View allAll Photos Tagged provocation
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
An empty canvas?
Not quite....
Concentrate.....
If Salvatore Garau can get away with something similar, so can I.
😉
La provocation de l'art #11
See the full album "Les provocations de l'art" here:
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
photo by Jessica Stewart - www.romephotoblog.com Public Provocation: www.colab-gallery.com/ June - October
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
An artist that doesn't provoke will be invisible. Art that doesn't cause strong emotions has no meaning. - Marylin Manson on Gottfried Helnwein (source)
Even though this is my concept, I can't take all of the credit for it. After sending her 3-4 rather poor concepts sketched and scanned, she rejected all of them. Then she inspired me to come up with this one, which we debated for hours until we found a point of agreement. If there is one thing friendship could be measured by, I put my money on honesty. A good friend will tell you to fuck off when you deserve it. So thank you Tina for working with me on this one.
Facebook profile with behind the scenes material.
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
History of the University Hospital in Krakow
General Hospital St. Lazarus was established in 1788. After all, to understand its origins one has to go back in the rich history of the number of hospitals in Krakow to mention at least two. The longest and najnobliwszą story has a hospital of St. Spirit, begun the thirteenth century. This hospital which is under the care of the monks called Duchakami, was intended for the sick and for foundlings. The Order, however, had the centuries old beautiful traditions, so declined in the late eighteenth century, in 1783, was abolished. The hospital, however, for some time still remained.
And a few words about the other hospitals . In 1714, the Bishop Michael Szembek brought from Warsaw to Krakow "Miss peculiar to works of mercy with God's provocation", thus called the Daughters of Charity or, in French, Szarytkami. It was a small hospital at St. John, originally designed for patients (men and women in half) in the time-honored hospital number 12, and for orphans. In the eyes of a critical inspector, which on behalf of the Bishop of AS Zaluski was Mr A. Łopacki, but the priest and doctor of medicine, the hospital did not raise any objections, and therefore did not make the usual in such cases, claims and commands "what could be used to good governance, as those in which there are excellent", on the contrary praised " incessant zeal and diligence " nuns.
The work of the National Education Commission (established in 1773 ) was a fundamental reform of the University of Cracow Its activities also referred to the Faculty of Medicine. Thanks to the active attitude of Andrew Badurskiego (1740-1789) was the first in Poland teaching hospital in pojezuickim building at St. Barbara in the Small Square. He had indeed only eight beds (four for men and four for women), but it gave an opportunity to teach "at the bedside." The activity was supported Badurskiego activity Czerwiakowski Raphael Joseph (1743-1816), professor of anatomy, surgery and obstetrics. Came more patients, increased level of assistance provided, however, decreased "usable area " because it is decorated room, anatomical, a pharmacy, a separate room occupied surgical and maternity patients .
To ensure proper patient care and nursing, was the idea, at first it seemed reasonable to bring to the hospital Sisters of Mercy, which are relatively new so beautifully wrote in his report, I Łopacki. And so it happened. How will the future was not a fortunate move .
Meanwhile, at once keenly felt the need to bring in Krakow General Hospital, where did the municipal authorities and the clergy were aware. Problem solved referring to the old General Hospital St . Lazarus. In 1787, he was bought for a price of 20 000 Polish zlotys, which introduced the primate Michal Poniatowski, the impoverished former monastery of the Carmelites. In April 1788 the academic hospital of St. Barbara has been transferred to that hospital for Merry. Since then, the fate of the university of medicine will bind to this district and its main street, which in the early nineteenth century will take the name of Nicolaus Copernicus, and the history of the hospital of St . Lazarus from the right side.
The clinic was isolated little space. The hospital was calculated on the 200-bed hospital had only 24 beds: 12 for internal medicine clinic, 8 to surgical clinic, 4 on the maternity clinic. The rest of the hospital subject to the physician-in-chief title physics, so named was fizykatem. It had a common ward for patients with internal diseases and surgery, a division of maternal and premium, infants and foundlings branch and a branch of cripples. Infants with suckler, older children with a babysitter, the midwife and the service was moved here from the hospital of St. Spirit.
Chief doctor of the hospital was a physicist Professor A. Badurski, and next to him acted as a surgeon and obstetrician Professor RJ Czerwiakowski. They also were managers conducted clinics and clinical teaching.
