Lt. Amy Zaycek, the severe trauma platoon nurse with the Female Corpsman Team, poses for a photo with Afghan children during a recent patrol in the area of Now Zad, Afghanistan. The FCT recently returned to Now Zad, Jan. 3, to assist members of the Female Engagement Team, Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan, with their effort to further the process of treating, educating and engaging the women of Now Zad. Zaycek is a native of Wall, N.J. Photo by Cpl. Zachary Nola

Recently during Operation Cobra’s Anger, a multi-day operation led by Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, to rid the Now Zad area of Taliban control, members of the company’s severe trauma platoon extended an invitation to members of the battalion’s civil affairs group to take cover from the rain in their mobile severe trauma bay.

Within the security and warmth of the STB the members of the two parties began talking about the day’s events.

“We started talking about stuff on the battle front,” said Cmdr. Tom Craig, the officer-in-charge of the emergency medical facility, Severe Trauma Platoon 3. “What CAG said was that there were a lot of females that needed to voice complaints and that if we could get a female in the battle zone to talk to these people, we could probably help a lot of folks.”

CAG’s observation about the female population was correct. In the Now Zad area medical treatment is scarce, often out of reach and varies in level from town to town.

Memories of Taliban repression still cause women to second guess leaving their home in search of help. For any type of surgical treatment, women must travel many miles to Lashkar Gah, where they receive no post-operational care and due to cultural practices women in the area are often uncomfortable seeking treatment from men.

“There is no doctor in the villages of [Khwaja Jamal], Changwalak, and Dehanna that the women feel comfortable going to,” said Lt. Amy Zaycek, the severe trauma platoon nurse with the FCT.

The end result of this scarcity, fear, long distance and potential embarrassment is the women of the Now Zad suffering unnecessarily.

It is because of this reason, upon returning to his forward operating base, Craig relayed this message to his command at Combat Logistics Regiment 2 and requested female support at his position.

The response to this request was the Female Corpsman Team an all female medical team consisting of a nurse and three corpsmen.

Lt. Amy Zaycek, the severe trauma platoon nurse with the Female Corpsman Team inspects the hand of an Afghan girl during a recent patrol in the area of Now Zad, Afghanistan. Photo by Cpl. Zachary Nola

“I was on a twelve-hour notice,” said Zaycek. “Cobra’s Anger had ended, people were coming to the villages, and from what Dr. Craig had gauged, female medical care was needed.”

In the wake of Cobra’s Anger the team visited surrounding areas, including the village of Changwalak, which reflected how valuable it was to have female medical personnel on hand.

“We saw approximately 40 patients there; 27 women and 13 children,” said Zaycek a native of Wall, N.J. “Something to gain from that, was that I was told we were seeing women, but the women brought their children. So, that was an unusual circumstance. In addition, it’s something that’s never gone on before.”

The FCT eventually had to move on to different operations but recently returned to Now Zad on Jan.3 to assist members of the Female Engagement Team, Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan to further the process of treating, educating and engaging the women of Now Zad.

“The FET is really riding shotgun on this but they only have one female corpsman with them so that is why we requested more help,” said Craig from Chesapeake, Va. “Of course seeing how Zaycek and her team were tried and true in the past, the command element picked them.”

Based on the teams last visit to the area the FCT will be confronted with numerous medical conditions ranging from dehydration, to joint and dysentery problems.

Another area the FCT is tackling is creating instructions for FET members on how to educate Afghan women about basic hygiene principles.

Ideas include creating a flip book for FET members which will include instructions on how to teach dental hygiene, hand washing, the importance of three meals a day and practices that will prevent clean water from becoming contaminated.

FCT members are also helping with the effort to re-establish those medical teaching aids which were once in place in Now Zad.

“Right outside the wire there is a public health area and we were able to find scrolls that had been used four or five years ago as teaching aids,” said Zaycek. “The [medical] education was here in this country. It needs to just come back.”

An informational scroll educating Afghan women about child care hangs in a building in the area of Now Zad, Afghanistan. The Female Corpsman Team recently arrived in Now Zad, to work with Female Engagement Team members, to reestablish those medical teaching aids which once existed in the area in addition to treating, educating and engaging the women of Now Zad. Photo by Cpl. Zachary Nola

Basic medical assistance is not the only the service the FCT provides. While Now Zad’s male population is forthcoming about their physical medical concerns, the area’s female population has shown an anxiety about emotional concerns. FET and FCT members have shown the ability to provide the female population an emotional outlet where they can voice mental issues and concerns.

“What [the FCT] has been able to provide is really, truly an open door. When we’ve gone out into the villages to see people, [the female population] tend to open up to the female providers,” said Craig. “When I looked at the list of complaints that the females were providing to the [FCT] it was fear of Taliban, fear that my son is going to be brought into the Taliban, fear for my family, fear for my home. A lot of fear components which the guys don’t say at all.”

Another secondary effect of the FCT is giving female medical personnel valuable field experience and knowledge, through working with the FET, which can be passed to others.

“It’s a good opportunity. A lot of corpsman will never get to come here and will never get to experience this,” said Petty Officer 2nd Class Latese Smith, a hospital corpsman with FCT from Chicago, Ill. “I’m looking forward to teaching [the women] to better take care of themselves and their families.”

