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00:00Welcome to Operation Healing Heroes. Join us in the boat today as we feature U.S. Army veteran
00:09Dave Allen in beautiful Clearwater, Florida. They served for us. They sacrificed for us.
00:21Their stories deserve to be told. Every military veteran has a story to tell.
00:32Join our host, Jay Garstecki, as we honor the stories of our true American heroes, one
00:40soldier at a time. The mission today is Operation Healing Heroes.
00:48Brought to you by Great Clips. Clearwater, Florida is world-renowned for its beautiful
01:00beaches and seemingly endless roads to ride. It's here where we connect with Florida native
01:07and self-proclaimed motorcycle junkie Dave Allen.
01:12So where did you get your love for motorcycles?
01:16From as little as I can remember, I've been drawn to bikes. I got pictures from when
01:22I was a little kid, a little bitty kid, on anybody's motorcycle that would let me climb
01:27on it. I'm always on the bike, always sitting in somebody's lap, barely big enough to hold
01:33on to the handlebars. I think as soon as I could climb up on the bike, I loved the thought
01:39of it. I would ride on the back of anybody's motorcycle as a kid that would take me for
01:44a ride. My first vehicle was a motorcycle. I got my first motorcycle when I was 15. I lied
01:52to my parents. I said, hey, look, as long as it's under a 250, it's legal with a learner's
01:58permit. Yeah. And nobody fact-checked that. So I was riding my motorcycle, you know, to
02:04high school. But I was cool, man. I had my own wheels. I rode high school and work. And you can be
02:12with somebody else, but you're by yourself at the same time when you're on a motorcycle. Because it's
02:18you and the bike and the road. Even if you got a guy like three feet away, you're sharing brotherhood
02:25in that adventure together. But while you're riding, you're by yourself.
02:29So tell me, does motorcycle riding do similar things for you with your buddies or no?
02:33Absolutely. It's a really good way to look at it, right? Because I ride a lot with other
02:40people with the combat vets. And it's a unique kind of wind therapy. I think you get some of
02:48that riding out in a boat, that wind therapy, that being outside. You got a destination and an
02:54activity plan. But on a motorcycle, it's also about getting there, right? Hey, me and you, we're
03:01going to take a bike out. Me, you, Tom and Pete, whoever, right? We're going to ride 200 miles just to
03:08go have a lunch. You don't do that in a car, right? You know, nobody says, hey, let's go all the way up here.
03:17Jump in the car and go ride 200 miles and go to lunch. No. On motorcycles, we do it all the time.
03:21Yeah. Cool. Well, I, I, uh, I want to mix our two pleasures. Mine fishing, yours motorcycles.
03:27So you're going to ride with me after I fish with you? It's exactly what I want to do. So I'd like to
03:32let you know I invited a buddy of mine to come join us. I hope you don't mind. But, uh, he's right
03:36behind you. Turn around. Holy shit, I recognize this dude. You recognize me? You know this guy?
03:43Paul. Is it, is it the mustache? What is it? It's the mustache. It's familiar. The good
03:49looks, the muscles. We can go on forever, Tom. It's the tattoos. The tattoos, yeah. Well,
03:54I used to, I watched this show for a long time. Yeah. Like years and years and years I watched
03:59this show. Founder of Orange County Choppers, Paul is known and loved around the world simply
04:05as Paul Sr., the star of the hit television show, American Chopper. I hope you don't mind.
04:12I invited this guy to come with us. I don't mind a bit. This is freaking, this is awesome.
04:15So I'll give you the good news and I'll give you the bad news. The good news will be if
04:20we catch fish. The bad news is if the water's rough, chances are I'll be puking all over
04:27you. But I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, any area is a good
04:32area. The boat doesn't make it, but this is going to be calm, right? It's going to be like
04:37this all day. Okay. I'm good. Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Great Clips, Northern
04:47Clearing, and by Enbridge. Operation Healing Heroes is a nonprofit organization dedicated to
05:00documenting the lives of our US military veterans. In addition, we also provide financial support and
05:06treatment for post-traumatic stress. Your donation will help heal our heroes.