The combination of the Sisters of Charity of hospital clinics was about to be a very unfortunate move. The dispute over jurisdiction, especially in view of the legal shortcomings (the end it was not known whether the sisters are at the service of clinics and clinics reside in the hospital sisters) , was born and it is very fast, the need to find another room, so that the supremacy clinics should clearly and exclusively to the authorities university. The solution to the problem "lokalowego" we had to wait several years. This created favorable circumstances: an energetic attitude, having political influence Prof. MJ Brodowicza (1790-1885), an outbreak of cholera, which was to have its source in a crowded hospital, and finally, and most importantly the generosity of members of the Masonic Lodge " Superstition Loser " that solving a box, sent his building at ul . Copernicus for clinical purposes. To it also in 1827 moved all three clinics. Professors: M.J.Brodowicz, L.Bierkowski, J. Kwasniewski ceased to be so far promariuszami branches. In the future do not have to be that way . After entering the patients 'clinical' hospital has gained a new room. By creating a singular surgical ward, there was a division of patients. Full autonomy, with a separate branch of the physicist received only in 1832.
New facilities for clinics Street. Copernicus 7 at first seemed to be sufficiently extensive, but not for long. Overcrowding gave up soon felt. It must be remembered that at this time the size of the building does not meet current but was only a part of the center in a square. Hurdle became especially screams emerging maternal and infant crying. Therefore, in 1836 it was decided to return to the hospital maternity hospital of St . Lazarus. Clinic has survived there until 1869. Then came back section .
Science Museum. Spirit, after the abolition of the law, had lost its previous function and became a refuge. Since 1821, Krakow was liquidated two hospitals, namely: Hospital of St . Sebastian and Roch (St Sebastiana meadows) for patients with venereal disease and a hospital for the mentally ill, or "mad house" or "pacarellów" (Street Hospital), patients were moved to a hospital room St. Spirit, forming two branches there. Later, ie after the fall of the Republic and the incarnation of Cracow in Galicia, in 1855, hospitals St. Lazarus and St. Spirit, have come under single management, so remember them here together.
In 1862 Anthony Rosner (1831-1896) was in Krakow the first associated professor of Dermatology and Venereology, and began teaching the subject. Since then, venereal disease ward for patients became basically Clinic skin-GUM departments, although the cathedral was formally approved in 1871 .
In October 1866 for gynecological maternity-clinic - Maternity Madurowicz - came Maurice (1831-1893). Thanks to his strenuous efforts, led by the clinic, was in 1869 moved to a house of Prof. Brodowicza (near the inner and surgical clinics), which sold to the University 's goal. Branch gynecological-obstetric hospital of St . Lazarus - however, still remained in place, and the Madurowicz the responsibilities prymariusza (primarius).
In the second half of the nineteenth century, especially after the Galician autonomy had positive changes occured in the development of the hospital of St . Lazarus, particularly in terms of its structure. There has been a development of the old building as well as an excellent operator and a great organizer which Alfred Obaliński (1843-1898), prymariusz surgical ward, has led to the superstructure of the second floor in the main hospital building . There, surgical patients were transferred and held (until now) the operating room. This took place in 1878.
At that time, intensive work on the construction of the new building of the hospital. Scheduled back to the time of the Cracow Republic was not completed due to economic difficulties. Returning to the issue repeatedly, yet to finalize had to wait a long time. It was not until January 1, 1879 was opened the main building of the hospital board (17 Copernicus Street) and two parallel pavilions in which patients placed internally (a division IA and IB) .
Empty space in the old hospital was occupied by the clinic, skin-GUM departments, transferred here from the hospital of St. Spirit (year 1879). In the same year , the mentally ill were placed in the new building, which was built in the gardens of the Hospital of St . Lazarus (Hospital St . Spirit henceforth ceased to exist, and a few years later it was demolished).
Beyond any doubt, the greatest organizational achievement of Prof. Obalińskiego was to build "pavilion" (as it was then called the hospital buildings standing loosely) surgery. According to his own design at the architectural support Professor K. Zaremba, no small expense, he stood in 1893 at. Copernicus, vis a vis the surgical clinic, red brick building, hereinafter called the " red surgery ." Since then, it housed the hospital surgery ward of St . Lazarus. The room on the second floor of an old building, it will take from now on and until now, the branch and clinic skin-venereologist . Also spreads division obstetrics-gynecology .
