Minot AFB missing M240
The other day we talked about Minot Air Force Base missing some Mk-19 ammunition. Today they’re missing an M-240.
Officials at Minot Air Force Base say they discovered that a M-240 machine gun was missing during a standard weapons inventory Wednesday.
The 5th Bomb Wing and 91st Missile Wing immediately began searching their weapons inventories, and have opened an investigation with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations.
The weapon is a 7.62 caliber. Lt. Col. Jamie Humphries says that all ammunition is accounted for.
Nice.
Category: Air Force
Wait, is this…? Accountability seems difficult nowadays. A while back my company arms room misplaced a piece of equipment (not a weapon); I had transitioned out of the arms room a couple of months earlier, but still had unaccompanied access and was annoyed (to say the least) as it was my fourth and likely final armorer position. Never had such an issue in the past but my replacement hadn’t followed thee procedures I taught him.
Now they’re looking for another serialized piece of equipment, which was never signed out from Supply. Glad I’m done…
I remember days when a paperwork error for anything in the arms room (i.e., an item at maintenance without the proper paperwork) would result in a company recall. Even on a Friday night with the entire company drunk off their asses.
You’re being awfully hard on these guys. Haven’t you ever misplaced anything? Your wallet? Your car keys? A few HE grenades? A general purpose machine gun…
… a few TLAM-Ns?
Nuclear weapons?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_States_Air_Force_nuclear_weapons_incident
That sort of thing seems to happen around there.
We had a Recon Marine drop his M4 that had his PEQ and PVS dummy corded to it off the shit off the coast of Onslow Beach. They got out there in a “scuba op” and found the damn thing. Ooops
Isn’t this the same AFB that misplaced a couple of nucs a few years back?
BHWHAHAHAHA
sent them cross country
Hotter then hell
Indeed it is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_States_Air_Force_nuclear_weapons_incident
Well, at least it doesn’t have a bump stock.
But they have all of their planes, right?
Um…
LMFAO Fuze!!!
And their nukes?
Don’t they have nukes too?
Yes, that’s what that AFSF unit is suppose to protect. I remember back in 2008 they had some problems with guarding the nukes there. We worked with a Engineer unit on a HA/CA mission too Central/South America, they mentioned some thing like that.
Come on Fuze you know the VT ROTC lost an M60 back in the day. That day was a long time ago but caused the Corp to lose their arms room.
Virginia Tech? I’m going more for “Variable Time”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximity_fuze
As for me, I went to University of North Texas so I’m not a colligate ring knocker!
I didn’t go there either, so I guess we can both make fun of them. 🙂
Sounds good! 😀
“The weapon is a 7.62 caliber. Lt. Col. Jamie Humphries says that all ammunition is accounted for.”
Whew! At least you can’t find that type of ammo in the civilian market!
On the other hand, since it is a M240b it only takes belt fed which makes it slightly harder to get links
On the gripping hand, if they can get the gun, I’m sure they can get ammo
A quick trip through any militaries base’s MOUT facility will normally prove to be a treasure trove of 7.62 and 5.56 links.
Extra points for Mote reference.
Indeed.
(Niven & Pournelle)
LMAO I caught that too! Oh wait…that makes us NERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRDS!
Sorry couldn’t resist. 🙂 Happy Friday all y’all.
Sorry, I’m unfamiliar. A quick Google Search later, I know now we are talking about “Mote in God’s Eye”, but I don’t get the reference.
Help a brotha’ out!
Moties (some of them; been awhile) have three arms; one (the gripping hand) bigger than the other two.
So, the gripping hand (also, name of the second novel) is the one that overwhelms.
“Point”, “on the other hand”, “on the gripping hand”….
Accidentally ‘reported’ your post. Terribly sorry, it’s early here.
Anyway:
“Gripping hand”: instead of ‘on one hand, on the other hand’ (two options), it’s three options with one dominant.
“On the one hand, McD’s is cheaper; on the other hand Burger King is closer… but on the gripping hand, both really kinda suck and there’s a Cookout right down the road.”
Just click on any computer link, and you have all the “links” you want. Not bad for a Friday morning Yoke.
