Sleepless in Midland

Airport Disaster Drill 2006 - photos

Here are some photos from the Airport Disaster Drill 2006 at Midland International Airport on June 24, 2006.  This series shows a couple of "victims" with moulage as well as some on the runway.  Note the ball point pen protruding from the young woman's side in photo number 2.

This series shows the woman with the pen in her side lying on the runway, then being hauled to the red (critical) triage area, and eventually carried to the ambulance.

Here we see "Stumpy" with the artificial amputation.  And for Southwest Airlines it was just a normal day.  The temperature wasn't as hot as it has been on recent days, but the water rehab was well received.  These photos should pop up when they are clicked, and I hope they show up for you.  I've had a problem viewing photos at this site on my own computer, but I don't know yet whether the problem is my computer, my ISP, Typepad, or somewhere in between.

It was a Disaster (drill)

Picture this:  Badly injured from a plane crash and possibly near death, a husband and wife, both in great pain, reach out to try to comfort each other and call out for help, however weakly.  ACTING!

What a scene!  Bodies everywhere.  Fake blood all over the place.   But when dead people start sitting up and talking to one another the whole scene got a little less stomach churning.

It was the 2006 Airport Disaster Drill, and the moulage was amazingly realistic.   My two favorites were Pen-in-the-belly, the girl with the ball point pen stabbed into her gut, and Stumpy, the woman with the leg amputation just below the knee.  All fake.

The people who volunteered to act as crash victims really put there hearts into it.  They were assigned a role and given a tag describing their affliction so that it was a little easier for the first responders to label them with dots.  Red  was critical, yellow was serious, green meant that they were able to walk, and those with blue dots were dead.

One fellow with burns on his arms really let loose with the howling.  He even complained about ant bites.  (Hmmm,  those could have been real.)  But he did get a red dot, so he didn't have to hang around long.  And as one might expect, some of the silent ones were pretty badly banged up.

The very first responders wore space suits and made the determination that it was safe for the rest of the rescuers to come in.

The goal was to triage the injured so that those who were in critical shape but who could be helped got attention first.  Ambulances were called in for miles around, and the patients were taken to area hospitals.  The walking wounded were directed to a bus which took them to get treatment, although I suspect that if this were real they would have had quite a wait.

I was there in two capacities, water boy and media man.  The media were taken to the scene just after the crash so that they (we) could get in there, and mingle with the victims, and photograph the blood and guts.  Then as word of the incident got out the police came and shoed us all outside a makeshift perimeter.  One police officer had his hands full with a woman acting as an elderly relative of a victim who just couldn't stop wandering around looking for that relative.  It was really quite amusing for those of us who weren't actually being tested.  But for the first responders it was very serious.

It's hard to say who had the toughest job.  The hardest physical work was performed by those men and women who had to strap hefty people onto backboards and haul them to the triage area.  However, a victim could be misdiagnosed and end up not getting the care that might have kept him or her alive, so surely the triage evaluations must have been quite exhausting.

The volunteers who played dead bodies were replaced with sandbags and didn't have to wait around in the hot sun.  And to the workers who had to haul off the sandbags, they were just sandbags, not bodies.  So I learned something today.  A dead body in that circumstance is a federal problem.  The local officials just leave them there for some federal agency to deal with, or stink up the place, which ever occurs first.

But for the volunteers it was a hoot, and they got a free brisket lunch provided by the Citizens Fire Academy Alumni Association.

I took about a zillion photos, and if any of them make it through the triage I may post some of them here tomorrow.  So check back.

The Vietnam comparison just doesn't fly

One doesn't have to look very hard to find some antiwar argument comparing Vietnam with Iraq.  See almost anything written by AP's Tom Raum for an anti Bush spin with a Vietnam analogy.  But factual comparisons and distinctions are easy.  It's not brain surgery, it's what lawyers do all the time.

The Vietnam war had a high body count, and the main stream media seems obsessed with the body count in Iraq.  As a channel flipper I seldom watch those lists of recently deceased of the U.S. military that scroll down the tv screens at the end of some of the national news shows.  The reason they would give for showing those names is probably that they merely wanted to show respect.  But in reality it's part of the steady anti war drum beat.  And it's working. Take for example a recent discussion on The Late Show with David Letterman.  Tim Russert was the guest, and the topic of their discussion was Iraq.  Here's Letterman:

I watch these shows, the network nightly news shows, the Jim Lehrer News Hour, and at the end of their programs they will tell you, they will give you the names and the ages of the most recent American men and women who have died over there.  And like everyone else I'm just getting tired of it.  These are 22,23 year old men and women.  Dead.  Is that the price we have to pay for their stability? (Applause.)

The network nightly news shows and the Jim Lehrer News Hour probably nudged each other after hearing that and said, "It's working!  It's working!"

But they seem oblivious to the threat that Saddam would have been to us a few years down the road had he stayed in power.  He was a pretty good poker player.  Everyone believed he had those weapons of mass destruction, but he was bluffing.  And it's conceivable that under certain circumstances a weak president would fold a good hand and make some major concessions to Saddam if he threatened to use those fictitious WMDs.

So let's make an analogy of our own.  Have you seen that Capital One credit card commercial in which a blundering guardian angel seems oblivious to all sorts of risks that his ward encounters?  But by golly, he'll protect her from some credit card risk.  So there's the Vietnam antiwar movement, resurrected to oppose the war in Iraq simply because it's a war.  But they are oblivious to the threats we would have encountered had we not gone to war.

Need more?  Go to It's Vietnam! (It Has To Be) at Rantingprof.com for a compelling argument that the reason for the comparisons with Vietnam is because of the coverage itself.

