postings

[Rcmaster199 at aol.com]

> Subj:postings 
> Date:4/11/2004 6:45:23 PM Eastern Daylight Time
> From:Rcmaster199 at aol.com
> Reply-to:discussion at nsrca.org
> To:discussion at nsrca.org
> Sent from the Internet 



I've tried a couple times to post on the list and nothing got through. I am 
using this as a test. 

MattK 


> Subj:Off Subject: "Fwd: An email received from Colonel Jeff Poffenbarger in 
> Iraq" 
> Date:4/9/2004 10:59:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time
> From:Rcmaster199
> To:discussion at nsrca.org
> 


It is all too easy to get so involved in our everyday living that we forget 
there's a war going on. I asked permission from Phil to post this private 
letter from his son on our discussion board , and he was kind enough to allow it. 

I think I understand what the politics of that war in Iraq are, but it is our 
young men and women that are paying dearly to support the politics and 
protect our freedom
to fly our model planes as we please. Lets never forget that!!

Matt K


> Dear friends, I am forwarding a letter received from my son Jeff now
> stationed in Iraq. He functions as a neurosurgeon. 
> Phil Poffenbarger, MD
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: jeff.poffenbarger at us.army.mil [mailto:jeff.poffenbarger at us.army.mil] 
> Sent: Friday, April 02, 2004 8:01 PM
> To: Phil Poffenbarger; Mark Poffenbarger
> Cc: glenjpoffen3141 at aol.com
> Subject: Re: from Dad
> 
> Great to hear from you again.  Glad your computer is up and running.  We
> have been very busy here the last few weeks.  We actually eclipsed the
> "total monthly surgical hours" record set last November during "traumadan"
> as Ramadan has become known.
> My team has done more cases in 8 weeks than the prior team did in 8 months.
> We have had some heart breakers, but thankfully have also had many saves.
> Several rocket & mortar attacks, but none really serious for me.  We had a
> doc with 4 days to go before going home; he walked outside to get better
> reception on a cell phone so he could call his wife.  A mortar shell landed
> close and fragments ripped his thorax (he had no body armour on).  He died
> after 8 hours of surgery.  Lesson learned.  This is the real deal.  
> Anyway, I am relatively safe and don't take unecessary chances, but this is
> a crazy place.
> I flew a helicopter to Balad last week to get a casualty.  Y'see, I am the
> only show in town.  If you have a neurosurgical problem from Kuwait City to
> Diyarbakir, from Amman to Tehran, I am the only option.  This guy had a
> terribly unstable cervical spine fracture, so the rotor heads  flew me down
> from Baghdad to Basra (about 3 hours cross tiger country with bad guys) and
> I put a HALO on to externally fixate him, then flew him back to baghdad with
> me for surgery.  On the way back, all of my monitors conked out, and I had
> to resort to one hand on his chest to feel and count respirations, and one
> hand on his neck to feel and count pulse.  Every so often as much as I dared
> I would flash a redlens light in his eyes to check pupils.  Very primitive
> medicine in the back of a chopper blacked out at night.  The pilots were
> great and did everything I asked to keep the casualty in good condition.  Of
> course, it is quite a calsthenic exercise to do all you need to in the
> cramped blackh
> awk with full body armour and weapon on.  But we got him back here and
> operated on him, adn he has gone from a quadriplegic to having biceps and
> deltoid function as well as sensation all the way to his toes.  I think he
> will continue to improve.  Very satisfying to see someone go from a flacid
> insensate quad to a motor and sensory functional level.  He may actually
> walk again.  We'll see.
> On the down side we got a 19 year old boy in this morning with a mortar
> fragment as big as my fist that crashed thru his brain.  Dead on arrival.
> Those ones just crush you.  His pockets had a instant camera, MP3 player,
> and a list of things he had to do once he got back from patrol.  A lot of
> plans that never get finished.  It was tough to handle that body so early in
> the morning and realize that half a world away, his family was sitting down
> to dinner and probably thinking about him and wishing for his safety, not
> knowing what had occurred only minutes before.  You look at that gaping hole
> in the side of his head that no longer bleeds and you begin to understand
> the 200+ year price of freedom and safety.  It is a curious fact that so few
> purchase so much for so many, but alot of things are like that.  One Mom
> cooks dinner for an entire family, everyone eats, but she does 99% of the
> work.  One company builds a housing development that hundreds of families
> eventually call ho
> me.  The hundreds of families all sit warm and dry in a storm a year later,
> but a few construction workers put up the walls that keep them so.  America
> sits unscathed for 2 years after 9-11, but a few young men pay with life and
> limb to keep the bad guys at bay.  I hope folks back home realize the price
> paid here.  The CNN blurb " 1 soldier dead today" does not convey what is
> lost as you put a young man in those heavy vinyl bags.  
> Anyway, deep thoughts.
> To close on a happy note, my new camera came today and I hope to take some
> better pictures and send them to you.
> 
> Jeff



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