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Soldiers find protection where this Buffalo roams

Oct-23-2006 » Filed Under: 3/2 SBCT

SEAN COCKERHAM; The News Tribune

MOSUL, IRAQ – People in the streets stared at the behemoth rolling through their city on a hunt for roadside bombs – at 24 tons, even heavier and certainly taller than an armored Stryker infantry carrier.

Some watched in curiosity. Others glared. There are many people in this northern city of 2 million who would love nothing more than to blow up this vehicle and the Fort Lewis combat engineers inside.

“These vehicles have bounties on them,” said Spc. Dave Zawitaj of Lakewood, driver of the Buffalo armored vehicle. “These are the number one vehicles they want to take out.”

That’s because of the Buffalo’s ability to find roadside bombs. It has a 30-foot robot claw that rakes through suspicious-looking garbage or mounds of dirt. There’s supposedly Arabic graffiti spray painted on walls down in Baghdad that says “Kill the Claw.”

Zawitaj, 23, and his fellow soldiers from the 18th Engineer Company at Fort Lewis frequently run into bombs. But their Buffalo can withstand terrific blasts with no harm to the men in the elevated cab.

The engineers are attached to 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division and went to Iraq with the Stryker troops this summer. They said they’ve been hit several times in their four months here, with the only real damage being flat tires.

Small-arms fire is little more than a distraction. Gunshots sound like popcorn when they hit the bulletproof windows.

The Buffalo cruised through the early-morning Mosul streets Saturday, looking for improvised explosive devices hidden among the garbage that is strewn everywhere in Iraq’s cities.


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