In the coming years the cathedral professor of gynecology and obstetrics Madurowicz (year 1863), habilitation of pediatric Leon Maciej Jakubowski and a year later started lecturing. The result is a cathedral pediatrics, and 1873, when professor Jakubowski was appointed professor, a division became converted into a clinic. Three years later, the clinic moved to a new building of the hospital of St. Louis, along with a detachment at Arms. The maternity ward in 1895 comes to the division of the ward and branch training for midwives .
In the nineteenth century one dit not feel the need to isolate patients with infectious disease, so "fever" patients have been placed on the internal medicine wards. An exception in epidemic periods when a large number of patients were forced to seek periodically rooms at hospitals. The impetus for the establishment of a separate branch of Asiatic cholera was the case in 1892, the domestic unit, which became the cause of the descent of some sick women. Thus, efforts to establish a new branch in a separate building met with understanding. Was given for this purpose storey building near the surgical pavilion. Wretched condition of the building and the constant threat of new epidemics, overriding factors led to the construction of a hospital in a garden at a sufficient distance from other branches, a separate building, at first storey, which from then on was a branch of infectious diseases. This took place in 1905.
The second half of the nineteenth century was characterized by the formation of what it once the new specialty. In the hospital of St . Lazarus was reflected in the establishment of additional branches. So in 1880 in the lower areas of the branch IB there is a branch of eye diseases led by prof. L. Rydel. A few years later ( year 1893) he will find extensive facilities in the main administrative building on the first floor of the hospital.
The underground "Red surgery" while tied S. Pieniążek ENT department (hereinafter assigned the patients had surgical ward). In 1899, a branch of laryngological transformed into the clinic. A few years later acquired the miserable room in budyneczku the infectious ward, which was given to it to survive two world wars .
At the end of the nineteenth century, ul. Copernicus 15 near the main hospital building St . Lazarus or the administration building on the west side, which is closer to the city, a new internal medicine clinic to which patients were transferred from the former Masonic lodge .
In this state, he finds the hospital of St . Lazarus World War. With the intended redevelopment pavilions internal medicine IA and IB had to be abandoned. One of the two barracks for the temporary stay of patients allocated internally for the purposes of division of infectious diseases ("typhoid"). For the same purpose was given a second hut in 192.
The interwar period is not enrolled in the larger transformation. In the years 1924-1927 the pavilion of infectious diseases, a new observation building in 1938 comes to extensions and additions, the main building of the same branch. On the basis of the hospital of St . Lazarus arise university clinics. In the year of 1926 internal medicine IA pavilion is converted to Department of Internal Medicine. Department snuggled in the street 15 Copernicus II henceforth is called the name of Department of Internal Medicine . The Department of Surgery at a certain time (1929-1933) becomes the Second Surgical Department. Permanently maintain this position after the war.
www.su.krakow.pl/historia-szpitala-uniwersyteckiego-w-kra...
Edward P. Morgan Quote
"A book is the only place in which you can examine a fragile thought without breaking it, or explore an explosive idea without fear it will go off in your face. It is one of the few havens remaining where a man's mind can get both provocation and privacy."
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
This artistic provocation seeks to estimate the orders of magnitude of critical ecosystem services fundamental to all planetary life processes. It is common to use economic metaphors, which entail specific understandings of value, to describe our relationships with society, the world, and the biosphere. Today’s prevailing economic conventions are unable to recognize the intrinsic value of the ecosystems on which all life depends. In cultures overdetermined by concepts from economics, we are left without adequate discursive instruments to socially or politically address the importance of ecosystem contribution to life on Earth. This experiment consists of 1 square meter of wheat, cultivated in a closed environment. Critical inputs such as water, light, heat, and nutrients are measured, monitored, and displayed for the public. This procedure makes palpable the immense scale of ecosystem contributions and provides a speculative reference for a reckoning of the undervalued and over exploited “work of the biosphere.”
Philipp Gartlehner of the Ars Electronica Center planted barley with the heilp of the Life Support system and after three months, the harvest was ready to be brought in. The cost for growing one square meter of barley indoors accounted for the massive amount of 430 Euro. Another reason why we really have to take care for our ecosystem.
Photo: Ars Electronica - Robert Bauernhansl
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
I don't agree, but i i love it! Only the red is already a provocation..with the Othake at the back...