>Rimshot!<
Correct me if I am wrong, but I suspect the linked ammo is available as military surplus. I know the linked 7.62 ammo for the M-60 used to be available for civilian purchase rather inexpensively. People delinked it to shoot in .308 caliber rifles.
Are they sure they know what they have. I thought M249 was 5.56 and 240B was 7.62.. Just asking
It states above 240, someone put 249, just asking.
just asking?…we can figure that out.
Perhaps they don’t even know what they are supposed to have, let alone what they are missing.
Yep
An astute observation on Yef’s part.
Give Yef the benefit of the doubt.
Smartest comment he has made so far. We may have to promote him to Sgt. “Obvious” Yef. But he still has a long way to go to become CPT Obvious.
M249 or M240?
I know it might look the same to you oldsters used to the M60, but the M249 and the M240 are completely totally different, as in 5.56x45mm vs 7.62x51mm.
I went through MCT in June of 1995. When we got done with our M60 shoot, the instructors said that we didn’t have to get the things boot camp clean because we were the last class to go through shooting them. The fact that every armorer we had had up to that point wanted us to scrape off about a millimeter of metal when we cleaned ANY weapon makes me think that was probably the truth. I think I saw some at my reserve unit the next year and that was the last time. Very sad!! 🙁
https://get.google.com/albumarchive/104745627018165888181/album/AF1QipP61EHC5-73wybgMF7dolZqVEREENCMyNdVfhQw/AF1QipMvUyNNqG0KXmOr_rF0PlIPl5-eON9iRX2rs1lP
Yeah, I believe The Navy was the only force left after that, they had M60E3and then NSW and Seabees went to M60E4 and Mk 43. We had the Mk 43 during the invasion 03, as we were going through a change over from 60 to M240B. they didn’t have enough 240’S for our units and the 60’s had to be returned to “CRANE”. The marines we were attached to asked us what kind of weapon was on our Hummers, they had never seen them. NSW still uses the Mk 43 today, but going with SCAR both of them.
As an oldster, I hate to break it to you, but most of us likely know the difference between the the M249 (aka SAW) and the M240 (current GPMG). Most of us even knew the former fires 5.56mm linked ammo and the latter linked 7.62 mm.
Yef. You’re in timeout.
HOW MANY times have both you and I told him NOT to huff the floor wax, but did he listen? I bet he regularly gets CQ Runner Duty on Saturdays!
Having fired the M60, M240, mot to mention the M73/M219. All fired the same ammo 7.62 4 and 1 linked DODAC 1305-A131.
I was a Tanker by MOS who spent time as a unit armorer and as a Battalion Ammo NCO back in the day.
I never ‘lost’ a weapon or accountability for any Class V entrusted to my care. As Bn Ammo, I was also the Class V property book officer. My unit had physical custody of our Class V basic load.
The person or persons responsible should be roasted over a low fire along with the whole chain of command.
Finders keepers!
Hahaha! I was thinking of making a road trip to Minot.
Some slob walks into a North Dakota pawn shop and asks “uh..How much for the Rambo gun dude?”
Hey, at least they don’t screw-up with their nukes. Oh, wait…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/19/AR2007101901590_pf.html
Someones got some ‘splaining to do!!!!
They should’ve never gotten rid of SAC…
Still would have happen. The problem is they use it as a unit system. Meaning no one individual is assigned to weapon as they mount them on a Vic. We do it differently we have Gun Teams and gunner on each team, that is his gun no matter were it is placed on Vic or in a fighting position and even on gun line on Range. This system means one person or small 3 man team is accounting for that weapon at all time. The problem the way they do it is as unit, they just take over on watch or use them on line at range and not one person is in charge of that weapon. The Navy does same thing on ships and with their security forces its a unit gun not a small team gun. I can see how this happen, dumb ass and RSO and Range Chief will be in hot water or if on GRD they will be held accountable.
That is not at all how USAF missile cops do it chief, or at least not how we did it a decade ago when I was one. The weapon is assigned to a qualified gunner only. And it is their gun for the duration of the shift.
I hope that’s the way they do it, and this is a paper drill, weapon got sent out but not taken off books. Maybe a unit deployed and same thing not placed on statues of being out or down range.
