SOUTHWEST ASIA -- For Airmen assigned to the 386th Expeditionary Maintenance Squadron Munitions Flight for the last six months, the end of their deployment is a lot different than the beginning.
Since the beginning of Operation INHERENT RESOLVE, they have adopted three new missions and grown substantially in both storage area and manpower, said Master Sgt. Galen Williams, Munitions Flight chief.
Since August, ammunition on hand has increased 32 percent, Williams said. This is in direct support to OIR and the Afghanistan Retrograde.
To support OIR and the fight against Da’ish, the Munitions Flight is not only responsible for equipping joint and coalition aircraft conducting missions in the area of operations, they also track, transport, inspect, and store munitions for foreign military sales.
The flight is providing support to 12 units across the wing, which includes 512 precision-guided munitions dropped and 21,000 rounds of various types of aircraft gun ammunition expended since October.
“Since August, the wing has acted as a hub-and-spoke operation for in-transit munitions both heading north for foreign military sales and coalition support, as well as missions coming out of the former OEF (Operation ENDURING FREEDOM) theater for retrograde,” Williams said.
In order to deliver the increased capability, the flight had to increase the size of the munitions storage area.
Williams said that when OIR kicked off, the munitions storage area was not equipped to handle the increased demand for the munitions throughput.
“To combat that, we’ve created a new storage pad that’s increased our NEW (net explosive weight) by a third and allows us to store more munitions, and therefore support the mission better,” he said.
In addition, the unit has doubled personnel since October, and the mission taskings have grown.
”With a typical tasking, we get a phone call or an email telling us ‘these munitions are required in support of an operation somewhere,’” Williams said. “If the munitions are based out of the stockpile here, we have munitions inspectors go out and pull and inspect the assets to make sure they are in a condition to ship, and then prep the aircraft pallet, perform the hazardous declaration and prep the assets for flight.”
As a result of operations, the value of munitions storage area has increased from $10.39 million to $55.32 million in just six months, and there are no plans to scale back in the near future, he said.