LT. COL. JAMES WELLS
G4 Supply and Services
Virginia Army National Guard
North Chesterfield, Virginia
Several years ago, I was deployed as a platoon leader in a medium truck company with the Virginia Army National Guard. We were stationed in southern Iraq at Contingency Operating Base (COB) Adder, near the city of Nasiriya. Our unit had been on the ground for about five months and the deployment was going well. We primarily hauled equipment and containers to the Baghdad area. We’d not experienced any major mishaps or losses, and the Soldiers were starting to feel pretty confident — possibly bordering on complacent.
Most of the Soldiers were not truck drivers by trade. However, as we were a Guard unit, a few were professional truck drivers. During pre-mobilization, we got some good training on our vehicles, the M915A3 line-haul tractor. Most of our Soldiers were pretty self-assured behind the wheel.
One morning, we received a mission to haul large commercial generators, as well as other equipment, from Baghdad International Airport to COB Adder. A young sergeant in my platoon was loaded with one of these generators for the run. After his vehicle received the load, he made a trip to the latrine. In a line-haul operation, the driver is responsible for ensuring the load on the trailer is properly tied down and secured. In his absence, however, the assistant driver and another Soldier secured the generator.
The two primary means of securing non-containerized cargo are tie-down straps or chains and binders. The assistant driver struggled to close one of the chain binders even with leverage and needed the other Soldier’s help. The leverage used to close a chain binder is a large, hollow lead or steel pipe, typically referred to as a "cheater bar." Using a cheater bar was an acceptable practice to close a binder to get the chain tight and make the load more secure.
When the convoy completed its journey from Baghdad to COB Adder, the drivers proceeded to the joint distribution center to unload the cargo. The young sergeant climbed upon his trailer to unsecure the chains from the generator. Unaware of the extra tension used to secure the binder, he struggled to pop it loose. Frustrated, he grabbed his cheater bar, placed it on the lever end of the binder and pulled to release it. This is something you should never do, and the results were dire.
When the over-tensioned binder released, all of the energy propelled the cheater bar like a catapult. On the way up, the bar struck the Soldier under the chin, breaking his jaw in three places. The force of the blow was so great that it lifted him off his feet and threw him from the trailer to the ground. Luckily, a broken jaw and a month-long liquid diet were the worst of his consequences. A few inches lower and the pipe could have easily crushed his windpipe or severed arteries in his neck, which likely would have been fatal.
I learned a valuable lesson that day. We spend a lot of time in our driver training programs teaching Soldiers to operate the vehicle safely. We spend much less time teaching proper tie-down and cargo-handling procedures. Safely loading and unloading cargo is also critical to the logistics mission and Soldier safety and must not be ignored.
FYI
The U.S. Army Combat Readiness Center’s Driver’s Training Toolbox contains a wealth of information, including a page dedicated to resource materials, training circulars and graphic training aids for line-haul operations. Check it out at https://safety.army.mil/ON-DUTY/Drivers-Training-Toolbox/Line-Haul. (A CAC login is required.)