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Guard units come together to protect Southwest Asia

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Jacob Morgan
  • 380th Air Expeditionary Wing
SOUTHWEST ASIA --  A RQ-4 Global Hawk is flying across Southwest Asia with a mission of surveying more than 90,000 square miles of open water. Without eyes, the Global Hawk must fly hours weaving in-and-out of thousands of commercial, private, and military jets in the area; but how do the operators know what is where?

A joint combined force of Expeditionary Air Control Squadrons and other assets deployed in the region scan from zero to 99,000 feet for more than 200 nautical miles detecting every aircraft. The radars send information to each EACS displaying it on their operating systems. The data is analyzed and the information is translated providing every coalition aircraft situational awareness, and a full picture of the battle space.

The 727th Expeditionary Air Control Squadron, assigned as part of the joint combined force and mainly made up of members of the 255th Air Control Squadron from Gulfport, Miss., has three missions: providing joint forces and theater commanders an accurate and reliable air picture for command and control of offensive and defensive missions; providing weapons control, surveillance, identification, inter-service connectivity; providing battle management of air defense activities within an assigned area of responsibility.

"This unit brings a lot to the fight," said U.S. Air Force Master Sgt. Seaton Hixson, first sergeant with the 727th EACS. "We have members from eight different Air National Guard units, coalition partners, a team of U.S. Army air defenders, and contractors. We have operations members, maintenance members and support members, and we all work extremely well together."

Providing a full battle-space picture in the air begins with the maintenance and support functions including maintaining specialized generators, cooling the electronic equipment, and overall maintenance of the radars.

Providing the antennas and radar system the best weather protection, placement and concealment are all considerations. On May 28, 2013, the 727th EACS successfully moved a radar antenna, which weighs approximately 7,000 pounds, from zero to 50 feet in the air and covered it with a protective dome reducing downtime of the radar.

Once the systems are set up and maintained, the operations team becomes the face of the 727th EACS speaking directly to the pilots of military aircraft and liaising with coalition and combatant commanders. Surveillance is a 24 hour, 7 day a week operation and requires a team of multiple members on alert. It all starts when a military aircraft enters the unit's assigned air space; they contact and check in with the 727th EACS.

"The surveillance technician has been checking every aircraft in the assigned area and the interface control technician is making sure data is flowing," said U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. David Kendrick, director of operations with the 727th EACS. "Based upon certain information, the technician and the crew supervisor can determine the purpose of each aircraft and give a full battle-space picture to the pilot and the Air Operations Center."

Another aspect of operations, which is connected to the same system but relies on a different scenario, is weapons control. The normal surveillance team operates with four to six members. For certain missions, more team members can be called to the operations floor as part of an active scenario including a mission crew commander and a senior director.

"The weapons controller starts by speaking directly to the pilot," said U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Chrystal Thompkins, a weapons director with the 727th EACS. "Imagine the pilot's field of view being directly in front of them, we provide 360 degree coverage, monitor weapons systems and fuel, and point the pilot in the right direction in order to deploy their weapons systems. We then monitor the surrounding area for possible follow-on threats and relay any needed information."

The area of responsibility of the 727th EACS has thousands of aircraft flying through it every day on their way to destinations across the globe. The responsibility of tracking, identifying and relaying the information for each aircraft falls upon the maintenance, support and operations functions of the 727th EACS.

"The 727th EACS is a unique and diverse squadron, bringing together air guardsmen from across the states, coalition partners and the US Army. We epitomize what it means to be joint and combined," said U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Berry L. McCormick, commander of the 727th EACS. "In that, we mirror the 380th Expeditionary Operations Group and the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing; diverse and capable. We are proud to be part of the team here."