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Air Force MWR facilities closing, transferring lodging functions to Army

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Jack Sanders
  • 451st Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs
KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan --  Air Force Morale, Welfare and Recreation activities run by the 451st Expeditionary Force Support Flight will stand down effective Oct. 1, 2013, as part of retrograde efforts at Kandahar Airfield.

The closure ends a four-year run at KAF of highly effective, enjoyable and memorable events hosted by the 451st EFSF.

"The 451st EFSF was my source of entertainment for my entire tour," said Master Sgt. Christopher Alden, 451st Air Expeditionary Wing bioenvironmental engineer. "Every event was professional and fun, the prizes were great and the service awesome."

While the Air Force MWR events will be closing, Airmen will still be able to utilize the Army MWR events held at the Fest Tent near the Exchange. The Army will also assume responsibility for Air Force lodging operations, with the transition lasting the month of October.

"We've always had the bodies and the means to hold our own Air Force specific events," said Capt. Jeremy Miller, 451st EFSF commander. "Now it's just going to be a culture change to understand that the Army is just going to take care of everybody."

With the Army taking responsibility for nearly all of the MWR activities, the 451st EFSF can reduce the number of personnel in their flight.

"That pretty much reduces the need to have the services sustainment portion of force support to be at KAF any longer," Miller said.

"I think it's a good step forward because we're going to meet the military's intent to reduce the footprint on KAF," Miller said. "It happens after every war. We've seen it in Iraq, where we just had to make the hard decisions to, no kidding, cut jobs -- cut the nice to haves. The Army has all the facilities; all the manning to do exactly what the force support flight was doing, so it was easy for leadership to say, ' Ok, here's a piece of the pie that we can take away immediately because Army already does it.'"

As the 451st EFSF prepares for the transfer to the Army they're working to ensure Army force support troops to ensure they know how the 451st tracks Air Force billeting, maintenance for the dorms and does reservations.

Miller said that while most things will remain in place Air Force specific events many Air Force members have become accustomed to like bingo, Texas Hold'em or trivia night will go away.

"Now, Air Force members are going to have to rely on the KAF [events]," Miller said. "There's an MWR tent across from the [Base Exchange] and members can go in there and utilize the MWR facilities and that's also where they post the flyers for combatives, yoga, zumba or whatever they may be having that week. There'll still be an opportunity for the Air Force to take advantage of MWR activities."

Another change Airmen have expected is the closure of the Camp Losano Gym, a popular facility with nearly 35,000 users in the last six months.

"The gym was originally supposed to be closed down and we were going to dismantle all the pieces and send some gym equipment over to Camp Davis and just realign it among the remaining units," Miller said. "However, there's been another unit that has agreed to manage the Losano gym so the Losano Gym will be staying it will just be overseen by somebody else."

During the past six months of operations the 451st EFSF has hosted 151 MWR events, with more than 4,800 people taking part.

"That's good," Miller said. "It boosts morale and it makes our folks feel like they're doing something."

Included in the total events are five morale runs, such as the Air Force Marathon 10K, with each run averaging nearly 200 participants. The 451st EFSF MWR activities have provided a necessary morale boost to Airmen deployed to Kandahar, and their closure is just one of many that the current mission here is ending.

"We all enjoyed the events sponsored by the 451st EFSF, and they will be missed, almost as much as we miss our families back home," Alden said.