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
Had to attend a meeting in Daventry today, on the way home I decided to visit a random church, I chose this one purely because I spotted it from across the fields. It has a strange collection of bits and bobs (worth a Google), the chancel was just boarded up! you could still get there, just via another door. There was an amazing oak effigy in there of Sir Thomas le Latymer. Met a lovely lady in there who was on flower duty. Amongst other things she told me a few Braybrooke facts, one was that the wooden effigy is a place of pilgrimage!! Then she told me how they used to do total submersion baptisms in the River Jordan (just outside the church) Then she went on to mention the tale that featured Braybrooke Castle (also just over the road) and a ghost called Isabelle!! I had a quick Google and found this:
In England during the fifteenth century (those were troubled times), there was a civil war in progress (The war of the Roses). After which, Edward IV needed and was grateful for any support which he could muster from the Barons. Such a person was John, Lord Seagrave and he stood tall in the King's favour. When Lord Seagrave passed through a town or a village he was cheered by the Yorkist followers and spurned by the Lancastrians.Burton and Barton were Yorkist places, this was because no one dare cross the powerful Lord Seagrave. The two villages Gave him a huge welcome on his return from the wars tributes of huge feasts and arches of white roses (the symbol of the Yorkists)to honour his triumph.
One man who did not take part in the war was Lord Latimer of Braybrook, for he stayed at his home which was the castle at Braybrook peacefully with his two children Isabel and Robert, his wife having died many years previously. Upon return from Cambridge for the vacation, Robert brought back a friend, Hugh Neville, and soon Hugh and Isabel were in love.
The Manor House at Burton was owned by Lord Latimer,and, whilst he was staying there with friends, Lord Seagraves entourage passed through Burton from London. With the Manor House facing the road along which the entourage was to pass, the lovers, Hugh and Isabel Stood under the white rose decorated porch, the beautiful Isabel stood amidst the decoration with an expectant look on her face.
The cheering grew ever louder as Lord Seagrave passed by the Manor House. Looking toward the group on the porch,he raised his hat.Isabel blushed because she know that John Seagrave was staring at her.The image of Isabel on the porch in all her beauty did not leave John Seagrave's mind that day and he could not forget her, this made him morose because he knew only too well that there would be a great deal of difficulty in arranging a union between himself and the beautiful Isabel.
Throwing caution to the wind, the following day he sent forth Sir Henry Clopton with a message for Lord Latimer. The message was an invitation to Lord Latimer to dine at Barton Castle. Should he accept, he would pehaps discuss the subject of a marriage between himself and Isabel. Lord Latimer gave his answer in no uncertain terms...He
would never accept the hospitality of Seagrave!
Lord Seagrave was seathing with anger upon hearing the response to his invitation and he was determined to gain his revenge upon Lord Latimer for such an insult. Lord Latimer himself became fearful of Isabel's kidnap as rumours spread of Lord Seagrave's great anger, and as a precaution, he returned to the castle at Braybrook and made sure that Isabel was accompanied every inch of the way.
Barton Seagrave had a huge, strong fortress surrounded by a deep moat and the surrounding countryside was wild and woody, a far cry from the Barton Seagrave of today. Due to his standing as a favorite of the King, The owner of the castle was in effect a law unto himself. A few weeks passed with no movement nor provocation on the part of Lord Seagrave and thus Latimer relaxed enough to perhaps brush aside all the speculation, perhaps he was being too cautious, perhaps he should afterall return to Burton Manor...upon consideration, he did.
Upon Latimer and Isabel's return, they settled back into Burton Manor, unfortunately, upon retiring to bed that first night, he heard screams coming from Isabel's bedroom...rushing to Isabel's quarters Hugh Neville found only an open window revealing the devastating scene of Isabel herself being kidnapped by a man on horseback.
Neville abandoned any caution he had and mounted his horse and persued them into the night. There was a storm that night and the rain was fierce and accompanied by the loud clapping of thunder...on and on he rode never quite catching them, he would only catch glimpses of them in the distance, until both Isabel and the unknown horseman dissapeared over the drawbridge and into the fortress at Barton Seagrave. Neville continued undaunted perhaps onward until he was brought from his horse by an arrow which was fired from one of the turrets striking him in the arm. He was rescued and brought back to Burton by the sad Lord Latimer and his son Robert.
