BLOG: INDIRECT FIRE-- Day 23: No pressure Published July 29, 2009 By SSgt. Jacob Richmond 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs JOINT BASE BALAD, Iraq -- So, this is what it's like to be a military journalist at war. Back at home, the stories we write are often specialized and geared toward our own military audience; and when our stories are good enough to transcend that category, they're usually covered by the "real media" (a victory in the public-affairs world). Today, though, after a rare chance to interview a group of true heroes in the combat zone, I realize that their story is one only I can tell. The real media isn't here to cover it, and even if they were, they don't have the military perspective to pull it off the right way. So, it's on me. When that story is edited and approved according to journalistic principles and Associated Press Style, it'll go where all of our stories go. Here on this page, though, I get to tell the story of the story. Just over a week ago, we got word that a young Iraqi girl had been badly injured by an improvised explosive device (IED) right down the road from one of our base gates. Insurgents presumably put it there to target coalition forces patrolling outside the gate. The girl had been with other children near the entry control point (ECP), accepting clothes and toys donated by service members. Less than a mile into her walk home, she stepped on the wrong patch of dirt and set off an explosion. The Airmen at the ECP heard a somewhat distant blast, and at first figured it was a routine controlled detonation. A few minutes passed before they saw an Iraqi man running toward them and yelling, "Bomb blast boom! Help!" Two Airmen immediately sprinted in the direction the man was pointing and saw a barely conscious, badly bloodied little girl being pulled out of a truck. She had a life-threatening sucking stomach wound, fingers hanging by their skin, lacerations halfway through her ankles, and serious burns all over her body. Most security forces Airmen who work at ECPs here go through Combat Lifesaver (CLS) training, where they learn how to become an emergency bridge between basic "self aid and buddy care" and combat medics. One of the Airmen on scene that day had graduated from CLS the day before, and another had graduated just a week prior. They reacted immediately; they got her on a litter, brought her back to the ECP, called in for more medical attention, and started putting their CLS training to use. They had all of her wounds stabilized in about three minutes. The girl is alive. Why? Because in a time of crisis and confusion, that group of Airmen instantly sprung into action and used their training perfectly. And also because we have a truly outstanding medical facility, the Air Force Theater Hospital, right here at JBB. A team of doctors there pulled a piece of shrapnel the size of a man's thumb out of her stomach and stopped her internal bleeding. A neurosurgeon reconnected her fingers and feet, and with successful physical therapy, she'll make a full recovery. I heard about the whole thing the day after it happened. A major who works in my building happened to be out at the ECP and witnessed the entire thing. He told me how amazed he was to watch the scene unfold, knowing there was no room for another person to help, but determined to be the one to remember the details. He even talked to some of the doctors later, and they told him that the immediate and effective treatment of her wounds was the only reason the girl survived. They also said it was most likely the expert bandaging that kept her ankles stationary enough to prevent amputation. The Airmen who saved the girl's life knew that she survived. They even visited her in the hospital the next day. But during the interview, they seemed a little too humble - not just the good, sensible humility of an ordinary person who knows they did something extraordinary. Their humility seemed genuine - almost naïve - and as they all talked, I noticed that the two CLS-trained guys seemed to dwell a little too long on the fact that they never got the emergency IV hooked up. The needles in their CLS packs were apparently not the kind they were used to, so they weren't able to hook up the saline bag before the medics arrived at the scene. They were still being sincerely self-critical. I was confused. The major who witnessed it all was part of the group interview. Answering one of my questions, he started recounting what the doctors had told him - something he had already shared with me days ago. The young Airmen were watching him as he talked. As he relayed the doctors' statement that it was the Airmen's CLS treatment that saved her life, their faces instantly changed. In a perfectly candid moment, I saw one of them literally drop his jaw. That's when I realized that, until that moment, they all thought they had only played one small part in this girl's otherwise lucky survival. They wrapped her wounds as best they could, turned her to the side when she had to vomit, failed to properly attach an IV, and attempted to share comforting words through an interpreter. Then they waited impatiently for the "real medics" to arrive, reviewing their checklists over and over. Frustration trumped pride by a wide margin. They had no idea how well they did. After a few minutes, I asked them if I was right. They reluctantly confirmed. So I asked them what it felt like to know they really, truly saved a child's life. Since it hadn't quite set in yet, they couldn't offer any profound answers. They were still in disbelief. One of them finally spoke up with some conviction. He said there's a slogan their CLS instructors frequently repeated: You don't rise to the occasion; you fall to the level of your training. The Airman said he now understood what that meant. In the military, and especially in the combat zone, performing under the highest kind of pressure is something you think about routinely - mainly because most of us have no idea if we can do it. In training, we're either in the field simulating hostile situations or in the classroom learning lessons from real-world experiences. Still, we all know that exercises and classes prepare us well, but there's no way to replicate the real thing. When human lives are in the balance, there's only one way to ever find out if you have the right stuff. So, today and every day for the rest of their lives, these Airmen have that rare knowledge of oneself - one part pride and one part solemnity - assured that they have succeeded under real and intense pressure. With death in their hands, they saved a life. They'll probably reflect on that forever, with the girl's living face burned in their memories. I don't envy them. One of them even said that he told the girl's mother, through an interpreter, that he was sorry for what happened to her daughter, but he was very happy she was alive. I know what he meant; in my own way, I also feel conflicted. As it's probably difficult to feel heroic after seeing the ugly circumstances that precede heroism, it's hard for me to be excited about writing the most important story of my Air Force journalism career. It goes without saying that if I could undo the physical and mental trauma that girl had to suffer, I'd gladly give up the opportunity to write the amazing story of her rescue. But I can't. So, instead, I'll use my own training to describe what happened and make sure my audience knows the names of a few real heroes. I'll tell the story as best I can. No pressure on me. At least not the real kind.