By Cpl. Eric D. Arndt, Exercise Cobra Gold 2008 Combined Joint Information Bureau
UTAPHAO ROYAL THAI AIRFIELD, Thailand (May 12, 2008) – The first U.S. military disaster assistance flight to Burma occurred May 12 in response to an official request from the country’s governing authority.
The flight was one of the first three planned C-130 aid missions to the country, which had been devastated by Cyclone Nargis – a tropical storm responsible for a reported 32,000 deaths – in early May and had not yet allowed U.S. military forces to provide assistance.
The flight carried five pallets of aid, including mosquito netting, blankets and fresh drinking water, weighing 14 tons.
The supplies arrived to be palletized only a day earlier, on May 11, when U.S. Marine Chief Warrant Officer 2 Ambrose V. Pantoja, the officer in charge of the Exercise Cobra Gold 2008 Joint Movement Control Center's in-transit visibility section, says he was told he would be changing from exercise to operation.
“We got a call to be prepared to support this mission by receiving all these supplies,” Pantoja said. “Now what we’re doing is shifting from Cobra Gold over to a humanitarian mission to get supplies ready for Burma.”
During a press conference prior to the mission, the U.S. Ambassador to Thailand Eric G. John noted that Burma’s cooperation with foreign aid agencies – and those able to transport the supplies – is critical to curbing further unnecessary deaths.
“It is important that we and the international community are allowed to help the victims of this unimaginable disaster – the world has much to offer Burma in their greatest hour of need,” John said. “We offer our hand in friendship, we offer our assistance without condition, and we offer food, clothing, shelter, medicine and expertise born of experience.
“Make no mistake - as needed as the supplies aboard this airplane are, we know that it is a small salve for a much larger wound. More has to get into Burma. More has to get to the areas hardest hit by this cataclysm.”
While the supplies were and are still needed in the cyclone-ravaged country, the mission itself was not just about sending relief, but the promise of more to come.
“The mission is really two fold,” said Air Force Capt. Trevor N. Hall, a pilot with the 36th Airlift Squadron, 374th Airlift Wing, 5th Air Force, as well as the mission’s aircraft commander. “The first part of the mission is obviously to take some humanitarian assistance to the people in Burma to help them out with the situation they're in, but the second and maybe more important part of this mission is for the United States to extend a hand out to the government there and let them know we're willing to help – to try and establish a relationship with
them and make sure that we can continue to give them this kind of aid in the near future.”