“We’ll take all our lessons learned, our knowledge gained, and give it to [other corpsman].” said Zaycek. “The plan is to train up other corpsman and nurses so they feel comfortable doing these missions in different locations”

While smaller than most units operating in the Now Zad area, the FCT is showing size doesn’t matter. It’s not just the impact they are having on the insurgency but the means they are using to make that impact. They are fighting the insurgency with knowledge and band-aids. Not bullets.

In recent weeks the mood in Now Zad has changed from one of constant tension to one of reconstruction. The area still presents challenges and dangers to both civilians and military forces but the positive results that Afghan national security forces, Lima Co., the FET and FCT have made are undeniable.

“It touched my heart while we were out in Dehanna seeing the kids come up us.” said the 51-year-old Craig. “Knowing that they’re actually coming to us, trusting us without fear of retribution from the Taliban, lets me know that’s a blow for freedom,”

DVIDS
Story by Cpl. Zachary Nola

Navy Seabees walk toward the Regimental Combat Team 3 Combat Operations Center, May 13, at Camp Leatherneck. The sailors said there will be no down time for them in between projects while in Afghanistan. Photo by Cpl. Aaron Rooks

The Marines affectionately call the structure “Noah’s Ark,” for its similarities to the vessel built before flood waters covered the earth in biblical times.

In the rugged desert of southern Afghanistan sit hundreds of tents occupied by Marines for as far as the eye can see.

Rising above the dust and grit that blow across the Helmand plains, one object stands out majestically amongst Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan’s sprawling tent city at the unit’s base of operations at Camp Leatherneck.

The Marines affectionately call the structure “Noah’s Ark,” for its similarities to the vessel built before flood waters covered the earth in biblical times.

This modern-day ark, built for Marines in less than three months by sailors of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 5, looms over all other structures across the desert camp.

“In my 19 years in the Navy, I have never built a building this big,” said Petty Officer 1st Class Thomas Damron, a supervisor for the construction of the 12,000 square-foot structure. “This is the largest wooden structure I’ve ever seen Seabees build.”

Damron, a Port Hueneme, Calif., native, said the building is the largest building made by the Navy outside the U.S. since World War II and will be used for coordinating various aspects of MEB-Afghanistan’s mission, which includes counterinsurgency operations and mentoring and training Afghan national security forces.

Construction of the massive building began two months before MEB-Afghanistan arrived in Helmand province. Damron said the Seabees are currently on schedule to meet their deadline for finishing the Ark, but only because of the sweat and perseverance that has come from the naval construction workers involved.

“We’re all pushed to our limits,” Damron said. “A construction job of this size takes an average of five months to complete. We’re doing it in less than three.”

The sailors each work an average of 12 hours every day at the least. By the time the sun rises, on average, the temperature is 85 degrees, said Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Amber Chambliss, hospital corpsman, Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 5. She said temperatures lately can reach 125 degrees by mid-day.

“This job they’re doing can be extremely dangerous,” Chambliss said, of working both inside and outside the building, which currently lacks air conditioning. “Dealing with the heat is a serious issue alone, not to add the possibility of falling off the roof.”

The Miami native said individuals who work on the job site drink anywhere from two to three gallons of water daily. And it’s necessary, she said, noting the fact that if one of the workers falls out, the job will become even harder to complete on time.

The day-to-day job hasn’t been easy, Damron said. In order to reach their completion deadline, the Seabees work nearly non-stop, taking an hour-long break for lunch and 10-minute breaks every hour to rest. Reaching their completion time has required every one of those minutes saved, he said.

“This is one of the toughest jobs some of us have ever done because of the elements and working conditions,” Damron said. “It’s controlled chaos. We’ve been building this at more than two times the speed it would take on average to complete. Everyone is constantly doing different things, moving different directions, accomplishing one job, then moving toward the next.”

“Look at them, you can se the exhaustion in their faces,” said Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Garrison Hardisty, project supervisor. “And they’re only halfway through the day. They’re all pushed to the limit.”

Hardisty said everyone is physically drained when they leave the job site in the evenings. The job has taken an obvious toll on Damron, who said he’s lost more than 30 pounds since he arrived in Afghanistan. But, Hardisty said, they return each day and never give up.

And even though returning each day reminds them of the grueling tasks ahead, it also reminds them of how far they have come in such a short amount of time.

“Everyone’s excited to see the end result,” Damron said, enthusiastically. “We’re all proud to have had a part in this building. It will be around for years to come.”

Petty Officers 2nd Class Landon Church and John Nicholas, project lead electrician and utilities man respectively, said they were confident in the building becoming operational by its deadline. Church, a Byron, Mich., native, said he and his team of electricians have installed more than 10,000 feet of wiring throughout the building to support hundreds of computers. Nicholas, a Boise, Idaho, native, said the facility will also be climate-controlled, ready to accept those who will work there when it opens.

As the clock continues to count down, the Seabees remain resilient, motivated by purpose and commitment. But as one job nears an end, others add up by the week. After the brigade command center is complete, they will move on and continue to build the Regimental Combat Team 3 and Camp Leatherneck Garrison Combat Operations Center, also 12,000 square-feet each.

“As soon as this job is complete, we will carry on to the next,” Damron explained. “There will be no rest for us.

DVIDS
Story by Cpl. Aaron Rooks