After fifteen years in the Army I had survived all sorts of incidents, close calls and near death experiences. From near misses in live fire training, vehicles behaving badly, the odd minor engine fire in a BlackHawk (a story to follow) and the usual array of rocket attacks, explosions, firefights and one Afghan National Army soldier who fired his RPG a little to close to me when I was behind him, I had ticked off most of the list of ‘things to nearly be killed by’. Given that most of the action in Afghanistan was ‘outside the wire’ I thought I was pretty safe in my bedroom cum office cum planning sanctuary one night in late January, 2011. But in the Army you have to be ready for anything. It can take just one small thing to really ruin your day. This is the story of how one small piece of meat almost sent me home in a coffin. . . . . . Stay with me, it’s funny I promise.

Our Combat Team Headquarters was at Forward Operating Base Hadrian. This was a base where a complete Dutch and French Battle Group had operated out of for many years so we had more facilities and space then we knew what to do with – a nice problem to have compared with many of the other bases. The Mess was manned by a combination of US Army cooks and other contractors, typically from India and Pakistan with the odd Nepalese national thrown in for good measure. The food was. . . . .variable. Better than ration packs, but I’d back our Aussie Army chefs in a ‘My Kitchen Rules’ style event any day of the week and twice on a Sunday night elimination cook off.

On this evening I went to grab a meal and head back to my room to write reports. I had been out on a long patrol that day after a longer couple of months planning and then executing a major combat operation. It’d gone well and we were mopping up the remnants of the enemy forces and building new facilities for the Afghan Army in the nearby valley. The passage of time has dimmed the memory a bit but I think on this night I was writing some soldiers up for awards of some sort or another. So back to the office with a tray of mystery meat in gravy and boiled vegetables it was.

I continued to write the award nominations in the sort of flowery prose that would attract the attention of those who made the decisions on such things back in Australia while eating dinner, wishing it was paired with a cold beer or a cheeky shiraz but making do with a lukewarm bottle of water. I picked up one of the last remaining pieces of meat with my fingers and absentmindedly threw it into my mouth. I was never the best basketballer, and in a career spanning one terrible season would never have scored anything that could be described as a ‘swish’. Until now. Whatever goat, sheep or cow that had died of old age before being broiled to the extremes in the bowels of the Hadrian Mess exacted some kind of revenge from beyond the grave as it flew straight down my throat and lodged in my windpipe somewhere near the juncture of my neck and chest.

Oh-oh.

I like to think I am fairly hard to rattle in situations of life or death. I’d once stopped my youngest sister from choking by remaining calm when our babysitter and others were freaking out. In combat I’d done pretty well and not panicked in some dire situations. So as I figured out that the lump of meat was stuck I knew I had an issue but wasn’t phased. A couple of coughs and it would come up. No problem.

Cough. No movement of the meat. Cough-cough. Nothing. Cough-cough-cough. Nothing again. Oh. . . .fuck. Problem.

I was getting just enough air down my throat to keep my lungs a little inflated but I was running out of air. Alone in my room there was no-one to try to assist so I decided that I’d have to get someone to help. I stumbled into the corridor between the rows of our accommodation containers and almost smashed into the Second-In-Command of the US Army company who lived with us. ‘Hi Sir’ he said and kept walking.

Maybe it was my vague attempts at waving at him, the fact I was bent over awkwardly or that my efforts at breathing were starting to result in me retching that made him turned around with a puzzled look on his face. “Are you okay. . . . .oh shit, are you choking?” A nod of the head confirmed that and he swung into action. A few swift blows with the palm of the hand to the back. Nothing. “Hang on Sir (American officers are always unfailingly polite – even when they are trying to save your life), I’m going to do the Heimlich maneuver.”

With that the young Captain wrapped his arms around my stomach and rapidly and repeatedly squeezed and heaved me into the air. If anyone had walked in at that moment they would have assumed either this was some weird wrestling move gone wrong or that we’d become really close. Either way they would have walked out. Unfortunately for me the only result of this near-coital experience was that all the remaining oxygen was pushed out of my lungs and I dropped to the ground gasping for air again. “We’ve got to get you to the Aid Post Sir!” (See, still polite).

