Eight hours seem to fly by when there are bullets in the air, according to Richard Stacey.
August 4, 2009, was a day like any other day in Afghanistan, says Stacey, a master warrant officer with the Lord Strathcona's Horse (Royal Canadians) regiment: clear, sunny, and hot as hell.
"It was extremely hot," recalls the former Edmonton resident, with the mercury bubbling at around 62 C. He was riding in an armoured personnel carrier with a convoy of American, Canadian and Afghan forces when one of their tanks struck an improvised explosive device.
That's when the ambush began. "It was a lot of small arms fire and RPG [rocket-propelled grenade] fire," says Stacey, who is now stationed in Ottawa. It was not his first skirmish with insurgent forces, but it was probably the longest — the battle lasted eight hours.
And yet it felt like five minutes, he says. "It didn't feel like an entire day."
With bullets pouring in from all sides and men and armour falling to heat and explosions, it was Stacey's job to keep everyone safe and moving. He did. This Friday, his courage will be recognized as he receives Canada's second-highest decoration for bravery: the Star of Military Valour.
One long day
Originally from Scotland, Stacey says he's been a member of the Canadian Forces since 1983. "It was a childhood dream," he says, one nurtured by years of watching British soldiers on parade in England. He eventually joined the Strathconas, serving with them in Bosnia, Kosovo and Haiti.
Stacey was on his second tour in Afghanistan in 2009. As the sergeant-major of "C" Squadron, it was his job to manage casualties and resupply troops and vehicles.
The squadron saw a lot of combat during that summer, notes Maj. John Cochrane, who was Stacey's immediate superior at the time, with insurgents launching rocket and suicide-bomb attacks in the lead-up to Afghanistan's presidential elections.
The squadron was headed back to base along the Arghandab River, Cochrane says — a popular place for ambushes due to its sandy, tire-trapping shores. The distance was a mere 15 kilometres.
The convoy had set out at dawn, Stacey says, and travelled in peace for about an hour and a half before the first explosion. As he worked to get the crew out of the crippled tank, enemy forces started firing on them from three directions. "It got progressively worse from there."
Stacey spent the next eight hours zipping up and down the convoy's 1,800-metre length, treating wounded, fixing vehicles, organizing defences and calling in air strikes from attack helicopters. "There was too much going on." It was probably the most intense fire-fight of his career, he says.
It was hard to get a grip on the number of people attacking them, he says — three or five guys would open fire, slink off, and then resume fire further down the convoy. "This was non-stop for eight hours." Three Afghan National Army soldiers would die by the end of the day.
Stacey says he didn't think much about the ambush after he finally got back to base — he was too busy planning the next day's activities.
Stacey's situation would have been extremely difficult to manage in even the best of times, Cochrane says, and Stacey exceeded all expectations. "He probably was doing the job of at least three men at once," he says, and saved many lives in the process.
Stacey is the eleventh person and first armoured corps member in history to receive the Star, according to the Governor General's office.
Stacey says he's "fiercely proud" of the actions of his squad-mates on that day, and says this award goes to all of them. "It was their hard work and determination that allowed not only for my success that day, but for their own."