The only person at that time with whom it should be said had any power over Seagrave
was that of the King, and Latimer spared no time in petitioning the King for the restoration of his precious daughter Isabel, but Seagrave was able to influence the King in such a way as to steer the King into not complying with Latimer's wishes. Latimer, failing this even resorted to trying to persuade neighbours into helping him in his plight,
but no one dared cross the powerful Lord Seagrave, this left poor Isabel at the mercy of
her captor.
During her captivity, Isabel was only fed bread and water and her health soon began to falter, luckily for her, the warder in charge of her was endowed with a little compassion and gave her a little extra food and somehow was able to allow her to communicate with her family, for he could not bear to see her in such a sorry state. After time, the warder realised that there was little or no hope for Isabel for he knew that there would be no chance for release for her and she could not survive living in such an awful place...his compassion for her grew such that he decided to help her escape the clutches of Lord Seagrave.
Choosing the right time, he waited for one particular night when Lord Seagrave had gone to the village of Pychley, the warder took hold of poor Isabel and carried her to the
drawbridge of the fortress and into the arms of Hugh Neville and her brother Robert.
after a joyful reunion they quickly whisked Isabelle onto the back of Robert's horse and
they rode with great haste toward the direction of Braybrook Castle hoping to use the
track leading through Kettering which crossed the river Ise. Upon approaching the ford at a place which now houses the A6 road which allows traffic to pass between Kettering
and Burton Latimer the waters being swollen after many days of torrential rain they
forged onward and urged their horses through the river.
Coming upon them rapidly was the dreaded figure of Lord Seagrave, they tried in vain to not be recognised, but to no avail...and Lord Seagrave met them half way across the ford. Lord Seagrave let loose his sword and with a fearsome blow slashed at Robert and killed him instantly. Hugh would not lose Isabel again...he would fight...the two men prepared to fight each other.
Isabel was so weak due to her captivity and was terrified...and in her panicked state fell from her horse into the swollen waters and was drowned before her beloved Hugh could save her. In desperation, Hugh began slashing at Lord Seagrave's horse and managed to dismount him, but Seagrave struck at Hugh and for a long time they fought in the mist and the darkness in the middle of the river. Hugh was still in a weakened state as his arm had not healed from the arrow which struck him from Seagrave's stronghold, Seagrave struck and slashed Neville's leg which sent him down into the waters where Seagrave ran him through with his sword...leaving his body to the mercy of the unforgiving waters which now enveloped and engulfed his lifeless form.
Enraged, Seagrave sped back to the castle, found the warden who had helped Isabel escape and had him hung, his body displayed upon the battlements and three other conspirers were buried within the walls of the castle, but Seagrave feared that Latimer might inform the King of his misdoings and have him punished, but alas, poor Lord Latimer, upon hearing of the events which had transpired died of a broken heart...
So The Legend Goes...
For three nights John Seagrave could not sleep, when at last he did, he was awoken to the sound of clashing helmets, the ghostly apparitions of Hugh and Robert stood pointing accusing fingers at him...then upon their vanishing, a hand was said to clasp a burning sword was thrust through the wall of his chamber, the light from this burning sword shed flickering light upon his ceiling illuminating the spectral head of the warder...The severed head let out a terrifying scream and dropped to the floor...
The sword Vanished and all was silence...
Still shaking, Seagrave then saw the ghostly figure of the beautiful Isabel who uttered the words " Oh Seagrave be warned, I shall appear before you at the ford, where I fell and drowned, If thou cross at night beware that death is approaching. When thou art dead I shall return to the ford every fortieth year, for the space of three hundred years. I shall come till thy castle is destroyed and grass covers thy halls. I come as a warning to repent thee of thy evil ways..." So saying, the apparition of Isabel dissapeared.
For some time, the rememberence of that grizzly night kept John Seagrave in check, but on one fated night upon returning from a caroose at Rockingham he approached Kettering. Upon crossing the river he remembered Isabel's curse. Surely enough, Isabel appeared, her shadowed ghostly figure spoke to Seagrave, uttering the words "Seagrave take heed" So shocked was John Seagrave from this point that he gave one half of his property to his son and the other to the church, then from that point he went into reclusion within a monastery.
Grass now grows where once stood the halls of Seagrave Castle and the three hundred year curse passed in 1771...
...Isabel walks the ford no more...
