationary the more of a target it became. In many ways the Taliban were opportunists who had an almost irresistible desire to attack – it was almost comical in its predictability. Sit anywhere long enough and they would have a go.
Dave and I inched our way forward to the location of the switch discovered earlier. I suddenly saw the two metal washers sticking out of the ground, almost touching each other. ‘Jesus – I didn’t think they were that close.’ A breath of wind or a heavy footstep could have caused them to move and detonate the device. I immediately shouted ‘Stop!’ Although the string had been cut the device was still active and primed. This was not a scenario I had practised in training but rather than be deterred or even scared I felt as though this was the challenge I had been looking for. Stepping as softly as possible, I moved back along the track and searched a path to an area where Dave and the infantry escort could get into cover.
‘Wait here and don’t move,’ I said before disappearing back towards the bomb. I inched my way around the switch, taking several pictures of the device in situ, primarily for my report but also if anything was to go wrong at this point and I got wasted there would be some sort of record of what I was dealing with when I was killed.
I very carefully placed the needle next to one of the wires while at the same time chuckling to myself on how ridiculously dangerous the situation had become. The kite string had somehow become caught between the two washers, which had prevented the bomb from exploding. It was the equivalent of a hand grenade with the pin nine-tenths hanging out and was possibly the most dangerous situation anyone in the EOD world could ever encounter.
Despite the risks, I was never scared, my hands didn’t shake and I felt no surge of adrenalin, something that always happened during the early part of the tour, and at one point I was actually laughing at the sheer danger I was facing. It did occur to me that this wasn’t the normal response but I decided not to dwell on my behaviour. I searched my way out of the target area and back to the ICP making sure that the firing cable did not get tangled. Lewis fired the needle and after I gathered my equipment I made my way back to the device.
I taped the exposed ends of the cut wires and began sweeping the dirt away with my paintbrush. After a few minutes the yellow palm oil container that contained around 20kg of HME was exposed. It was a massive bomb, designed to kill and not maim. The main charge was destroyed in situ and twenty minutes later the convoy was back on the move. As the APC bounced along the track I noticed my team all staring at me, serious and concerned.
‘What?’ I said to Dave and the others.
‘You were laughing, boss,’ Dave said, looking very worried.
‘What? What are you on about?’
‘You were laughing when you were taking a picture of the device. That’s not right. That thing could have gone off at any time and you were laughing. Do you really think that’s the right response? What we do is dangerous. It will always be dangerous and it will never, ever be funny.’
‘Come on, lighten up. You have to admit that was funny. I mean what else are you supposed to do when you come face to face with something like that?’
But it wasn’t funny to them. I knew I shouldn’t be laughing but there was nothing I could do. If that was my subconscious response to the stress then I was happy to live with it.
The engine noise soon killed off the conversation but the mood didn’t lighten. I closed my eyes and tried to relax and attempted to convince myself that it was sometimes healthy to laugh in the face of extreme danger.
Ten minutes later we arrived at the checkpoint only to be greeted by a Scottish sergeant major gobbing off about how late we were. His comments were aimed at us and I mumbled the words ‘wanker’ as the team gathered around. A huge roar of laughter erupted and the sergeant major looked furious but said nothing.
The following morning we were lifted out of FOB Shawqat and took an uneventful flight back to Bastion. I made my way to the Ops Room and walked straight into Jim, the Task Force SAT.
He greeted me with a handshake and asked how the job went.
‘You know, same shit, different day. Just another three pressure plates and an odd command-pull that the Taliban couldn’t even bury properly, nothing really.’
Jim’s demeanour changed as the clumsy words fell from my mouth. He grabbed me by the arm and led me out of the Ops Room.
‘Oi, dickhead, stop being an arse.’ His face was so close to mine I could smell the coffee on his breath. ‘Every one of those bombs can kill you. Respect them or I’ll pull you off the ground. If you become a danger to yourself, you’ll be a danger to the team. Now wise up.’
&n
bsp; I wandered back to my tent with Jim’s words ringing in my ears. He was right and I didn’t blame him for his reaction. I hadn’t lost the plot, I’d just grown used to living with fear. I’d become immune and in Afghan fear kept you alive. ‘God complex?’ I said to myself as I lay down on my bed. ‘Don’t be a twat. You’re just a lucky arsehole at the moment.’
