FORWARD ARMING AND REFUELING POINT, Near Jalibah, Iraq — Soldiers from 1st Battalion, 3rd Aviation Regiment set up a forward arming and refueling point to keep Army and Marine helicopters going in support of ground forces engaged in Operation Iraqi Freedom.

“We set up a six-point FARP to rearm and refuel 1-3 Aviation’s attack helicopters at first,” said Sgt. 1st Class Theodore Campbell, FARP noncommissioned officer in charge, Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 1-3 Aviation. “But in a wartime situation, if any bird comes in, we have to be ready.”

In addition to rearming and refueling their battalion’s AH-64 Apaches, the soldiers also support Black Hawks and Marine aircraft, including Cobras, Hueys and Sea Stallions, at the six points they set up for three days, said the Charleston, S.C., native.

“The soldiers have been highly motivated,” said Capt. Dan Ostrowski, a platoon leader with HHC. “They’ve had to learn to fuel three new birds in the last 72 hours. Nobody’s ever refueled them, and even in combat, they’re all lining up to learn.”

“It’s fairly simple,” said Staff Sgt. Kevin Robinson, a petroleum supply specialist whose home is Jacksonville, N.C. “With the aircraft we have coming in, it’s learning how much fuel it takes and where to hook the fuel line up.”

Within the first 72 hours at Jalibah, the FARP’s 22 soldiers supplied U.S. aircraft with 25,800 gallons of aviation fuel, 2,000 rounds of 30 mm ammunition, 120 2.75-inch rockets and 23 Hellfire missiles, Ostrowski said.

Campbell said all of the soldiers have to be ready for an aircraft to come in at any time.

“It’s an all-day job, said Pfc. Crystal Blalock, a petroleum supply specialist who hails from Chicago. “You get your rest and everything whenever you get time, because you’re on call for when your point gets filled.”

The soldiers woke up at 4 a.m. March 20 to get started on a seven-hour convoy to the site, Ostrowski said. They stayed up until 4 a.m. the next day setting up the point and were awake four hours later to start full operations before 1-3 Aviation’s helicopters arrived at the airfield.

“My soldiers have been doing an outstanding job,” Campbell said. “They were up for 24 hours, and got back up ready to perform any mission. This is a superb team.”

Army Pfc. Gilbert Henderson, from Sumter, S.C., makes an adjustment to the 30 mm canon on an AH-64 Apache helicopter at the forward arming and refueling point being run by HEdaquarters and Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Aviation near Jalibah, Iraq. The FARP supplied more than 2,000 rounds of 30 mm amunition in its first 72 hours on the ground. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Jacob Boyer

Soldiers from Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Aviation, refuel a MEDEVAC helicopter at a forward air and refueling point they set up at an airbase in southern Iraq. The unit supplied more than 25,000 gallons of fuel to U.S. aircraft in their first 72 hours of operation. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Jacob Boyer