This page from a website developed by: gary catlin
Provocation, scuffle and arrest at Israeli Embassy protest. London, 15.05.2011
The pro-Palestine protest celebrating the Nakba today outside the Israeli Embassy in London was a bad-tempered affair, with rival groups of Arabs and Israelis penned up close to each other, frequently trading insults with each other. The much smaller Israeli section of the protest was infiltrated early on by the EDL (English defense League - an extreme Right-Wing Ultra-Nationalist organisation), though the Israelis seemed quite happy to have them as bed-partners, provoking the tension all afternoon.
The EDF were also gathered across the road all afternoon, and at various points during the protest several of them carried out overtly provocative actions, never completely crossing the line, but clearly hoping maybe to goad the often hot-headed and wound-up younger Arab men into some kind of physical reaction, which, to their great credit didn't happen.
As the pavement at the end of Kensington Court got more and more crowded, a heated argument broke out when a female Palestinian journalist objected angrily to being photographed repeatedly and intentionally by a needlessly antagonistic young Israeli photographer - wearing a blue and white rolled-up scarf around his head with an obvious Star of David motif - who had been aggressively shoving his camera right in her face, taunting and mocking her.
As people started gathering around the photographer, starting to grab his arm and attempting to remove him, a man wearing a red top tried to prevent the manhandling of the by-now isolated photographer, who was actually in no danger as there were several policemen standing and watching less than fifteen feet away, still being screamed at by the Palestinian woman.
A couple of agitated Arabs - no doubt cranked up on adrenaline after all the tribal brinkmanship and general cock-waving - unfortunately mistook the Good Samaritan for an accomplice of the Israeli and they started shoving him, right into a policeman. He tried to back away but got shoved back into the policeman by a girl. Again he tried getting out of the way but another person shoved him again and started to scuffle with him. By now he was shoved into the policeman's chest with nowhere else to go. Next I knew the police swarmed around him, handcuffed him and carried him rapidly over the road to a police van.
Needless to say the antagonistic Israeli photographer, having all the anger of the crowd misdirected towards the Good Samaritan did nothing whatsoever to help him, but he did take the time to photograph him being dragged across the road in handcuffs. Nice. There's a deep moral in there somewhere. What a shithead.
All Photos © 2011 Pete Riches
Do not copy, reproduce or alter any images without my permission
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
Thank's to Bs Castings Firenze
And and Special thank's to:
my mother for create me
and Dr. Walter Bini and his equipe that saved me ! Mariangela Di Nunzio
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org
by Tech. Sgt. Benjamin Rojek
Defense Media Activity
5/4/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. -- Walking almost 90 miles, 36 Airmen completed the Air Advisor Memorial Ruck March from New York City to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., April 26-27.
The march, which started at One World Trade Center and ended at the Air Advisor Academy, was in remembrance of the deaths of nine U.S. air advisors in Afghanistan.
On the morning of April 27, 2011, an Afghan Air Force lieutenant colonel walked into the Afghan Air Command and Control Center at the Kabul Air Command Headquarters and, without warning or provocation, opened fire, killing eight active-duty U.S. Airmen and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. Those nine service members came from various bases and specialties, but were working together for a common mission: advising the Afghan military.
"It was a unique situation," said Lt. Col. J.D. Scott II, the march coordinator and chief of core knowledge at the Air Advisor Academy. "It didn't happen for a particular base. It didn't happen for a particular squadron or base or even for a particular (Air Force Specialty Code).
"Because of that, remembering their sacrifice may not have been captured as a whole," Scott continued. "The individual would have been honored at their base, but the mission of the entire of the team would not have been recognized."
Since all of the nine went through the Air Advisor Academy, Col. John Holm, the academy's commandant, decided that would be the place to honor their sacrifice as a team, Scott said. Holm made plans to create a physical memorial, but a plethora of obstacles made it impossible to complete the memorial by the one year anniversary of the tragic event. One of the obstacles was funding.
Holm and his team came up with idea of a ruck march to both honor the fallen air advisors and act as a fundraiser to help build the physical memorial. Scott was put in charge of organizing the march and, in just two weeks, succeeded in gathering people from Dover AFB, Del., to Eielson AFB, Alaska, for the march. Each marcher knew at least one of the nine fallen air advisors in some way.
