Seattle Post-Intelligencer
May 1, 2003

Prowler Crews Back With Loved Ones On Whidbey After Long Hitch

By Mike Barber, Seattle Post-Intelligencer Reporter

WHIDBEY ISLAND NAVAL AIR STATION -- Navy Lt. Heather O'Donnell returned home with her shield yesterday.

She carried it with her as she flew into combat last fall in Afghanistan and again in March in Iraq, where the planes dodged anti-aircraft fire to lead the way for air and ground troops by disrupting and destroying Iraqi radar and communications.

Looking relieved and weary yesterday as she and 16 other Navy aviators with the Cougar squadron of Prowler jets returned home to a swell of family, friends and admirers after their long deployment, O'Donnell ticked off a list of things she would love to do: Take a 30-minute shower, sleep in a feather bed and use American money.

Then she pulled a small gold shield from her left front pocket.

"It's my family's crest," the tall, 27-year-old Naval Flight Officer said holding the quarter-sized emblem of her Irish ancestry. "Whoever carries that shield into battle won't fall. I've had it with me on every flight."

The four-plane Cougar squadron of EA-6B electronic warfare jets with which O'Donnell returned at precisely 4:35 p.m. yesterday is the vanguard of the much-heralded, returning Everett-based aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln; the Lincoln returns to its home port on Tuesday.

The 5,000-sailor carrier and its air wing's prolonged deployment of nearly 10 months is the longest deployment of a carrier since the Vietnam War, and likely since the Korean War, Navy officials said.

Families who expected the carrier, and the Cougars up the road on Whidbey, to return at New Year's following a normal six-month deployment had their hopes dashed as war clouds rose over Iraq. The Lincoln's air wings flew home to air stations around the United States yesterday, including the four planes and 16 total air crew members of the Cougars.

The Cougars' 120-member ground and maintenance crews, which kept the jets older than O'Donnell flying, are due home at noon tomorrow at Whidbey.

The Pentagon considers the 123 Vietnam-era Prowlers and their crews invaluable, and is looking for a way to replace them as their airframes age. Scarcely any combat takes place without a Prowler in the air leading the way to disrupt and destroy an opponent's radar and communications systems.

The four hours it took to travel 1,500 miles from the carrier, off the coast of California, to Whidbey, was small compared with the 313 flight hours, nearly eight 40-hour weeks, the squadron logged over Iraq. The squadron also made the first field landing using night-vision goggles by a Prowler air crew at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan.

The nearly 100 people in the crowd at the Cougars' long-empty hangar whooped and swayed at first sight of the planes as they streaked by overhead, dipping their wings and looping the field before landing one by one. The shrill-sounding jets taxied to a semicircle at the hangar's huge bay and folded their wings before simultaneously cutting their jets. An American flag was draped across the inside canopy of one.

Families and friends surged to greet the air crews as they climbed down from their planes, grafting themselves together again after leading separate lives.

Lt. Cmdr. "Chip" Gaber said he was "dying to hold my (4-year-old) daughter, Madison." Squadron Cmdr. Scott Pollpeter gave his wife a long kiss. "I'm a mountain of emotions," she said. "He's my friend, my soulmate, everything."

Pollpeter pulled a necklace from his pocket and gave it to his wife, Sandi. The couple had bought it in Hong Kong last August when they rendezvoused before the Lincoln had its assignment extended. She declined to accept it then, telling him to give it to her when he returned. Yesterday, it was one of his first acts after getting his crew safely home.

The couple's 17-year-old son, Derek, offered his sleeve to his tearful 19-year-old sister, Ashley. As senior "Navy brat," Ashley said she took charge and ordered that she and her brother, and the kids of their dad's executive officer, Cmdr. Frederick Niles, stay at motels last night. It was a gift to their parents, allowing them time alone in their homes.

"I don't even think we want to be in that house tonight," she said half-jokingly.

"Before he left last July he told us all to be strong and to help each other out as much as possible. I missed him so much -- my dad and I are so close -- and my brother and I are so proud of him," she said, acknowledging she kept her eyes glued to the television throughout the way.