Afghanistan !!!!!!!

UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUMS THE UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUM (INTERACTIVE)
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Hello all,

As you have guessed Iam at last safe and sound back in the goood old UK :smiley:
and as promised I have got a couple of photos together for you all to have a gander at.

When I got out to Afghan, last September, I was quite apprehensive as to what to expect but to be honest it was not to bad. The weather was good and we was busy for the majority of the six months we were there : ie, not a day off from the 19th Sept till the 17th Dec, then 2 weeks R and R and then straight back into it again from the 2nd Jan straight through till end of March !!

The jobs we did basically consisted of taking stores and supplies to the out lying bases around the HelmandProvince. It wa anywhere between 6 and 100+ vehicles, which included our force protection of upgraded Land Rovers with some serious fireower on them.
The bases were anywhere upto 150Km from where we were based at Bastion,now I know that doesnt sound a long way, but believe me with the terrain we had to use it was somewhat emotional on a number of occasions especially after christmas when the rains came in and the temperatures dropped.

Quite a few of the lads including myself managed to get on MOG’s which supported Artillery units and such like which meant we were attached to them for anywhere upto six weeks just living in the desert and cabbying round the place putting the fear of god into the Taliban :smiley:


The Vehicle Park in all its glory !


Me taking 5 minutes to chill out after a 18 hour straight drive


My IMMLC


DROPS in the desert


Your average view at 40 mph !!!


Lots of these things flying all the time


At the time this was the largest convoy to have travelled around Afghan, at the last count there was 107 vehicles.


Possibly one of the best roads in the country…Pftttttt !


The kharzis…actually better than some service stations I have stopped at in the UK.


One nice thing about Afghan was the sunsets

Driving hours out there were never a worry, it was nothing to drive upwards of 18 hours plus on a single trip. The worst one was 33 hours :open_mouth:

Still it was all good fun. Iam now ready to do some agency work soon and have been told I could well be working on containers down at the docks, so that will be another string to my bow so to speak. Any tips on container work would be appreciated :stuck_out_tongue:

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Cool pics! :sunglasses: Let’s have some more “story” though. Tell us more about it and what was involved etc. All I’m seeing is you driving across a desert with a 20’ box on the back of an off-road 8-wheeler and not a lot else. :confused: :confused:

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Glad to see you back safe and sound G. but

Driving hours out there were never a worry, it was nothing to drive upwards of 18 hours plus on a single trip. The worst one was 33 hours

shouldn’t this be in a different thread - the one about foreign drivers and excessive hours? :confused: :unamused: :laughing:

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I love those Leyland DROPS, they certainly have some presence on the roads dont they :sunglasses:
Saw one parked at the side of the road in Church Crookham last week with a load of motorbikes on the back, with the driver dressed in civvies :confused:
Big up all those people fighting in place like Afghanistan, I for one think you do a brilliant job under horrible conditions :exclamation:

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Great pics, glad you are safe and sound. Can I borrow that foden for morrison RDC deliveries

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Good picts , and glad your safe , now you just need to risk your life on the breakfasts at the sevices :laughing:

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Did you not have time to clean out the cab of your Leyland DROPS motor, It looks a disgrace Corporal !! :wink:

Good to see you back home safely and respect to all our lads & lasses who are out there doing what our politicians have always been too scared too do!!

Hope things go well for you back in the UK , if you get a chance on the containers I’m sure you will find it easier than in Afghanistan, good luck for the future.

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Excellent pics there Grundrill.

Looks like you could have done with some sunscreen on your napper :laughing:

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That was possibly the cleanest the cab would ever get, as soon as you set off your covered in dust and sand etc. As for the suncream…yep, your right !!! :blush:

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Just out of curiosity, Grundrill, where you allocated the same vehicle or was it just the usual take the keys of what was loaded & available and go were told, did you have to do anything mechanical over and above the normal daily checks, what happened if you got lost in the desert areas ?

I’m sure you know us back home don’t get the real info on whats happening out there and some real frontline experience would be great to learn from. Sorry, I’ve just thought are you restricted by ‘Official Secrets Act’ ?

Again I can only give our guys & gals who are trying to keep the peace out in Afghan & Iraq the biggest respect possible.

