Ramstein Airmen ‘deploy’ to Fairford, England

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Trevor Rhynes
  • 86th Airlift Wing Public Affairs
RAF FAIRFORD, England --  More than 140 personnel and four C-130J Super Hercules aircraft from the 37th Airlift Squadron, 86th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron and the 435th Contingency Response Group arrived to begin off-station training here April 23.

This OST was put together to test Team Ramstein's ability to deploy its aircraft and supporting assets on short notice and conduct tactical airdrop missions at a bare base.

"This was an unexpected OST, we get to do a lot of OSTs throughout (the European Command) and this was ... given to us about three weeks ago," said Capt. Ryan Wilson, Fairford OST mission commander. "It allows our squadron and our wing's ability to deploy on short notice, whether it's to Africa or the Middle East, wherever we may be tasked to go."

OST Fairford will also be used to give maintainers, aircrew and others an opportunity to perform their mission under real-world conditions.

"This training will push us to the limit to fly four planes at one time for a four-ship formation," said Wilson. "This will be great training for our aircrew, we have tactical airdrops planned for our loadmasters and pilots, while also including low-level tactical flights for our pilots."

The maintainers of the 86th AMXS work nonstop, including night operations to ensure the aircrew carries out their training.

"Operations here aren't going to be too different than Ramstein, but to take four aircraft off at the same time is going to take all 53 maintainers and support personnel to get the aircraft ready to fly," said Master Sgt. Shayne Heitt, 86th AMXS aircraft section chief. "The weather won't affect us at all. We work through the weather during our normal operations anyway; so snow, rain, or the cold won't slow our mission at all."

Working through the elements and the night is how the maintainers will accomplish their goal to make sure the aircrew can provide successful combat airlift throughout the training exercise.

"We want to get every mission out on time," said Hiett. We don't want the aircrews to miss any sorties so they can get the most from this OST."