I did an IA deployment to Afghanistan a few years back. I’ll never forget making a trip to main base Bagram where the outdoor food court was (Green Bean Coffee, Pizza Hut, Popeyes, etc) and seeing some Specialist get up from his table and leave his M249 SAW right under it, with a few TCN workers just eyeballing it.
I ran and caught the bus that was getting ready to pull off on Disney, that he had just hopped on, dangled the M249 in the air and yelled inside to him “Hey, dumbass. You forget something?”
He said “oops” and came up to the front to get it when someone snatched it before he could and told me “I’m his First Sergeant. I’ll help him carry this back.” I could hear him ripping that guy a new asshole as they drove off.
Whoopsie moments like these have consequences.
Dude…we would always see the email traffic over there “M9/M4/M249 serial number ####### is currently unaccounted for along with X rounds of ammunition. Please check all work spaces”
Yeah, I remember over SIPER, all the time almost everyday. I was an NCOIC on a JTF and would always have to check on that shit. We even had civilian Contactors with weapons, had to do same thing.
Bagram 2002. Place was still relatively small (this was shortly after Operation Anaconda). I was the OPS NCO for a signal detachment. My supply SGT finds an M9 in the portapotty about 0200. It ain’t ours, so I call the MP detachment located next to us. Tell them we found an M9 and they might wanna do a quick check. Guy immediately says “yup, it’s ours, I’ll send somebody to get it”. I said hold on there Bubba, you give me a SN and I’ll give you a weapon. MP 1SG showed up about an hour later with the proper SN, at a high level of pisstivity. He brought down hell on that detachment.
2004 Mosul my BN Cdr’s office was right next to the one star’s (BG Ham) briefing room. Apparently one of the higher ups left a little light because we found an M9 on one of the chairs and turned it in. Must have been an interesting conversation…Baghdad 2009 opened up my inherited CONEX/Arms Room and found an MP5 with no paperwork and an M249 with paperwork from 5 years before. Took me six months to get rid of that thing with the PBO. Does anyone in the AF actually sign for this equipment or do they just give it away?
Happens all the time. Had one of the cleaning ladies (Host Nation) bring me a M-9 that she found in one of the bathrooms of the Ibn Sina Hospital. It turned out to belong to one of the other teams member of my squad. I was digging through a connex at Cropper, and found a M-203 laying outside of the connex. I traced it down to some goofball from another squad that got sent to help me go through th connex. I guess he saw me working, sat down, sat down smoked a cigarette the n went back to his hooch. He became my Go-to guy for details after that.
when someone snatched it before he could and told me “I’m his First Sergeant. I’ll help him carry this back.” I could hear him ripping that guy a new asshole as they drove off.
– someone got loved tenderly over several days LOL!
Old Pig or new Pig, still just a Pig no matter which model.
Probably job ordered to 3rd shop to fix that thingy in back that goes up, but the work order copy missed the file folder and is laying in the bottom of the file drawer.
No, wait, that kind of stuff is all computerized these days. No paper copies at all.
I blame the Russians./smile
The computer equivalent is inputing the information and then forgetting to hit “update” but a lot of databases don’t let you forget.
If a US Army unit lost a belt of live 40mm and then it was discovered that a 240 was missing, the 4 Horsemen would come down from the sky hurling flaming 15-6’s and relief for cause Pet’s and NCOER’s. What a fucked up bunch of idiots. Maybe the chick with the dino puppet took it.
Entire battalion would be relieved for cause all the way down to PVT Joe Snuffy.
We had 4 PVS-14s come up missing from an armory we shared with another outfit. 15-6 showed it was one of our troops that took them. I think he got a promotion out of it. Seriously. He was a PFC, and two years later I see SPC Shitbird walking around the DFAC at Camp MacGregor.
If I heard correctly she, and that entire chain of command were relieved. Not likely she was able to walk away with even a spent shell casing!
How autocorrect made pets from OER’S is beyond me,lol
P/O and E/R keys are next to each other. You certain it was an autocorrect error … or not enough coffee?
