Christine Had A Mind Of Her Own

Christine Had A Mind Of Her Own
Submitted by SSGT Keith Bowers

My gun was named Christine because she had a mind of her own. Named after the Stephen King movie Christine. Gun #3, Christine, never gave me much trouble after she got a new pack but she had a personality. The day after she had the new pack put in, my driver and I, and perhaps my number one man, took her out for exercise.

After going maybe a good half - mile we stopped, smelling something burning. I was on the grill waiting for the tube to be traversed right. I had already opened the travel lock.

I waited and waited. My driver stuck his head out saying she won't go. I came around and got in. We tried a couple more times. We could hear the cherry juice flowing through the control handle but no movement; just blow by. As we thought about this, wondering what was wrong since she worked just a few minutes before, she traversed "right" on her own with no one even touching the stick. And not just a little bit, she traversed far enough to open the grill which was amazing enough in itself but she stopped about 6-10 inches before hitting a tree which was about the same size as the tube. As it turned out it was only paint on the manifold/exhaust burning.

Christine showed herself other times. On one fire mission as soon as we fired a round she cranked up her engine, another time after firing a round she not only cranked up her engine she put herself in gear and tried to come off her spades. All the while no one was in the drivers hatch. Many guns have a bit of leakage in the hydraulics and over a few minutes the tube may drift down. Well Christine was an individualist; she would often drift up and if I remember correctly traverse left or right a little at times.

Christine was a good gun all in all. Being the chief, my section and I performed maintenance on her for the two years I had her. She made most all field ops before she got her new pack which is quite a feat in itself. After the new pack she was really frisky and never missed a chance to fire rounds range.

She was known throughout the battalion.