Hooray for our military...

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PENSACOLA, Fla., Sept. 6 - Two Navy helicopter pilots and their crews returned from New Orleans on Aug. 30 expecting to be greeted as lifesavers after ferrying more than 100 hurricane victims to safety.

Instead, their superiors chided the pilots, Lt. David Shand and Lt. Matt Udkow, at a meeting the next morning for rescuing civilians when their assignment that day had been to deliver food and water to military installations along the Gulf Coast.

"Their orders were to go and deliver water and parts and to come back," Commander Holdener said.

According to the pilots and other military officials, they rescued 110 people.

The next morning, though, the two crews were called to a meeting with Commander Holdener, who said he told them that while helping civilians was laudable, the lengthy rescue effort was an unacceptable diversion from their main mission of delivering supplies. With only two helicopters available at Pensacola to deliver supplies, the base did not have enough to allow pilots to go on prolonged search and rescue operations.

"We all want to be the guys who rescue people," Commander Holdener said. "But they were told we have other missions we have to do right now and that is not the priority."

The order to halt civilian relief efforts angered some helicopter crews. Lieutenant Udkow, who associates say was especially vocal about voicing his disagreement to superiors, was taken out of the squadron's flying rotation temporarily and assigned to oversee a temporary kennel established at Pensacola to hold pets of service members evacuated from the hurricane-damaged areas, two members of the unit said.

In protest, some members of the unit have stopped wearing a search and rescue patch on their sleeves that reads, "So Others May Live."


This is really fucked up. I understand that a search and rescue mission is set up as an intricate plan, but come on. They had completed their mission and helped these people? Hmmmm.

No BUSH - BASHING posts in here. Each will get met the delete button. Later, QD.

[speedminded]

but they did not complete their mission..."Their orders were to go and deliver water and parts and to come back," Commander Holdener said. What if one of them got shot down or simply crashed? We're out a $500k to million+ aircraft possibly resulting in many deaths because they didn't follow their orders. This is why we have the national guard and coast guard, despite how long it takes their units and crews to get to the victims.

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Ahh, but they did complete their mission, oh faggoty one. They did a humane thing along with their mission, but they completed it. They got supplies, delivered them and returned. They also saved a hunfdred peoples lives during their mission. You sir, as has been repeated numerous times on IA, are the usual idiot bantering on like the stupid motherfucker that you are. Later, QD.