05:11I'll be 75 in two weeks. Like for me, I should have been dead at 35. No, you know, I had the old
05:24alcohol and the drug thing. So I really should have because I almost died. But anyhow, so I look at it as
05:30a mile mark. So like, I'm not afraid to get older, because I feel like I beat the odds. So you know
05:36what I'm saying? And it's like, this cat's got nine lives. Are you saying you're on borrowed time?
05:42No. Oh, no, no, I don't ever, I don't ever look at it. I don't ever look at it as, you know, well,
05:49you only got 10 years to go or something like that. Nobody knows that. That's right. Hey guys,
05:53let's go do some fishing. All right. After a little wind therapy, as Dave put it, Paul's competitive
05:59spirit was on full display. Nice. Oh, Paul's ahead. Two. So what's that? Two to one. Yeah. But who's counting?
06:09I am. I am. Paul would hook a couple of fish today, but he didn't stop there.
06:19If I take the drone out, it's not my fault.
06:23Paul would win the day after catching two fish and drowning one drone.
06:43I'm killing it, man. I'm freaking killing it. That's like a monster. That hurt my arm.
06:50I'm surprised the line helped him. So tell me about what, what was it that made you go into
06:55the military? Well, I grew up on a Eglin Air Force base or right near the base on the Panhandle.
07:02So being a military town, dude, there was a lot of influence. So actually I was 17. My mom had to sign
07:12and say, sure, you can go. You got a plan. And so I went and delayed enlistment. So I was under contract my senior year, but I was kind of living the life of a grownup at that point.
07:25And I'm, you know, I'm in the army. But yeah, thinking I'm going to be a biomedical equipment technician and fix medical equipment in a hospital.
07:34That's what my recruiter said in a hospital. And of course, it had been peacetime. This is 87. So Vietnam had been over 12, 13, 14 years.
07:43So that was not even in my war, combat, any of that. Hadn't been on the news. Wasn't anywhere.
07:52Wasn't even on the radar. No, it wasn't in the radar.
07:55My sister was at West Point. My dad had served. My grandfather was a World War II, a Korean War vet.
08:03And he did 33 years in the military. So the family very much connected to the military. And so it wasn't a stretch.
08:12I think it was actually in the late 60s or early 70s, right?
08:18Yeah.
08:19The draft came out.
08:20I mean, what? We still had to register for selective service. And so that was a thing.
08:24Well, in case there's ever a draft again. And I was like, I ain't gonna have to worry about that. I'm going in.
08:29I thought I had my life mapped out at EMH. I thought I had it all figured out. And really, it kind of ended up that way. And I ended up with the career I thought I would have, but with some crazy twists and turns along the way.
08:45There was like no thought. It was like, I'm going into a peacetime army and it's just going to be a job.
08:50I never planned to go to combat.
08:54My first duty assignment was with division for three years. And that's where I ended up going to Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
09:03Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Great Cliffs, the Al Lynch Foundation, and by Lumberjack Lodge.
09:14Welcome to Operation Healing Heroes. Join us in the boat today as we feature Army veteran Dave Allen in beautiful, sunny, Clearwater, Florida.
09:29So this is how the sausage is made.
09:32All right.
09:32If you'd like to see more behind-the-scenes footage, follow us on social media and subscribe to our YouTube channel.
09:40If you're a U.S. military veteran in Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, or beautiful, sunny Florida, log on to our website, takeavetfishing.org, to find an event near you.
09:57Dave was deployed to the Middle East as part of Operation Desert Shield.
10:02And what would later become Desert Storm.
10:05I remember being on guard duty and we're still Desert Shield.
10:09And it's the middle of the night, 1, 2 o'clock in the morning.
10:13So you had guard duty every night for at least two or three hours and it rotated.
10:17We heard the planes going over.
10:20Lots of planes.
10:22Like this is new.
10:24It started.
10:25And 15, 20 minutes later, you could hear boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
10:34Really?
10:35And you could see, I mean, it was far enough away, you could just see the color in the sky change.
10:42It's like, uh-oh, it's on.
10:44Uh-huh.
10:44It's on.
10:45Just two hours ago, Allied air forces began an attack on military targets in Iraq and Kuwait.
