Don't use other pin pullers, You could get hurt! 
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Plan reduces risk for truck drivers in Iraq
/4/2005 - SOUTHWEST ASIA (AFPN) -- Recently 250 additional U.S. truck drivers per week were removed from the dangerous roads of Iraq because of expanded air operations that deliver cargo directly from the United States to airfields in Iraq. This, combined with existing air operations, now removes about 1,280 convoy drivers per week from Iraqi roads. Army Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, who is in charge of U.S. Central Command’s Distribution and Deployment Operations Center has been working hard not just to get more truck drivers off Iraqi roads, but to get convoys off the roads where the risk is the highest. “Ninety-one percent of all U.S. casualties occur in an area called the Sunni Triangle, so that is the area all logisticians were directed to turn their focus to reduce driver casualties,” General Scheid said. “Many cargo operations were flying into airfields that were located in … the most dangerous areas of Iraq,” he said. “Truck convoys would then drive outward from these airfields across the most dangerous highways in the world in order to deliver supplies to the military forces. There had to be a smarter way to get supplies to our forces.” Air Force officials increased the number of aircraft available to mitigate convoy operations, but, until now, the focus was not in the areas where truck drivers were facing their greatest threat. Today, strategic airlift delivers cargo directly to several airfields capable of handling the large aircraft, officials said. A hub-and-spoke system has been established to re-fly cargo to smaller airstrips where C-130 Hercules aircraft can land, but more importantly, to locations where the largest concentration of military forces are assigned. These initiatives have not eliminated all trucks on the roads within the Sunni Triangle, but air support has certainly mitigated the threat for at least 250 more truck drivers per week that once traversed the most dangerous roads in the world, officials said. (Courtesy of U.S. Transportation Command News Service)
