While writing my last story about AVSUPFAC Cordova AK, the little gem below popped into mind. Just one of the little issues I ran into as Chief of Maintenance at this little temporary isolated aviation support facility located in Cordova, AK. It also was the closest military facility to where the MV Exxon Valdez ran aground in the Prince William Sound dumping oil over pristine Alaskan waters, shoreline and wildlife back in 1989.

A week or so into my temporary deployment, we received word that a very powerful US Senator who represented Alaska would be flying in the next day via a fixed wing aircraft and we would be using our HH-3F helicopter to allow him and his team to overfly the spill area to survey the damage.

The problem was, the H3's cabin door proudly stands about 4 feet off the ground when sitting on its wheels. There is a portable ladder that attaches just inside the cabin door for entry and egress. And the ladder was broken. Not an issue for a normal person as you would just jump up and climb in. But the Senator was short. Very short. There was no way he would make it into the door.

The pilot in charge of AVSUPFAC Cordova was a LT (O3) that was stationed at another CG unit and didn't know me prior to this deployment. And he was going crazy about the broken ladder. He had called all the closest helo units with H3's to try and get a ladder but for one reason or another, none were available. That's when he called for me around noon and explained his problem and asked if I had any ideas.

I thought about it a few minutes and said, "There's a broken Air Force H3 sitting over in the corner waiting for parts. I'll just grab their ladder." Several days earlier the AF bird came in broken. We moved it to the corner of the small apron and it had been sitting there ever since. The crew had gone to town and gotten rooms for the duration of the wait. Sure, their ladder was painted silver and ours white, but so what?

The LT exploded! "Absolutely NOT!!!! That could cause an interservice complaint and we would be embarrassing the Coast Guard! No! NO WAY!"

He didn't know me nor my background. heh heh. (Side note: I just now realized what my next story will be about!) I just said, "OK." I went looking for my right-hand man who could find ice on a barren deserted island on the equator. When I found him, I passed him a $20 bill and asked him to go into town and find the AF crew chief. Explain our ladder situation to him and ask if I could rent their ladder for 24 hours or so in exchange for as much beer 20 dollars could buy.

He returned several hours later with permission from the crew chief to use it. We went and got the ladder and put it on our helo and went about our business.

At 2300 that night, as I was soundly asleep dreaming of naked women holding cold cases of Coors Lite behind every local palm tree, and other such pleasantries, there came a knocking on my door. It was the LT. He stated that he finally got permission to borrow the Air Force's ladder and could I get someone to fetch it and configure it on our helo? No apology for waking me up, no please, just barking an order.

I told him, "Done. Good night." And closed the door. The next morning, he was fuming. He had asked around and found out we had permission to take it but was still mad. To this day I don't understand why, but he was mad. And I'm glad he wasted his whole afternoon and evening worrying about that damned ladder and getting permission for use of it. And then wasting his whole evening calling the Air Force Aircraft Commander's room every 10 minutes trying to get that permission.

But we met our mission. And I smiled as I watched the senator climb that silver ladder.

BONUS After posting my first Cordova story, a friend of my wife's (which she is a story all of her own about how we met during Hurricane Katrina) contacted me. They were both CG Reservists. This young lady reached out to me and stated she had been sent to interview some people at AVSUPFAC Cordova during a refueling layover while enroute to somewhere else.

She said that everyone she talked to said go talk to the Chief. Someone said that the Chief was in the galley. Now in that first story I had made the remark that I was only 28 at the time and looked 10 years younger. She owned up that when she went into the galley, she only saw a 17-year-old kid drinking a beer and thought, Nope, no Chief here. She also said she departed without a story.

Hope y'all enjoyed and see you next time!