Ground Crews
Home > General Information > Ground Crews
Threadfall day, always a hectic time for the Weyr, begins with the assembly of several groups of people out in the Bowl. These people begin milling about and working at least an hour or more before Thread is due to fall, hard at work even before the riders begin putting straps on their dragons, feeding them firestone and donning their own flight gear.
Some are loading up firestone into sacks, then stacking the sacks where weyrlings, who will land, pick them up and deliver them to resupply riders in the air. Others are checking the hoses and nozzles of flamethrowers. Still others are setting up tables. One or two seem to be in charge, giving orders to the rest. Weyr youngsters bring water for those who get overheated during all the work. These are the Igen Weyr ground crew, and their job is critical to the Weyr.
The ground crews at Igen are made up of several different divisions, named primarily for their pre-Fall duties. Most of these form squads to seek burrows, as well. These are:
- Gofer Crew
These are the youngest helpers, and while they aren't usually a formal group or squad, their work is just as important as those with a higher level of organization. Need some protective lotion? Ask a child to go for it. Getting dehydrated and need a glass of water? Ask a child to go for it. Need a hat, an extra cannister of agenothree, some food to reward the firelizards who bring messages back and forth from runner crew to the sprayer crew? Send a child for it. No one's contributions during Threadfall are trivial or discounted. Even the youngest and smallest and simplest are vital to the Weyr's success during Threadfall. - Sprayer Crew
This team is responsible for all things related to agenothree sprayers. They fix minor problems with the sprayers, refill them when they're running low on agenothree, and of course use them during and after Threadfall to kill whatever riders miss in the air. Sometimes the sprayers get too badly damaged for even these resourceful folk to fix, in which case the sprayers are sent to the smiths for more extensive repair. This team also forms one of the ground crew squads which walk all over the area affected by each Fall, seeking out burrows and spraying them down to kill whatever has escaped the dragons' fire. - Healer Aid Crew
The Healer aid crew is responsible for ensuring the availability of all supplies which the healers and dragonhealers may need. As well, the healer aides set up the tables, chairs and cots for healing, which may go from simple bandaging of minor cuts and scrapes to last-resort field surgery (dangerous even in the best conditions, and made more so by Threadfall and less-than-pristine outdoor conditions). After Threadfall this crew carry the badly wounded into the infirmary, clean up the tables and chairs, repackage whatever supplies are left and carry it all back inside until next time. - Firestone Crew
Once the stone has been broken apart, then separated into piles by size and grade (usually a task completed by weyrlings, sometimes joined by Minecrafters), the firestone crew fills sacks with the stone. Each sack must be filled with stone of the appropriate sizes and amounts for the size of dragon who will receive that sack. While it doesn't take an extraordinary amount of training to do this job, it can be done incorrectly, so this crew typically works on the days when Thread is not falling. This way they can work at their own pace, supervised by someone well acquainted with the appropriate grades, sizes, and amounts each dragon will find it easiest to use. Still, in a particularly bad Threadfall, the Weyr may run low. In such a case, experienced sackers will rush out to fill several more sacks, so that the dragons will have enough to last for the entire Fall. - Runner Crew
The runners conserve their strength before a Fall. They range out with the groundcrews, running reports to a 'hub' who then passes the messages to those closest and best equipped to destroy each burrow of Thread. Most now have firelizards to assist them, and are responsible for ensuring their firelizards get the messages to the correct recipients. Occasionally, runners find burrows the crews previously missed. In Igen's heat, this branch of the crews must be especially careful to conserve their energies. They are primarily used around larger habitations. - Greenery Crew
When Fall is not imminent greenery crews weed and clean the Weyr's grounds. One incursion of greenery in the wrong place could endanger dozens of lives, so this crew will go out daily to pluck even the tiniest bits of plant matter all around where humans and their livestock live. No plant is permitted to survive within the radius determined by each Weyr to be the green-free zone.
When a Hold or Hall ground crew in the Weyr's sweep area is understrength for any reason, the Weyr crew makes itself available. They also help out in harvest times, when it is critical that burrows be caught as soon as humanly possible. More than once a sharp ground crew has ensured that a harvest wasn't decimated or lost entirely to Thread. The crews take pride in their work, and sometimes hold drills of their own.
