101st Airborne Division Captures Explosives
Camp Striker- Troops from 101st Airborne Division; Air Assault discovered a large cache of weapons, ammunition and explosives while conducting a security sweep of the area near Yusufiyah.
This most recent find brings to four the number of large caches discovered over the last week. Three separate caches of high explosives, IED, rockets and miscellaneous ammunition were discovered and turned over to Coalition forces by Iraqi Army and security forces. This material was confiscated and later destroyed.
Soldiers from Company A, First Platoon, 3rd Bat, 187th Infantry, and 3rd BCT of the 101st Airborne were working to construct a checkpoint when they noticed a plastic bag on the ground. Staff Sergeant Jon Hood walked up to the bag and kicked it, and heard a metallic clank.
Looking in the bag soldiers discovered several rounds of ammunition, and by digging at the site of the bag the largest cache of weapons they have seen in several months was discovered.
“We found a great deal of weapons in that small area, a lot more than we thought at first,” said Sgt Hood. Nearly 26 hours were spent carefully digging up all the explosives in this one area by help from the local Sons Of Iraq unit.
“This is certainly a large amount of weapons, it’s the biggest amount I have seen,” said Captain Terry Hilderbrand. Hilderbrand is commander of Company A. The massive amount of weapons marked a successful week following the receipt of three smaller caches given to them by their Iraqi Army counterparts.
