Microburst Storm in Niamey

It was May 1st, 2017—7 years ago today. I was winding down my deployed command tour in Niamey, Niger (West Africa), having taken command of Air Base 101 and the 768th Expeditionary Air Base Squadron in early December 2016. I would be leaving on May 20th.

The deployment had been awesome. Austere, filthy, and challenging, but awesome. I had an outstanding team. We certainly faced our share of challenges, but we also had quite a few team successes. I was ready to put Africa in the rear view mirror though and go home to prepare for an assignment to Germany.

As far as the weather was concerned, it was mostly hot but then again, we were in Africa (duh). We had storms from time to time, including nasty dust storms. Not a whole lot of rain, but we knew moving into the summer months we could expect more rain, storms, and heat!

May 1st started as a normal day. As the day progressed, the sky started looking kind of funky. We heard thunder and within minutes the winds started. We got word out across camp to hunker down and take cover—this one felt different. I was in the command tent with our First Sergeant and our NCO in Charge of Personnel. Little did I know what was to come and the challenges we would face on that day and the weeks ahead.

Our tent started shaking like crazy, and we were trying to ensure we held together our meticulously crafted, Civil Engineer (CE)-approved, furniture, especially the large table where our DEERS equipment (machine that makes ID cards) was sitting. We needed to protect our capability to make ID Cards! There was a lot of wind, rain, thunder, and some loud crashing sounds. We weren’t sure what was going on out there! It didn’t last long, maybe 10-15 minutes. Then, everything went quiet. It was gone as fast as it came!?

We went out to survey the damage and immediately initiated an accountability drill. Everyone was accounted for and okay. The camp was a total mess. The wind had been so strong it lifted up a couple of 463L Aircraft Pallets (metal pallets used to load equipment on aircraft) from the cargo yard and flung them across the camp. One impacted a generator and the other one was found benignly lying in the red African dirt. Those pallets weigh 290 pounds each! The storm tossed them like frisbees. I was very thankful they landed where they landed.

We had an unoccupied tent on our basketball court. Our tents were not small. They were large, military grade temper tents. This one was an overflow tent and full of metal bunk beds. The storm winds sent it flying several hundred feet, outside the camp fence line, leaving the beds behind. By the grace of God, there were no humans in it. By the time we got to it, the Nigeriens were already trying to drag it off. After all, it was a resource and we were in an extremely poor country. We quickly secured it to ensure proper disposal in accordance with Air Force guidance.

Clean up and recovery continued. Our team rallied strong and recovered the camp within a few hours. There was some extensive damage that would take much longer to repair/replace, to include aircraft shelters, and we still had a lot of work to do, but we were at least operational.?

I knew we needed to do after action review (AAR). AARs are commonplace in the military, for exercises, major events, etc., to quickly capture the lessons learned and ensure we do better next time. What did we learn? What could we do better? We knew we had to strap down the aircraft pallets when they weren’t being actively used and all tents, regardless of status, needed to be staked. We put new procedures in place for both of those and also put measures in place to improve our warning system, along with a few other changes for the better.?

As the Camp Commander, I reflected on what I could’ve done differently or better. I knew about the overflow tent. Should I have taken a closer look at safety? Should I have asked my CE team about it? While nobody could’ve predicted such a massive and quick storm like the Microburst we had experienced, leaders must be prepared at all times. I was prepared to be held accountable, hand over the guidon (be fired), and head back to Charleston. I wouldn’t have been bitter or started crying “woe is me” at all. I knew early in my career as a leader and especially a commander, you are responsible and accountable, even for things you may not be personally responsible for. To channel my inner President Truman, I knew “the buck stopped with me."

An independent report of survey/inquiry was done, and no negligence was found, however, as the commander, I still felt responsible and had a couple of fruitful, mentoring discussions with my leadership about the incident. I wanted to learn from it. I also thanked the Almighty for looking out for us that day and steering those flying objects (especially the pallets) away from my team. It was one heck of a day and one I will never forget.

I would be tested again before my redeployment back to Charleston but that’s a story for another day.