Not a good stretch up there at Minot… I recall two criminal “masterminds” in my unit at 4/40 Armor at Ft. Carson in the 80’s who decided to “acquire” a grease gun (and not the BII variety). They wrapped it in a WP bag and buried it near Tank Table VIII (I think it was VIII, tough getting older). You can imagine the reaction to the missing weapon, we got locked down in place, CID descended on us, they tore the place apart with zero results; about the only thing they didn’t do was cavity searches for the whole unit… They finally let us go in from the range after all this. Fast forward about ten days, the two geniuses got busted at a local gun shop, they tried to buy 1000 rounds of .45 ACP ammo without realizing CID “might” have warned gun shops to be aware of anyone buying a large amount of .45 ammo. Yeah, when they went to pick up their ammo they got a bit more than they bargained for. Why the hell would ANYBODY want a POS like an M3 Grease Gun enough to go to Leavenworth for it?
The Marine Force Recon we had on board with the BLT used those green parkerized M-3 Grease guns. They used to clean them in the hanger bay using a portable steam jenny. The ship had WW2 small arms on board.
I liked the M3! Our MP company at Camp Zama needed a range officer for familiarization-fire, so I volunteered. In gratitude, they let me burn up a couple of magazines; I cut the e-type silhouette target almost in half with the first burst. Man, that was sweet.
Another No-Shit story from deep in the annals of the 4th ID at Carson during the 1980’s.
It’s 1985, a parts clerk from 6/32 Armor orders an infrared headlight for a M60A3.
10 days later a semi tractor w/flatbed trailer from Sharpes Army Depot in California shows up at 704th MSB Class IX warehouse with a 7 1/2 Ton Boat Anchor. Had to unloaded with a 10 Ton overhead crane.
The stock number that went through the system was one digit off.
Later on (under the cover of darkness) the anchor mysteriously ended up down at the Pueblo Army Depot until the Navy out in Norfolk needed it for one of their Frigates.
Well, the AF should just apologize on Twitter and put it behind them!
Unavailable for comment.
A semi-auto “Pig”?
Awesome!!
Only Chuck can raise that much havoc with a non fully auto M60. 😉
I take it the subtleties of ‘slow-motion’ video escape you? Yeffie, we found your soulmate…
Holy Crap! In 1981 I was in Ft. Lewis and my unit lost (had stolen)an MG off a tank. They were mounted on the outside for sub-caliber gunnery. We were locked up in barracks for a week while they sweated out the investigation. Found out years later they recovered it, one the guards had taken it and buried it.
Jerry,
I was going to mention another Ft Lewis “Fun in the Sun” opportunity; would have been in 91 or 92; I think it was an artillery battery out in the field discovered that one of their guys had left his M16 “somewhere in the woods”. They were ringed with concertina wire and lived rough for about a month before the damn thing was “found”.
One of my friends in the 104th had been the goofballs platoon leader, this event was an active duty showstopper for him. I had thought I was the 1LT in the division with the longest time in grade…until I met him.
A follow on note regarding M3’s: Hey loaders and drivers don’t leave those damn things in the tank. Carry them with you…or some smartass LT is going to find them and festooned with six of the damn things will show up to the PSG’s end of drill debrief…he will be mad as HELL at the tankers and the scouts will all point and laugh at you…
At the same time you were at Lewis, I was in the 2/503 at Campbell; during a multi-unit air assault, somebody in another unit dropped his M16 out of the Huey into the deep woods of Tennessee. (We were just fielding Blackhawks … it might have been a UH60.)
Said unit had to walk the area for a long time. I don’t recall if they ever recovered the weapon, but thereafter we all had to dummy-cord our weapons to our LBE (or was it LCE back then?).
Fun times.
We were somewhere (Benning or Bragg) and we went by a 50 cal sitting by its lonesome on a tripod at the entrance to some other unit’s AO. I asked my sergeant if we hardworking quartermasters shouldn’t secure such valuable military equipment. Her reply was emphatically negative.
Had an speedy 4 armorer lose a 1911 in the snow in the early ‘80s. Post lockdown, 100% barracks, car, and you name it searches. Total nightmare until it was found. Seems an E2 found it in the snow and decided to keep it until his CO found it in his locker that evening. Ass chewings for all, Article 15 for armorer, rank reduction, and reassignment to an infantry squad riding in the back of an M113.
I can only imagine the hell associated with the loss of a machine gun.
7.62 caliber, eh? That comes out to nearly 8 inches. 7.62mm is one thing but I didn’t know they were making artillery-sized machine guns now.
