HASN’T THE FOGGIEST By Waz Ando, C Coy 6 RAR
C Coy 6 RAR were on a CABW at Shoalwater Bay. We had managed to do about three million dollars of damage to our Bushmasters, and were on the last part of the ex, which was a stomp to take over the airfield.
So we drove the remaining Bushies to the drop-off point. We locked up the ones that still had doors and set off. The stomp in was pretty uneventful, but as we got to the final objective, the fog started to roll in. The coy shook out into formation, one up two back, with 9 Pl in the lead. As we set off, the fog was as thick as pea soup.
As this was my first major ex, I didn’t want to fuck up. I was assault gunner, and my number two was a pretty good dig. Within half a click, nobody could see anyone. People were on their personal radios asking where the fuck everybody was.
As we were going on, a figure appeared out of the fog – a seco from one of the rear platoons.
“What are you doing in my section?” I asked.
“I’m not, you’re in mine. Fuck,” he replied and wandered off to look for his section.
Next, the OC and his Tac party wandered past. He had a confused and
dazed look on his face, as his Sig fed him worthless information. There was one lone light near the airfield, and as it came into view, everyone headed for it. As my number two and I got to it, blokes everywhere were trying to find platoons and sections or at least anybody they knew.
Our sergeant was already there, getting our platoon organised. The boss turned up with half a dozen blokes (who were showing him the way) and our sergeant then ripped the boss a new one for fucking up, and going the wrong way etc
So we reorganised and headed off; the fog had disappeared. Our section was patrolling off. We got about 1000m down the road and found we were missing a bloke. It seems he’d sat down just before we’d set off, rolled back into the long grass, and no one saw him. We quickly ran back, did a quick search and found him! Then we got back into it. Epic fuck up!
