Risk Management Magazine

Being involved in direct-support air assaults brings its own hazards that we plan for and work out in every detail. We know where we are going and what time we are going to be there.

When I was a young sergeant, squad leader and shop foreman in a forward support company stationed at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, my section was shorthanded as we were training to deploy.

It was the Saturday of the first battle assembly weekend in the new fiscal year, and a staff sergeant and a few of his Soldiers were conducting a recon. The plan was to take a HMMWV into the hills to find the perfect location for training. This plan would have worked out great had it not rained the past two days.