I’ve worked in the armory at Minot back in the day (2000-2003) and it’s freaking huge.
It’s shared by two different commands with the space fairly divided up between them although Global Strike gets the brunt of the space.
First they lost a can of 40MM for the Mk19 and now a M240?
Someone is gonna get fired and/or go to jail.
Separate cage for everyone, one vault type door?
Sounds like cage-land CCO.
When I was a young Sgt on I&I duty in Alameda Ca back in the early 80s I accompanied an Interrogator Translator Det to Camp Roberts for training and when we got back I was informed a WO had lost his M16. Notifying the I&I was not one of my favorite times?
He had me take the whole Det back; on a Sunday afternoon no less ( these Reservists bitched and whined) to look for it and we found it where he had leaned it against a 5 ton buried in the mud since it had been run over.
Good lesson for me that I nevet forget and I always did a sensitive items check before a movement after that.
Next thing to go missing will be the payroll.
Do they still pay cash after signing and saluting for it? I’m old.
I did that back in 79 when I went through army basic OSUT [hand salute, “SPC Snuffy reporting for pay, sir!”] I think we did that either in a gymnasium or a theater … and I’m leaning toward theater, because I think there was a stage behind the finance officer.
Sheesh … or was that way back in USAF basic in 73?
Anyway, no. Pay is direct deposit now; but I’m not sure about basic training.
I’m old, too!
Back in 1980 it was the whole get-in-line-and-salute routine.
By 1987 when I had to go through basic again (due to a break in service) we were all required to have direct deposit.
Army was still doing the get-in-line-and-salute routine at Gordon in ’88. Direct Deposit was required upon arrival at your first duty station.
We still did it when I was in OSUT on Fort Lost-in-the-Woods in 91.
A goat ate it.
Pay lines ended in about 1971, I believe. I used to be my company’s pay officer frequently back in Germany in 1969-1970. I had to go to division finance and pick up stacks of greenbacks and German Marks. Believe it or don’t, after counting it out to me, the finance clerk put the about $75K of cash into a paper grocery bag, which sat on the seat of my Jag XKE next to a loaded 1911 as I drove back to Mainz from Bad Kreuznach.
When we got paid, two dollar bills were also included.
I think I had some in my payrolls, as well. Once, I found a counterfeit 20 dollar in my payroll. That was a shit show of grief when I reported it. One would have thought the powers that be suspected I was the person who put it in the stack of greenbacks.
When I worked at brinks in the ground part (banks) before I switched over to the diamond/precious metals side, we were doing a fine count at an ATM site. Fine count is counting the bills by hand instead of using the machine counter, so I was counting 20’S from one cassette and the ATM tech was counting another 20’S cassette and he found a ten dollar bill mixed in with the twenties. I wonder if the bank would believe you on that.
One of my duty stations in Germany was an isolated radio site with no brass. We had to get in class A’s once a month when an officer and armed guard would arrive with cash. It would then be directly deposited at the local Gasthaus.
LOL!
Any bombers missing this morning?
Maybe they should have apologized for this instead.
Good grief! If they had been at Ft. Jackson and the platoon sergeant had us looking for a DUMMY round until we found it…!
(Then again, maybe that was the time the drill was doing a candy search in the drop ceiling back in the barracks, meaning the platoon sergeant was standing on the dummy round or had it in his pocket or something.)
Maybe they need to put gamma sources on all their weapons so they could find ’em with Geiger counters.
Wait, they found it during an inventory? As in an arms room inventory? So how long has said weapon been missing??!!!
OK, this horse needs to see a vet. I gotta get back to work. (I wonder if the Air Force has its own vets; they have their own working dogs, right?)
AWW GEE WHIZ, they lose a box of uhhhhmmm, bang-boom thingamajigs AND NOW they lose a bangbangbangbangbang whatchamacallit? Some Air Force type with birds on his shoulder id kinda-gonna go apeshit if he hasn’t already.
OMFG, I am so glad that I don’t have to deal with this anymore.
dd-214blanket.com
http://dd-214blanket.com/
I hear you, shit like that makes me want to hug and kiss my DD214 one more time.
“Andrei, you’ve lost ANOTHER submarine?!?!”