CWOS in the news

4/19/2024

charles kelley, (uncle chuck) CWO-4, RET. link

4/24/2024 12:25:14

MATRATIN LIBYA
I served as engineering officer of Matratin during 1967-1968. To say the least, that was some kind of an experience in my 28 year service career in Charlie Golf. Here we go:
I boarded the C-123 log flight in Naples to the station in Libya and not long after takeoff I was told we were going to make a stop in Malta because of an oil pressure light going off in the cabin. When we landed on Malta a guy with a pushcart came out of a hanger and approached the plane. The cart was loaded with all kinds of booze. The crew took the booze, the guy got paid and away we went, oil pressure problem fixed. Next stop, Tripoli, Libya at Wheelus AFB. The flight stops there to pick up 2 crew members from Matratin that fly to Tripoli every two weeks
on the Mobil Oil field break flight from the station to food shop for the station. Our guys fill up a freezepak with perishables and get the dry goods. After loading the plane heads out for the Matratin station about 465 miles across the Libyan Desert. When we get there we land right beside the Marble Arch, a monunent built there by Mussolini during WWII that straddles over the Libyan highway. The arch divides Libya into the 2 states, ie, tribes, Tripolitania to the west and Seranaca to the east. We are met by the station 5-ton truck and after offloading the station supplies the plane departs and will make the same log run in two weeks. About half an hour later I arrive at the station and before I can even get inside to stow my gear or meet the CO, a little Arab comes up to me pushing a bicycle and says; "hey chief, you shifty". I told him he had better watch his smart a** mouth if he planned on getting along with me for the next year. He left in disgusp, kicking sand as he pushed his bike away. An Arab named Millet Salahmed Bahmud, a station employee whom I later found out took care of the CO and Chief,s quarters as a houseboy came up to me and said all the little guy wanted was for me to take a look at his bike and fix it later and that; "shifty", in Arabic, means to look see". Oh well, my first encounter with Arabs, Mufta, as the little guy was called for the next year, every time I would be doing anything he would throw down a rug, pile up a few rocks and pray. Millet told me he was trying to hex everything I did. After settling in I had a meeting with the "boss", LTJG, David Clements and the Chief ET. Evidently when the Cat generator engines would see a load change the governors would surge the RPM and the Loran signal would go beserk. I had brought a new set of injectors with me from Naples. The section engineer told me they were having problems and that I should go ahead and change them out on one of the engines..I changed them out and trimmed the governor to a nats a** and put that one on the line. End of problem. I had my own clean area and found parts to rebuild the injectors just removed. 2 done and one to go, but no parts left. I got to know Gene Brown, a Pilot at Mobil Oil and found out they were using the same power plants as ours. We made a deal that if they would keep me supplied with injector kits I would rebuild their injectors so they didn't have to exchange with the Cat plant in Peoria and sometimes get in a pinch waiting for the exchange. Within a couple of weeks we were in business with the generators on the station, I'm happy, the ET'S are happy. For that whole year we never lost any air time. I also found out that our 2 MECO distilling units were both on the line 24/7 and could barely keep up with our fresh water usage. I ordered another MECO from Section and Cap't. Ayers approved it. While waiting for the new unit to arrive we had Johnson/Towers, a contractor that did alot of work for the oil companies build a room addition to house the new unit. We got the new unit, put it on the line and rebuilt the other two. No more water problems. One thing about Cap't, Ayers, when I would request something, he would never turn me down.

Next was morale. We had guys in fights, cursing at each other and so on. So one of the first things I did was to repair the soft ice cream machine and put it on 24 hour self serve. Man, was that a help. Everywhere you looked someone would have a cone in his hand, me included. Our temperature ran from the 90's to the high 120's and this didn't help matters too much either. I drove down to Mobil one day and they were having a softball game and a BBQ. I asked My buddy, Gene Brown if maybe we could get involved. He told me that they had a league that included Occidental, Exxon and most of the oil wells down in the desert. Needless to say we joined the league. We would play home games and some games away. We could take a couple of vehicles and drive our nine guys to the oil co. sites, but when we were scheduled to play an oil well team, Gene would fly our guys in the twin engine Caravelle to the well and bring them back later in the day after they had chow. Tom Omri, now the CO since relieving Clements would tell us if anyt

CWOS in the news

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