JUST HANG IN THERE By Marc Mathews, A Coy 4 RAR (CDO) + 2 CAV East Timor
We were on a mounted patrol up behind Balbo but not in Adaby Forest. It was about 12:00 I think and the patrol came to a stop. I asked Cheesy (Driver) what was going on. A gun car had just gone off the side of the fucking cleft. So we all de-bused, as you do when you want to have a look out the top of the carrier and around the bend, and as sure as shit, there she was – the two front left wheels were hanging off the side and the driver was sucking on a lung buster with a big shit in his daks.
By this time, we were saying that if one went, wouldn’t the other one go with it? At the time, the CAV Officer thought it best to unhook the line from Recovery LAV.
“Good idea, Sir,” someone yelled from the back. Sometime later, a MI-16 (heavy lift helicopter) came in. We still thought we could see AVGAS pissing out of it. It came up the valley and hovered over the gun car. The crew and driver must have had the biggest set of balls for they stood on it to hook it up. They got off and that’s when it got lost. The vodka burner powered up to get a bit of height and started to move forward. At this point in time the MI-16 was above the hill, the AUSLAV was not. They slammed the gun car into the hill instead of cutting it away. They gave the vodka mother ship full power; the props bowed up that high it looked like they were going to snap. All you could see was this LAV getting skull dragged up this hill and off she went. We found out through the gossip vine that the Ruskies had a waver with the UN. We said 9er lost his shit over that. A week later we saw the gun car. Its 25 mm cannon was bent, not a straight panel was on it; it was up the shit.
Quote!
The weight of your equipment is proportional to the time you have been carrying it.