10
Where the Fuck’s the Bomb?
It should have been just an ordinary Monday. One of the many ordinary, routine, dull days on a six-month journey that eventually becomes blurred by time and forgotten. Instead Monday 20 July 2009 has been seared into my consciousness.
Brimstone 42 had been based in FOB Price for a week or so conducting routine bomb disposal missions. Much of the previous evening had been spent preparing for a move to FOB Keenan, another of our preferred bases, for another Counter-IED task that also should have been routine. A local Afghan had reported the presence of a home-made bomb in a field close to Keenan and Brimstone 42 was being sent to clear it. The Afghan, who we were told was a farmer, was willing to identify the device’s location, but also wanted to be paid.
So-called ‘walk ins’ were relatively rare in Helmand and something that was actively encouraged. The local population often knew where the IEDs had been placed but were usually too scared to report them to NATO forces for fear of punishment by the Taliban. So when an IED was reported by a member of the local population the EOD Task Force would pull out all the stops to get a team to the location as soon as possible. But ‘walk in’ IED finds also needed to be treated with caution because a Counter-IED team could find itself walking into a well-planned ambush.
The team was ferried to Keenan courtesy of an RAF Chinook, landing around 0800 hrs, still in time for a quick second breakfast. Waiting for us on the edge of the landing area was Major Sam Plant, the officer commanding C Squadron Light Dragoons, an armoured recce unit equipped with Scimitar light tanks. Major Plant was the base commander and the archetypal cavalry officer. Very laid-back, efficient and public-school educated. He had officer-style big hair, occasionally wore glasses and was always very welcoming and helpful. My team spent so long at Keenan that he almost regarded us as his own IED detachment but this time no smile greeted our arrival.
‘Morning, Staff,’ he said sombrely. ‘You need to call your Ops Room urgently.’
My first thoughts were that I had fucked up. Had I produced a shit report, had someone complained about a job – worse of all, had my team missed a bomb?
‘This is Staff Sergeant Hughes. I’ve been told to check in.’
‘Wait one,’ said a voice at the other end.
‘Staff, this is Major Eldon Millar.’ He sounded serious but not angry. Major Millar was the officer commanding the EOD Task Force. I waited for the bollocking coming my way.
‘. . . I’ve got some bad news,’ the phone crackled and his voice faded briefly. He said something about Captain Dan Shepherd.
‘Sorry, sir, I lost you for a second. It sounded like you said Captain Dan Shepherd. Can you repeat that?’
‘I’m sorry, Kim. Dan died this morning while working on a device in Nad e’Ali. He was killed instantly. I wanted you to know as soon as possible. I know you spent a lot of time together on operations recently.’
Suddenly my world contracted. I didn’t know what to say or how to respond. Dan was very relaxed but professional and had a really great relationship with his team. He was only twenty-eight, just married, with a whole life ahead of him. I had known him for a couple of years and was his DS on the Joint Service IEDD course. But we had grown closer in Afghan after we worked together on an operation to clear a deserted bazaar in a small village in the Nad e’Ali area during Operation Panchai Palang. It meant little to him that he was an officer and I was an SNCO; there was mutual respect, a common bond and a genuine friendship. I had only spoken to him a few weeks ago and now he was dead and it didn’t seem possible.
‘OK, sir, can I ring you back? I just need five minutes,’ was all I could think of to say.
‘Yes, sure,’ replied Major Millar, ‘but be prepared, you will be moving from your location to clear the area where Dan was killed.’
I put down the phone, walked out of the Ops Room and headed over to a corner of the HLS. It was almost like a dream, one of those occasions in life when you ask yourself ‘Did that just happen?’
Over on the opposite side of the square the rest of my team were relaxing in the sun, laughing and joking and smoking cigarettes.
I dropped onto my haunches and held my face in my hands. A tear ran down my cheek. I wanted to scream and shout at the top of my voice. Dan was gone. A good bloke, a good ATO, a loving husband, the perfect son and a good mate now gone. For what?
Lee the RESA wandered over. ‘What’s up, mate?’
‘Dan Shepherd was killed this morning,’ I said hardly believing my own words.
‘Shit.’ Lee’s face dropped. ‘What happened . . .?’ but his sentence trailed away. ‘I’ll tell the lads.’