At the Airport this Saturday

If you are flying into or out of Midland International Airport the morning of June 24, 2006, put your tray tables up, put your seat backs in the upright position, and prepare for a crash.

Actually it's a simulated crash for training purposes.  In the scenario a 737 carrying 145 passengers and a five person crew crashes due to a terrorist act.  Volunteers will play roles as victims made up to simulate injuries, and they've been told to wear old clothes that can be cut up.  And it was suggested that females wear swimsuits underneath.  (Hubba hubba!)

Oh, fasten your seat belts, too.

Juneteenth Parade on June 17, 2006 (also KKK meeting)

This Saturday morning in Midland the Juneteenth Parade will create a trail of cars and floats from Jumburritos on Lamesa Road to Washington Park.  It was lots of fun last year, and it's sure to be a good one this year.

However, there's a competing event scheduled to take place that same day a half mile away.  It's a tiny group of attention starved individuals who have attached themselves to the name "Ku Klux Klan."  The Klan today is an anachronism, a toothless entity.  And it seems to me that the only reason anyone would want to associate themselves with it is because of a desperate need for attention.  And try though they might, they cannot come up with any other way to get noticed.  They can't even come up with an original issue.  Immigration?  Puleeeze!

Anyway, according to Ku Klux Klan group plans Midland rally at MyWestTexas, they are planning some sort of gathering in Midland on June 17 at the Court House.  There aren't likely to be many of them.  Their last rally in Austin was attended by 14 members. Source.

Since they want attention, then the best response would be to ignore them.  So can't we do that?  I guess not.  See KKK plan to rally in Midland spurs community action.  It seems that the opposition groups like that attention, too.

So if you are looking for something fun to do Saturday morning, go to the parade and have a good time.  Ignore the Klan and the opposition groups they attract.  Don't satisfy their weird need for glorification.

al Zarqawi's news sources

Here's a short and easy quiz. 

What news source was found among the weapons, ammo and grenades in the rubble where al Zarqawi's body was found?

a.  New York Times
b.  Washington Post
c.  Newsweek
d.  al Jazeera

Answer, c.

Haditha coverage lacking perspective

I'm haunted by a tv image shown during the run up to the takeover of Iraq.  You'll remember it.  The UN inspection team was rolling down some street in Iraq, and a guy got into the car with them.  He had some papers with him, and the story was that he had evidence of something he wanted the UN team to see.

He got in the car on the drivers side and hung onto the steering wheel for dear life as Saddam's henchmen pried him off and hauled him away.  And the UN guy hugged the passenger side as if the guy were trying rub him with a flesh eating bacteria.

Then the story was dropped.  There was no follow up.  The guy was probably killed, we were to assume.  Dictator kills subject.  No story here.  Move along.

So now those same people who chose to ignore that story are wailing away about  alleged killings by Marines in Haditha.  Example:  Evan Thomas in Newsweek hitting all the bases with "Haditha may turn out to be the worst massacre since My Lai."  And are the Marines guilty?  Well of course they are, just read the papers and look at the tv.

But wait minute.  There are two sides to the story.  The Marines say that 15 civilians were killed in an IED explosion and nine were killed in a firefight that followed.  Check out "Haditha: Reasonable Doubt" in the Hawaii Free Press in which Andrew Walden lays out some compelling reasons for holding back the lynch mob.  (Via Roger L. Simon.)

For example, he suggests taking a close look at the accusers and the motives they may have to lie.  Chiefly among them is the U.S. policy of paying money to families of innocent victims who get killed but not to familes of people who were trying to kill Americans.  One way for all the surviving families to get a share of the money would be to claim that all the 24 dead were innocent victims.

And until the bodies are exhumed the only evidence that they were shot was from the death certificates.  Would a doctor lie?  Would a terrorist threaten a doctor if he didn't lie?

The point is that it's too soon to judge those Marines.  They could be guilty, but that's for a court to decide.  And even if they are, let's not get our panties in a twist over it. Terrorists certainly don't let a guilty conscience slow them down, and we shouldn't either.  So anyone who wants to wave the white flag to alleviate their feelings of guilt is handing a powerful weapon to the terrorists.   If it happened, it happened, so let's suck it up and move forward.  There's too much at stake.

For some perspective see Michael Yon.

And for the hand wringers, why were you so forgiving of Saddam when he was killing civilians?

Freddy the Comedian at the Mex-Tex Fest

Freddy Hernandez at the Mex-Tex Fest in Midland last night.  A sampling:

"I told this to my wife in divorce court.  'I went to Vietnam, and you waited for me.  I came back, and you stood by my side.  I started a business, and you stood by me.  The business failed, and you were there.  I had a health problem, and you stood by me.  We lost the house, and you stood by me.  You're bad luck.'"

"Anyone who has a drunk in the family, let me know by applauding.  Those of you who didn't applaud, if you are sitting there trying to figure out who's the drunk in your family, it's you!"

Coming up tonight at Mex-Tex:  Jalapeno Eating Contest.  Followed by bath room break.

Followup:  The Jalapeno Eating Contest took place Saturday evening.  Originally only four contestants appeared ready to compete, however when the MC issued an invitation to audience members to try it, a dozen audience members stepped up to the plate.  The original contest was designed so that the winner would be the one who ate the most jalapenos in one minute.  However, with all the new contestants there's weren't enough jalapenos to go around.  So each contestant was given a bowl containing 13 jalapenos, and the first person to eat them all was named the winner.

The winner consumed his 13 jalapenos in around a half a minute.