"Master Sgt. Tara Brown and Maj. Phil Ambard both lived three and four doors down from me in the dorms," said Tech. Sgt. Brian Christiansen, a photographer with the 145th Airlift Wing in Charlotte, N.C., who was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan at the same time as the air advisors. "Both were incredibly friendly people. And I met several of them (the morning of the shooting) as I walked into my building and opened the door and they walked out."
Those personal connections to the fallen service members and their families drew the 36 marchers together, Scott said.
"They were coming in from all over," he said. "That's kind of representative of the nine that we lost. They came from all over the Air Force to serve a single mission as an air advisor. So the marchers that were honoring them came from all over the Air Force to remember them."
Each paid their own way to New York City to honor their fallen friends and show their families that they haven't forgotten their loved one's sacrifice. The event also drew in another 14 volunteers to help with everything from transportation to food to health and care coverage.
The marchers were broken up into four teams, each set to march three legs of 7.3 miles. During their leg, each marcher carried a ruck sack with a paver stone inside, each stone engraved with the name of a fallen air advisor and to be laid at the memorial on JB MDL.
Holm and his nine-person team kicked off the march at 9:11 a.m. April 26. However, rather than just start off near ground zero, the colonel wanted to do something more for his fallen comrades.
"We wanted to honor them by doing something significant, and to me starting at the top of the World Trade Center was it," Holm said. "We had those ruck sacks on the entire tour. It was all symbolic and important to us in our own personal, different ways. For me, it was probably the biggest single gesture we could do short of opening up (the academy's) memorial ourselves."
The significance of the march touched a lot of people along the way, starting with the One World Trade Center steel workers, who gave the Airmen a standing ovation as they marched through the structure. Other people along their route also showed their appreciation by stopping to give hugs, encouragement, thanks and even money toward the memorial.
As they traveled by foot from New York to New Jersey, state and local police departments provided escort, each district calling the next to inform them of what the Airmen were doing, Holm said. The marchers were even given a chance to rest and eat at the fire departments in both Elizabeth, N.J., and Jersey City, N.J. It was a sign of support of both the Airmen marching and the fallen air advisors, he said.
When the fourth team finished their last leg, the marchers were 1.1 miles from the construction site of the Air Advisor Memorial on JB MDL. All 36 marchers gathered together in formation and made their way through the base gate. What met them there was surprise to all.
"Security forces closed down the road and gave us police escort in," Scott said. "There were numerous amounts of people from the front gate to the memorial lining the street on both sides, just cheering us on in.
"The fact that the base community just embraces us and cheered us in on those final steps, it's very inspiring," he added.
It was an emotional moment for Christiansen as well. He was present at the base when the air advisors were killed and attended their dignified transfer ceremony. However, each person was laid to rest in different locations around the U.S., so he never got to have closure.
Christiansen said the real impact came when he saw the road signs leading to the installation. "That's when it really started to hit in not that we're all going to do this, but this is for real. We've done this for the families, we've done this for our fallen brothers and sister. It was pretty easy to get caught up in the emotion there.
"The ceremony of laying the bricks down was really powerful," he added. "It brought some serious closure."
For Chaplain Maj. Eric Boyer, who said the opening prayer for the stone laying ceremony, it was a bittersweet chance to pay tribute to two of the officers that he had a connection to.
"It makes me proud to know that their sacrifice will be honored and will be remembered," he said. "Every Air Advisor who comes through the academy here is going to recognize the price that has been paid by their predecessors."
Prior to entering military service, Boyer knew Lt. Col. Frank Bryant from their hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., where he served as Bryant's wrestling coach.
Boyer also served as squadron chaplain for Maj. Jeffery Ausborn while at Joint Base San Antonio in 2011, but had already changed duty station's to JB MDL when he got the word about Ausborn's death. His biggest regret was not being able to preside over his funeral service.
"It meant a lot to me to be able to say something to honor his memory here, since I wasn't able to speak at his memorial ceremony back at his home station," he said.
While the ruck march and stone-laying ceremony brought some closure for Christiansen and others, the construction of the memorial itself is still ongoing. However, between the pledges for the marchers, donations received during the march as well as T-shirt and brick sales, Holm estimated that the team has raised almost $10,000 toward the memorial just through this one event.
"We have that feeling that we did the right thing just by honoring our comrades, regardless of what money we raised," Holm said. "That was a tremendous feeling."
The Air Advisor Memorial is scheduled to be unveiled July 27. For more information on the memorial, visit www.airadvisormemorial.org