‘No, it’s OK, mate. I’ll do it,’ I said, ‘just give me a minute.’
By now the team sensed something was wrong and I saw no point in delaying the inevitable.
‘Lads, I’ve got some really bad news. Captain Dan Shepherd was killed this morning in Nad e’Ali. I know you all knew him and liked him. Take a few minutes but be aware we’ve still got a job to do here and at some stage, either today or early tomorrow, we’ll be flying into Shawqat to clear the area where Dan was killed.’
Even when I said it – Dan was dead – it didn’t seem real.
I walked away from the team and was met by the OC. ‘Everything OK, Staff?’ he asked.
‘No, sir. We’ve just lost one of our operators.’ He could see that I was upset, broken almost.
‘I’m so sorry to hear that. I sensed something was wrong when the call came in from Bastion. Look, forget about this task here for the time being. There’s no rush and besides your Ops Room are telling us that you’re on the next helicopter out of here to Shawqat for a more urgent task.
‘It’s OK, sir. I think I’ll need to keep the lads busy for the rest of the day.’
After another brief chat with the Bastion Ops Room, the plan was confirmed. We would be leaving first thing in the morning for Shawqat. I would be working with the operations warrant officer to carry out a post-explosion investigation and to make sure what was left of Dan and his kit were removed from the battlefield. I couldn’t think of a worse job but at the same time I wanted to do it.
I called the guys together again. ‘We are staying here to complete this task then flying out tomorrow to clear the area where Dan was killed. Everyone needs to be focused. If we don’t do this someone else will so let’s get it done. We’re going to pull these bombs out of the ground or we’re going to blow them in situ. They’re in the middle of a farmer’s field but if he doesn’t like it he can fuck off.’
I was angry and not in the mood for shit from anyone. The team silently got their kit ready.
A platoon of soldiers from the Light Dragoons were ready and wanted to get on with the job. They were accompanied by a small detachment from the Afghan National Army, who were co-located at Keenan, an interpreter, known as a Terp, and the Afghan who had reported the IED. He was dressed in an ANA uniform in the hope that any Taliban watching us wouldn’t be able to identify him. He bore the classic features of the Pashtun warrior. He was tall, around six foot, with brown leathery skin, a hook nose, dark-brown, serious eyes and bearded. He could have been anywhere between thirty and sixty years of age. He said little and eyed us suspiciously – part of me wondered whether we were being lured into a trap. I wasn’t in the mood to be messed around.
By 9.30 a.m. the temperature was at an almost unbearable 97°C. As the patrol left the compound and began snaking its way through the fields towards the target there were so many questions. What had Dan being doing? Had he made a mistake? Was the device booby-trapped? I thought about his family and his wife, w
hom he adored and how right at that moment would be waking up to that dreadful knock on the door and nothing would ever be the same again. I thought of my own son and how he would cope if I was the next ATO to die. Up until that point our tour had been relatively easy. After the incident with Sam we had pulled together and grown stronger. Sam was in hospital back in the UK. He was out of danger and making steady progress on what was going to be a long road to recovery. Harry had managed to put the incident behind him and was back to his old self. The operations had come thick and fast but we had coped and all grown to relish the challenge. But Dan’s death hit us all like a low punch, leaving everyone on their knees.
The countryside surrounding Keenan was stunning, with wonderful contrast between the desert and cultivated fields of green young crops, criss-crossed with an elaborate array of irrigation ditches that had been feeding the soil for centuries. The sky was a perfect, cloudless, deep blue. It was a scene of simple rural beauty but it meant nothing to me and only seemed to fuel a deep anger burning away in the pit of my stomach.
After about twenty minutes of moving randomly across fields, the patrol arrived at the location of the suspected IED, an undulating field of about an acre in size where the green shoots of a crop, possibly wheat, were forcing their way through the sun-baked soil. A few hidden birds sang away out of sight, while high above a pair of combat jets took ownership of the sky ready to strike on demand.
‘So where’s the device?’ I said to the Terp, a young eager-to-please Afghan, with bright eyes and a ready smile. The farmer was pointing to the middle of the field and before the Terp could relay his answer, I interrupted: ‘That’s no good to me. I need an exact location otherwise I’m going to be wandering around that field like a twat.’
Painting the Sand Page 13