From my colleague, The Olympian's Christian Hill:

Darkness, a sandstorm and enemy fire: One or two of these conditions can pose a challenge for a medevac crew in Iraq.

Chief Warrant Officer Noel Larson, a 37-year-old Black Hawk helicopter pilot from Olympia, faced all three the night of March 25, while he was temporarily assigned to a special operations unit.

The Washington National Guardsman was flying in support of a ground raid by coalition forces north of Balad. Gunfire had broken out from the target building, and the forces took immediate casualties.

Larson’s helicopter was an hour out, but he and his three crew members immediately volunteered to retrieve three wounded men.

“It was never a question,” Larson recalled Friday while being awarded at Fort Lewis for the daring combat rescue. “It was going to happen.”

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Artist Thomas Kinkade will be at Fort Lewis post exchange on Sunday to present signed prints of his painting “Coming Home” to two Fort Lewis soldiers and one McChord airman.

Kinkade makes similar presentations at military installations across the globe; that’s him in the photo with his wife and the family of Staff Sgt. Keith Jones during a stop at Fort Lewis in 2006.

Post commander Lt. Gen. Charles Jacoby and base commander Col. Jeffrey Stephenson will be there for the presentation. (No word if they’re megafans like the folks on a “60 Minutes” piece four years ago.)

A state task force studying the Interstate Compact on Military Children – an agreement between states to streamline transitions in K-12 education for the children of service members – has released its report to the Legislature.

The task force’s recommendation: Approve the compact, with a few tweaks and adjustments. That’s what it agreed during its final meeting at the Clover Park School District building in Lakewood, but this puts it in writing. (A link is below.)

States that sign the agreement consent to work with each other to streamline records, course sequencing, graduation requirements, entrance and exit testing, inclusion in extracurricular activities, entrance-age rules for kindergarten and first grade, and other transition issues.

The task force was chaired by State Sen. Steve Hobbs, D-Lake Stevens, and Rep. Christine Rolfes, D-Bainbrigde Island. Both plan to introduce a bull adopting the compact during the 2009 legislative session.

Findings and Recommendations of the Washington State Task Force on the Interstate Compact on Educational Opportunity for Military Children [PDF]

The Washington National Guard is celebrating the Tacoma Armory’s 100th anniversary in style – with a ball that includes dinner, dancing and, apparently, horses.

A centennial ball will take place Saturday night at the brick fortress in downtown Tacoma. The event will take place on the drill floor, which used to overlook the stables housing the cavalry troop’s rides. Some folks attending the ball will wear period costumes, and we hear there might be a few horses in attendance as well.

My colleague Mike Gilbert wrote about the armory earlier this year. And here’s some background from the Guard:

The Tacoma Armory has been a center of the community ever since holding its first event - a New Years Eve ball hosted by the citizen soldiers of Company A and Troop B on December 31, 1908. Since then, the Armory has hosted countless concerts, dances, weddings, graduations and sporting events. Three sitting Presidents (Taft, Wilson and Truman) have visited the Armory. It has also been the site of Washington National Guard units mobilizing to serve in Word War I, World War II and the Global War on Terror, in addition to many State missions to protect lives and property here in Washington.

In 1907, The State Legislature appropriated $95,000 to build the Tacoma Amory on land donated by Pierce County. Built to resemble a crusader castle, the Armory originally contained horse stables, a shooting range and a swimming pool.