I cannot send messages over the forum from here due to OP SEC, so I will use my wife as a relay via MSN for this one to send from back home. There are not many other people who would find the story relevant except other people who religiously like to be prepared. It just goes to show that a PSK can save you’re a** in more ways than the usual lost in the woods scenario.
I have used my PSK before in a real situ. I had a student fall through ice. I have been lost while hunting. I have been caught in a storm and had to spend two days waiting for it to clear.
I never in 100 years figured that carrying a PSK would save my ass like this.We had just cleared the cache of HE projectiles and RPG rounds of booby traps and set them up for disposal 20 meters away in a small ditch. We need to get rid of these munitions to prevent later use against allied troops and every cache we destroy may be lives saved. The crew returned to the vehicle. My last job was to finish the initiation set and then pull the pins on the M-60s. Behind me was my LAV III and the rest of my team providing over watch as I tied up the last loose ends on this task. As I knelt down and went about my job my earpiece began to crackle but I could not pick out any words. I cussed like a drunken sailor at the lack of comms. Then out of the corner of my eye I began to notice that one of my guys was looking intently at something somewhere to my front with his vectors.
The LAV is 150 m behind me. There is a second 300 m out on a ridge scanning the low ground and an armored hummer 300 m on the opposite flank full of my American friends, feet up looking at “educational" magazines in the otherwise uneventful day. As I sit in the ditch I can only make out the abandoned mud grape drying huts to my front, and the LAV to my 6, but not much else. Everywhere else I am closed in by waist high mud walls spanning out 25 m from me and skirting the roads.
No biggie, he is most likely bored. Intel suggests that there is no activity in this area. “Besides, its broad daylight” I say out loud.
I begin to get the creeps…… No reason why, just that feeling of ????. Screw this, Time to get a move on. No cross over’s in my det cord.( Check). M-60s ready. (Check). Safety pins removed. (Check). Nothing to do now but police up my gear and wait for permission to pull pin. I turn back to give a thumbs up to my guys to let them know I am waiting for a go. My heart sinks.
I notice one of my friends running to the LAV from his dismounted position. The turret is hatches down now and the 25 mm cannon is swinging toward my bearing.
My radio crackles once more ……3 …….this is……….contact…………sssssssssssss………………………….grid…………………………multiple….….. They are shouting at me from the back ramp but I cannot hear what they are shouting. The point however, is painfully clear. The S just hit the fan and I am stuck in the middle of it.
Boom. Boom. Boom. I almost s**t my pants as the first three round burst flies over my head from the 25mm. I have had the crack thump of small arms fly over my head lots of times, but not from a 25mm Bushmaster. ……ma………hur…….the…fu……..up………………to your…………….. In a panicked voice over the radio. (Permission granted, says I).
I pull the first M60 pin. Nothing…. Son of a b****, must have pulled too hard. Try again man, easy this time. Reset, re-pull. Nothing. A f*****g dud. No worries, that’s why we always set up two, just in case one fails. I grab the second one and pull the pin. Nothing. Look up the word panic in Websters and it is from what I am experiencing now that spawned such a word. How the fu** can I have two duds?
The air rips apart over my head as the 7.62 mm co axial MG unleashes hell on…………something. I crane my neck as far out of the ditch as I dare but I still can’t see s**t. M y radio is going nuts but I cannot pick out words, only broken fragments…………….ge……………of……th…….now ………1 x …. Destroyed….flank….
If I leave now, the next time we see this ordinance will be when they are using it against us. I try to remain calm but I think I hear more shouting. It’s coming from somewhere in FRONT of me now……………sounds about 100 M or so to the front. Maybe it’s my imagination.
Then it hits me like a kick to the nuts from a wild bull. I have matches in my PSK tucked neatly away in my TAC vest. (You know. The same matches that everyone on the forum told me I didn’t need in a tactical situation)
I drop the death grip on my rifle and start tearing open my pouch. The next burst from the 25 shatters the top corner of the mud hut that is just visible from my ditch. Did he miss??? Was someone in that window??? WTF is going on over there? I tear open the PSK like a dog tearing up a newspaper and find the matches. I use my bayonet to cut half the M700 time fuse away and then strike all 6 of the Mariner matches at once(not taking any Godd*****d chances with it this time) The six matches spawn quite an impressive flame. I hear the all too familiar sickening rip of an RPG flying through the air. BOOM. I swivel my head like a owl looking for impact. It didn’t sound like it hit close to me. Smoke and dust swirl up 30 m or so behind the LAV……… The stupid bas****s are actually firing at the LAV of all things. Maybe they don’t even see me. No they can’t see me because if I were them, I would be shooting me. No one else is dumb enough to be here all alone. In the distance I hear fire from the second LAV. The Yanks are gone. I hear the sound of what appears to be a MK 19 firing from the low ground out of my LOS. There they are. The M700 flashes and spits when the massive flame from the 6 lit matches engulfs it. We are in business.
I have no idea how much time fuse I cut off but I know now I have no other choice but run like hell out of the temporary safety of my ditch.(funny that this part hadn’t occurred to me until now) As I get up to run, a loud ping as something bounces off one of the artillery shells in the hole. I guess they see me now. Whatever I left in the hole that spilled out of my PSK in my attempt to get my matches out can be easily replaced. As I run I notice the LAV is in full gallop towards me as well. Thank Christ. As I run I hear the second sickening rip of a RPG followed by ringing in my ears and the feeling of being hit with a bunch of small things. I don’t remember the next few second and then I realize that I am being pulled off the ground by one of my troops and fed in through the troop door of the LAV, some hands pulling and some pushing at the same time. As I pat the hell out of myself, frequently checking my hands for signs of blood I come to the conclusion that I was only pelted by dirt and rocks but nothing was bleeding (except my nose where I used it to break my fall)
A pair of hands grab my shoulders to sit me up and a voice yells you o.k.? That was fuc***g close. I am getting the hell kicked out of me bouncing up and down on the floor of the LAV as it speeds away. Over the IC I hear someone ask “how much time”? As I hold my bloody nose I yell back. “Drive! Faster! I have no F*****g idea”. My friend is standing in the left rear air sentry hatch looking for targets as we speed away. On wobbly feet I grab my bloody rifle and stand up in the right side hatch We are now within a good safe distance from the pending explosion so the LAV turns 180 and begins scanning with the thermals to once again take up the fight. I try to find something to shoot but there is too much dust kicked up to see anything behind us. It is now that I feel the pain in my fingers where I burned them on all the matches. As I drop down into the hatch and I begin to root through the med bag for a bandage I realize that the bad guys probably have no idea what I was up to in that ditch.
I smile as the sound of 1000 kg of HE detonates in the distance.
Take that
Over the LAV radio I hear an Allied AH-64 pilot who was in the area and decided to join the party. I smile even wider.
Then I sit and think about how no one on ETS is ever going to believe this story. I decided to have it posted anyway. I will post a few pics when I gets back home.
You never know sometimes how carrying a few simple things can make all the difference.
Take care
Holy cow! 
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