Team fuels freedom at record pace in July

Published Aug. 5, 2011
By Senior Airman Eric Summers Jr.
379th Air Expeditionary Wing

SOUTHWEST ASIA -- It's said records are made to be broken. The 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron, 379th Aircraft Maintenance Unit and 379th Expeditionary Logistics Readiness Squadron went one better July 31 and shattered their previous monthly sortie record by 55.

The team launched and flew 1,001 missions in July, the most flown in a month by the 340th EARS since it was reactivated in 2003.

"It all has to do with what the guys are doing downrange, providing overwatch for our guys on the ground," said Capt. Brian Sikkema, a KC-135 Stratotanker pilot deployed from Kadena Air Base, Japan.

"People talk about the drawdown here and there, but that doesn't lessen the amount of work we have to do in the air in keeping an eye on everybody including U.S. troops and various people that are fighting with us."

The KC-135s refuel U.S. and Coalition fighters, bombers, airlifters, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and command and control aircraft supporting Operation New Dawn, Operation Enduring Freedom and Combined Joint Task Force Horn of Africa. The thirsty customers require an average of more than 3 million pounds of fuel per day.

"When [ground units] need the air support, it is there and we are a part of that," said Master Sgt. Matthew Calisi, a 340th EARS boom operator also deployed from Kadena AB. "We're the largest air refueling [mission] in the world and it's a blistering pace, but the guys on the ground need the air support and that's what we are here for."

Sustaining an average of more than 30 sorties a day comes down to the ability of maintenance and logistics personnel to fuel and turn jets that are often twice their own age. Add in heat comparable to a convection oven and the stakes are even higher.

"This is a team effort," said Lt. Col. Paul Skipworth, 340th EARS commander. "And we have an amazing team of Guard, Reserve, and active-duty aircrews. I'm equally impressed by the Airmen who spend the majority of their days in the blistering heat making it all happen, namely the [Petroleum, Oil and Lubrication] folks from the 379th ELRS who fuel the jets and the maintainers from the 340th EAMU who keep the jets flying."

The KC-135 first flew in 1956 and the first aircraft was delivered to Castle Air Force Base, Calif., in 1957. The Air Force took possession of the last jet in 1965.

"This aircraft was designed and built in the late '50s, so they were not thinking about air conditioning back then," Calisi said. "I'll tell you it's not easy to maintain an aircraft as old as this one is."

The heat can turn even the most mundane task into a challenge.

"The plane is miserable hot," said Staff Sgt. Jesse Fuller, a 340th Expeditionary Aircraft Maintenance Unit crew chief deployed from McConnell Air Force Base, Kan. "Just the heat beating down on the outside of it will turn it into an oven."

Staff Sgt. Benjamin Peles, 340th EAMU hydraulics mechanic also deployed from McConnell AFB, agrees.

"It's rough, 120 degrees during the day [on the flightline]," he said. "When you go in to the jet it's so ridiculously hot that you have to wear gloves to touch anything."

The team's success isn't lost on even its most junior members.

"It's amazing -- for how many aircraft that we have that we could get that many sorties off," said Airman 1st Class Justin Sobie, a 379th EAMU crew chief from McConnell AFB. "It's a lot of hard work."

For Peles, the final outcome is worth the effort.

"I like what I do out here -- on the bigger scale -- especially since I have friends in the Army and the Marines so it's definitely rewarding that I'm indirectly helping them," he said.