10:53These attacks continue as I speak.
10:56Jump back.
10:57Boom, there's a hit.
10:58All they talked about was that they were going to use chemical weapons.
11:03It took a little while to go from being scared of deploying, scared of what might happen,
11:11to convincing yourself, hey, I'm with the infantry.
11:15This is it.
11:17This is where I'm at.
11:18And trying to change my mindset to let's go do this.
11:23And more choosing to embrace the suck.
11:28Yeah, you know, you were talking about chemical warfare, you know?
11:32And I think that that was probably one of the biggest fears anybody had, whether you're in the service or not.
11:38Chemical, it's frightening, you know what I mean?
11:41It's like...
11:43That was everybody's biggest fear.
11:46Now, we've got this job to do, and we're anticipating we're going to have to do it
11:52with a gas mask and a chemical suit on, and we're just hoping that when that does happen, we survive.
12:01I mean, they had us taking these preventative pills, experimental pills,
12:08to protect some of your nerve cells in case of a nerve agent attack.
12:13That's how convinced the government was that we were going to get gassed.
12:17I remember being 2, 3 o'clock in the morning.
12:21I'm dead asleep.
12:23So our tent's probably 20 dudes in the tent.
12:26It's like two rows of 10 guys.
12:28There's a commotion.
12:28You hear the commotion of him trying to get into the tent because the tent's buttoned up.
12:34He's commotion.
12:35I look over.
12:36I remember he's in his gas mask already.
12:41Man, that's the first time in my life I ever felt terror.
12:48I wasn't scared.
12:50It wasn't fear.
12:51It was terror.
12:54And he does.
12:56The top of his lungs, gas, gas, gas.
12:58He's giving the sign, which is, you know, hands up like this.
13:03And I hear in the background, the three long blows of a horn is the alarm.
13:11And that's for a gas attack.
13:14And I just knew, man, my heart.
13:17Talking about beat out of your chest.
13:18Yeah.
13:20So get that mask on.
13:24Get cleared.
13:25It's like you're double checking to make sure it's clear, right?
13:28You're like, oh, my God, I'll make sure this is real.
13:31And they called the all clear and said it was a false alarm.
13:34And the official line for 20 years was that was a false alarm.
13:40But it turned out that it wasn't.
13:42Really?
13:42It wasn't an attack.
13:44It was a target that we blew up, an Iraqi target that we blew up that had chemical munitions in it.
13:52And the plume from our own attack dispersed.
13:58And they had, like, later, it was all publicized.
14:00They had the weather maps and they could see the cloud.
14:04They knew who had been exposed, what units were exposed.
14:08Because the more you talk to people later, oh, yeah, we had an alarm go off that night, too.
14:13Well, you can't make those chemical detection kits go off without the chemical, right?
14:21They don't accidentally go off.
14:24I will never forget experiencing true terror.
14:29Yeah.
14:30It's so different than fear or being scared of something.
14:33It's something that you never forget.
14:44The Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association's mission is to support and protect those who have defended our country and our freedoms
14:52while providing assistance to veterans, veteran care facilities, and other veteran organizations.
14:58If you'd like to personally thank a veteran that you've seen in one of our episodes
15:03or nominate a veteran to be featured in a future episode, log on to our website, OperationHealingHeroes.org.
15:11Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Great Clips, Battle Born Batteries, and by SKB Cases.
15:21From all those experiences, I guess, before and after, what kind of dealings did you have with PSD?
15:35So, you know, you come back to the world and you just close that book.
15:44In 2000, I went to work for the Federal Bureau of Prisons as a biomedical engineer,
15:49thinking I would be doing just engineering in a new federal prison hospital.
15:55But during that time, I realized a few things.
16:00Number one, I was angry a lot for no particular reason.
16:04And I thought, well, maybe it's the environment I'm working in.
16:08Maybe I realized that federal prison inmates had it better than a deployed soldier did.
16:16Alcohol got a hold of me.
16:18I let it.
16:19And that went on for a while.
16:23So I ended up with, over the next couple years, like, admitting to myself and then actually going to get treatment.
16:32What would you say to other veterans that are struggling right now but basically like you that didn't want to really admit it?
