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Wednesday, December 24, 2003
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KABUL (CP) - Two Canadian soldiers have been given one of the most important jobs available at Camp Julien in Afghanistan - searching the skies with a high-tech radar device for a sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.
The job of tracking Santa as he crosses the globe is normally left to Norad, the North American Aerospace Defence Command. But with Canadian troops spending Christmas in a time zone that's hours ahead of Canada, the first sightings will be done using a military unit at Camp Julien near Kabul.
``I think we'll see a few reindeer, and maybe a man in a red suit with a big beard,'' said Bombardier Wayne Pardy of Marystown, Nfld. as he readied his radar screens for the duty.
``Hopefully we will see him. That'll make Christmas a bit better here in Kabul.''
Pardy, and Bombardier Jeff Hinch of Guelph, Ont., operate a mobile unit known as ARTHUR - a weapons locating system that hunts rockets that could potentially be fired at the Canadian Forces base and areas surrounding it.
``It hunts artillery rounds, mortars, that kind of calibre weapon,'' said Pardy.
Within seconds of detection, soldiers are able to pinpoint a weapon launching system's location, and fire back.
For ARTHUR, everything is a target. However, on Christmas Eve, the soldiers have to be extra careful not to aim their guns at any ``friendly'' objects.
``We're going to be keeping an eye out because we wouldn't want anything to happen to that kind of a target,'' said Hinch.
``We can probably identify (a sleigh) and probably identify that as friendly.''
The rest of the nearly 2,000 Canadian soldiers in Kabul are planning to keep a close ear to their radios on Christmas Eve, hoping to hear whether the radar has spotted anything unusual.
``We'll radio it in, to let everybody know that `Ho Ho Ho' is on the way,'' said Pardy.
``We won't consider him a target. We'll consider him a friendly.''
Pardy and Hinch have wives back home in Canada, and while they'll miss them, both know their missions in Afghanistan are important ones - even more so on Christmas Eve.
``I'm sure my wife misses me a lot .n.. but I just got back off leave so I'm feeling pretty good about it,'' said Hinch.
``I got married a month before I came here,'' added Pardy.
``So that's probably the biggest heartache. It's the first Christmas away from home with my newlywed.''
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2003-12-24, 07:25 PM
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