Push-pulling me the Captain got me around to the Regimental Aid Post that was manned by an American emergency Doctor and his support staff. A quick explanation from the young Captain ensued as I focused on not keeling over. Doc – they’re all called ‘Doc’ – gave me a quick examination and came up with a new and cunning plan “We’ll try the Heimlich Maneuver.” Oh hear we go I thought. Doc had no success either and now it felt like my diaphragm had tried to push my stomach out through my nose.

Newer plan! Forceps down the throat to try and grab it. Lets just say. . . .that was unpleasant and it didn’t work.

Newer and even more cunning plan! “You’ll probably pass out from lack of oxygen at some point. If we can flush the meat down you should be able to get more air in even if one lung is a little blocked.” I wasn’t sure this was the best plan but I wasn’t in a position to protest either. So the Doc grabbed a canteen, tipped my head back and poured. The water immediately back up in my throat and into my mouth, spilling over my face. A few droplets made their way past the blockage but that cut off my air supply.

Yup. I had just been waterboarded by Americans in the Middle East.

The Doc was keen to try again; me, not so much as it turns out drowning in a desert is not fun. But give it another shot we did. Same result. Realising the situation was now really getting close to perilous an evacuation helicopter was called for to get me back to Tarin Kowt (TK). I was drag/walked up to the LZ by a couple of my senior soldiers. Still trying to keep my wits and sense of humour about me I grabbed a notebook that was in my pocket and scrawled a note for Warrant Officer Lee H. “If I die, kill the cook.” He nodded in agreement. Tough crowd.

The helicopter landed shortly after and the crew took me into the back and sat me down. Helicopters are very loud and I didn’t have headphones so the medic in the back wrote on his pad “What’s wrong?”. I replied in kind “Choking on dinner.” He didn’t write anything down and he had a mask over his mouth but I’m 98% certain his reply was “Are you fucking kidding me?” Unfortunately not my friend.

Getting to the medical facility in TK was a relief. I was quickly surrounded by familiar faces in Australian uniforms who got to work stabilising me; which they managed to do almost without laughing at me. Nursing Officer Erica got some drugs into me that prevented my throat from closing down, all done with an almost hidden smile and laughter in her eyes. A couple of the US Battalion officers came down to visit. Mostly, I think, to make sure that it really was true that I was so stupid that I needed to be evac’d out because I was choking on dinner.

Unfortunately a sand storm was bearing down on TK and without the right type of surgeon present, my best option to have the offending meat removed was to wait for a evac flight to Kandahar the following morning for an operation. At one stage as this course of action was being debated at the foot of my bed one of the Doctors came up with the idea of trying to flush the meat down my throat with water. I’m not sure what convinced them it was a bad idea – it could have been my attempts to grab a nearby scalpel and slash anyone who came near with a bottle of water – but it was quickly abandoned.

In the middle of the night, fed up with waiting, I got the attention of the on-duty nurse and wrote down that I was going attempt to vomit the piece of food up by jamming my hand down my mouth with the outcome being it would either come out or I’d collapse and they’d need to do an emergency tracheotomy. Either way that meat needed to get out. I won’t bore you with the details, but after more than a few attempts it did come out. I don’t know who was more relieved: me, or the nurse knowing that he wasn’t going to have to give me mouth to mouth or tell my vegetarian wife I’d been killed by gristly steak!

The next day I was a bit of a talking point around the base. No not for the fact that I’d planned and executed a clearance operation that had just liberated a long held valley from the Taliban. Because, of course, of the stupid piece of meat. I sat down that night in the TK Mess with my fellow Australian officers with my tray of food. I looked at them, they looked at me, barely able to contain themselves. ‘Righto you tossers let’s have it’ I said.

‘Want some help cutting that meat up?’ asked Mick S.

‘Mate are you sure you should be eating that bread?” from Nick B

‘Here’s a bib for you big fella, don’t dribble your food’

“We got you a present mate” said another. And then about six tubs of yoghurt were banged on the table in front of me.

What do you say at a time like this? There was really only one suitable reply: “Thanks. You fuckers.” Their humor was a welcome distraction from our surroundings. Well for them at least. And how did my team let me know what they thought? When I got back to Hadrian and my room a few days later they had kindly placed a copy of my Casualty Evacuation Form on my door with ‘choking on dinner’ highlighted as the reason for evacuation.

Just one small piece of meat. . . . . . . .