16:39Take a look in the mirror and that's where you'll find the problem.
16:42And then there's something about connecting with other veterans, you know, finding your tribe.
16:49Dave would find his tribe in the Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association where the brotherhood and camaraderie of the military helped Dave give birth to an idea.
17:08An idea for a movement called the final mile.
17:11My name is David Allen of the Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association.
17:15I have a United States Army combat veteran.
17:19The ceremony you are about to witness today is called the final mile.
17:22The final mile is a demonstration of our commitment to ensure that no veteran goes to their final rest in place alone.
17:30Well, hey, I want to say thank you for your service to our country.
17:34And it's important to me that we make sure that we honor you in an appropriate way.
17:38Thank you, man.
17:39Even though you didn't get any fish today, I know that this rod right here has got a lot of fish left in it for you.
17:44So we have a rod here for you that says, Dave Allen, in appreciation of your sacrifice and service.
17:52It's got all the branches of service and our logo on it.
17:54That's for you.
17:55Thank you so much.
17:58And no fisherman is complete.
18:00And I think it was that shirt that you had on today that that's the reason you didn't get any fish.
18:04So we got you your own Operation Healing Heroes jersey.
18:07And it's got your name on there.
18:08That's for you.
18:09That's awesome.
18:10Brother, thank you for your service, man.
18:11We appreciate you.
18:11Thank you, brother.
18:12Thank you for sharing your story.
18:14Thanks, brother.
18:15Thanks for coming out.
18:16All right, man.
18:17So what are you doing?
18:19Are you doing anything tomorrow?
18:20I'm free tomorrow.
18:22After a long day on the water, Paul invited Dave back to the world-famous Orange County Chopper's Garage.
18:30I just started building a bike.
18:33I want to stop by.
18:35Can you name the time I'm there?
18:36Hey, I hope you're better at building bikes than you are at catching fish.
18:42I'm kidding.
18:42Well, so here's the thing about that.
18:45Probably not, but if I can do some of the electronic stuff, I'm good at that.
18:50All right.
18:50I'm really good at that.
18:51That's a deal.
18:51I made a career out of that.
18:53Good job.
18:54Cool.
18:55That'll be fun.
18:56See you tomorrow.
18:57Be great.
18:58See you tomorrow.
18:58Absolutely.
18:59Hey, Paul.
19:04Hey, what's up, man?
19:05How's it going?
19:06Good, good.
19:07A little sunburn.
19:08Hey, you're going, Paul.
19:10Yeah, hey, what's up, brother?
19:11All right, so this is my house, my rules.
19:17You got it.
19:17You got it?
19:18Yeah.
19:18Fair enough.
19:19So, not really.
19:21I try to do that with my wife, too.
19:24You know how that works, right?
19:25Oh, yeah?
19:25So, this is, I'll just go with my bike a little bit.
19:29This is my daily rider.
19:30This is what I ride out in Montana, wherever I go.
19:34It's not like a bar hopper.
19:37It's a rider.
19:37And if you look at the seats, you know, and I'll just do this briefly because I don't want
19:42to waste a lot of time, but everything, when you build a bike, everything is the handlebars,
19:47the foot controls, and the seat.
19:49If you got that right, you can ride around the world.
19:51You know what I mean?
19:52So, if you look at the way I'm sitting in this, you know, my knees are bent, my arms
19:56are not stretched out, I got cushioned in my back, and the bike does the rest.
20:01But I built this bike probably 12 years ago.
20:04We did a show in Sturgis.
20:08We did it in Sturgis.
20:09But I guess we're going to go over there and we're going to try and teach a song.
20:15I'm ready to learn.
20:16Are you teachable?
20:18That's questionable.
20:19You can tell me that after you try to teach.
20:21Afterwards, yeah.
20:22Ask his wife.
20:22She'll tell you.
20:23Yeah.
20:23Ask his wife.
20:23She'll tell you.
20:23Yeah.
20:31If you'd like to personally thank a veteran that you've seen in one of our episodes or nominate
20:35a veteran to be featured in a future episode, log on to our website, OperationHealingHeroes.org.
20:41And click on the Nominate button.
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