RESPECT TO ALL OUR SERVICE PERSONELL

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If we had only beeen allocated the same vehicle every time that would have been a god send !!!

Basically you would go into the office see what the next trip was and who you had been allocated as top cover ( sat looking out of the coupola with an ■■■■■■ big gun ! ), then spend umpteen hours trying to find out what and where your load was, then realiseing when you found it it was going over the weight limit for the DROPS LHS system. then sit round and smoke ciggarettes till somebody sorted the load out.

Eventually 2 days later the convoy would roll out at sparrow ■■■■ in the morning, go where it had to go, do what it had to do when it got there and then head back.

This does not take into account breakdowns Arghhhhhhh !!! A REME recovery truck would pull up and assess the situation, the main REME guy would normally say “Your problem, get on with it”. And then we would end up being towed back in by one of the other DROPS. It must have been a grand sight to behold on the return of our first convoy…9 vehicles being towed :laughing:

When we got back we had to ‘post op’ them which is the equivlent of a six monthly service every 3-4 days.

Still, all good fun :open_mouth:

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:sunglasses: Well `ard mate, great pics, god I miss deployments…not :unamused:

:smiling_imp: Could do with that GPMG from atop your IMMLC, (start a 5 shift cycle tommorrow…M Drayton/Southampton/Shepton Mallett/Strensham 1st night on… M6 will be a nightmare as usual ) could`nt think of anything better than a GIMPY to clear away the centre lane hoggers !! :wink:

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Great post and pictures!! :wink:

and good experience as hanbury davies are about to start their GPMG service to beat the maritime que at Harwich. :smiley:

Hope it was a quiet tour with no cassies!! :wink:

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Fabulous piccies mate. You guys ‘n’ gals certainly got my respect for doing a fantastic job out there. I have nothing but admiration and support for the armed forces kicking Taliban ■■■!

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Excellent post & pics . The last time I was in that part of the World I hitched rides from the Iran border to the ■■■■ /Khyber Pass border ( & back ) Had no probs at all . The Afghanis were the most peaceable crowd in the whole M/E .

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Shrek:
Fabulous piccies mate. You guys ‘n’ gals certainly got my respect for doing a fantastic job out there.

i agree with that. :wink: :wink: :wink:

I have nothing but admiration and support for the armed forces kicking Taliban ■■■!

not too sure about that comment. our men are meant to be the best in the world yet they seem to be struggling against men in sandles with weapons one step up from bows and arrows. look at the back up and equipment the the british army has and look what the taliban has. unfortunatley it seems under the circumstances the taliban are doing a bloody job. :open_mouth:

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not too sure about that comment. our men are meant to be the best in the world yet they seem to be struggling against men in sandles with weapons one step up from bows and arrows. look at the back up and equipment the the british army has and look what the taliban has. unfortunatley it seems under the circumstances the taliban are doing a bloody job.

Aye, I see what your saying but you have to realise that the Taliban have been fighting for years against the Russians, and don’t forget that at the end of the day it was the British Army who trained them. And to top that the Afghans beat the British many years ago…or was that just a tactical withdrawral ■■? :wink:

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Grundril:

not too sure about that comment. our men are meant to be the best in the world yet they seem to be struggling against men in sandles with weapons one step up from bows and arrows. look at the back up and equipment the the british army has and look what the taliban has. unfortunatley it seems under the circumstances the taliban are doing a bloody job.

Aye, I see what your saying but you have to realise that the Taliban have been fighting for years against the Russians, and don’t forget that at the end of the day it was the British Army who trained them. And to top that the Afghans beat the British many years ago…or was that just a tactical withdrawral ■■? :wink:

well grundil i cant argue with you as you are out there doing your best and im sat here. :wink:

good luck with it.

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The difference is that the Afghans are prepared to die for their cause .To the Allie’s its just a job & get home safe to their families ( don’t blame ‘em ) . Also the Afghans get good info from the locals & know the terrain like the back of their hand. The other thing is that the Afghans believe fervently that they are in the right whereas the Allies get lukewarm support from the general public back home. Wars are not won by electronic gadgets’ no matter how clever they might be, as the US found out Nam.