Possible to fly from Ramstein Air Base to Balad, Iraq?

Dan, That’s a good question. My first bit of advice would be to call CPIC; they can tell you yay or nay.

But… thinking about it… you’d have to have some sort of direct embed lined up with a specific unit. I’m also not sure the military has the logistics on either end set up for civilian journos to fly from Ramstein. You know, the PAOs, lodging, and other ash and trash to support us while waiting. It would make sense right?

Lemme know what you find out? I’m curious myself.

Hey dude,
I tried Baghdad-Germany (either Ramstein or Landstuhl) last year and didn’t have any luck. The PAO said it wouldn’t be possible without permission via the Dept. of the Army in Washington. I don’t know whether that remains true or whether he just didn’t work the proper channels, but that was my experience. Good luck.

Pete

I have been told that it is not a problem at all (as long as your orders specify that you can travel within that area.) I am getting ready to try it myself and from what all of my military contacts say, it has been done and can still be…

zoriah,
can you pass along tips/advice on this?

I flew from Balad to Ramstein on a C-17 flight—a Medevac. Great way to leave that place after 22 months. LOVE IT.

It’s possible. I flew to Hahn Int’l Airport and took a taxi to the gates of Ramstein airbase (1 hour drive, $200). I flashed valid travel orders and CPIC press badge and they let me through, but not my driver, so I had to walk 15 minutes to the passenger terminal.

There, they were bewildered by my documents, but after 30 minutes of waiting, I had a reserved seat on a C-17 to Ali Al Salem, Kuwait (which continued on to Balad). I hopped on the next flight to Baghdad without having to wait the 24 hours for the Kuwaiti exit visa.

Sorry for vanishing guys, no email for the last ten days…you know how it goes! Seems like Dennis has the route down…like I said, I have not actually made the trip yet, but that is how it has been described. Just make sure to specify this as your plan when you request your embed, so the proper information ends up in your orders…although I would guess you could find a way to work it out at Ramstein if anything gets fouled up (it would probably waste a few days though, if your orders were not in order :-) Anyway, I will be giving it a shot sometime in the next month or two and will let you know how it goes.

Oh, by the way, after my last embed I had the military fly me to Bishkek Kyrgyzstan and had a really fantastic time exploring, I would highly recommend it. You can fly commercial from Bishkek to Istanbul for a two or three hundred USD and from there, anywhere in Europe is pretty cheap.

Hi Zoriah – I passed through Kyrgyzstan a few months ago, taking the scenic route from Kandahar to Bagram. Manas Airbase was like club med compared to KAF, so no complaints, but they would not let us leave the base to explore Bishkek (something to do with immigrations issues) – did you have a different experience?

Yeah, it was a real pain the ass when I did it, but I refused to take no for an answer. Turns out what happened was, they brought in a translator who drove me back to the airport and walked me up the immigrations line and explained how I had arrived there and secured my visa for me. Then I just walked to the front of the airport, hopped in a cab and that was that.
Contact the PAO there if you have troubles, also, the guys in the terminal were the ones who finally got things moving and hooked me up with the translator. The whole process took 24 hours, but it was worth it (and did not seem that long, compared to other waits I have had with the military!

Good luck if you try it again!!

z

The 437th Air Wing, 17th ALS flies out of Ramstein to Balad (FOB Anaconda) on an almost daily basis. If you are lucky you can even fly in the RACM seat (right additional crew member seat) if you convince the pilots that you will make some cool pics of them as I did… ;) Again, as Bill and I were both in the military at the time. Agreed…the best way is to push and push and not take no for an answer. Good luck!!!
EHRG