Marine Corps’ first female ground combat battalion commander reflects on her historic role
By Erika I. Ritchie | eritchie@scng.com | Orange County Register
PUBLISHED: July 3, 2020 at 10:30 a.m. | UPDATED: July 3, 2020 at 5:48 p.m.
As a young combat engineer officer, Michelle Macander was part of the U.S. Marines’ push into Iraq in 2003.
Then a first lieutenant with the Marine Wing Support Squadron 372 at Camp Pendleton, she oversaw a platoon building a base camp in Kuwait that then pushed into Iraq repairing runways and airfields so American planes could land safely.
Lt. Col. Michelle Macander salutes Major General Robert F. Castellvi during a ceremony at Camp Pendleton on Friday, December 21, 2018. Espinoza and five other Marines helped save the life of a Riverside motorcyclist after they were the first to come across the accident returning from a camping trip in Big Bear. (Photo by Kevin Sullivan, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Now a lieutenant colonel, Macander recalled one of her first missions there.
“There was a runway with six 50-foot craters,†she said. “We compacted it down and I certified it to land the first KC-130. I stood on a Humvee’s roof, hoping it would land. And it did.â€
https://www.ocregister.com/2020/07/03/marine-corps-first-female-ground-combat-battalion-commander-reflects-on-her-historic-role/
