Combat Comm wires up Golden Lance

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman David Dobrydney
  • 48th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
CAMPIA TURZII AIR BASE, Romania --  Operation Golden Lance is a large-scale exercise involving more than 150 U.S. Air Force personnel, 10 fighter aircraft and dozens of pieces of support equipment.

Coordinating these assets would be much more difficult if Airmen couldn't communicate with each other.

In this relatively austere location, a 14-member team from the 1st Combat Communications Squadron from Ramstein Air Base, Germany, came out a week before the start of the exercise to set the incoming Airmen up for success.

"We provide tactical communications for a range of missions; whether it be internet, phone lines, radios, they call us," said 2nd Lt. Miles McMullan, officer in charge for the 1st CBCS team here.

A combat communications team can have core services operational within 24 to 48 hours of their arrival at a location. For Golden Lance, eight pallets of equipment were required to ensure smooth operations.

"What we bring is dependent on where we're going," said Lieutenant McMullan. "We have members that have gone on a range of missions, so they know what to expect and what to bring."

A unique challenge Romania presented was the fact that the flightline and administrative buildings were spaced nearly a mile away from each other. This required the 1st CBCS team to be careful in selecting a location for their main tent.

"We're maintaining line of sight so we can provide [regular computer], voice and [secure computer] capabilities as needed," said Lieutenant McMullan.

The tireless efforts of the 1st CBCS are much appreciated by the Airmen who rely on them.

"The services they provide allow us to run operations from what some may consider a bare-base environment," said Capt. Scott Snider, Operation Golden Lance project officer.1"With combat comm, we can operate almost as well as at home and in some cases even better."

Once the installation of phones and computers is complete, the team's mission turns to making sure everything continues to function properly until the end of the operation.

"In this exercise we have to stay until all the jets have left, in case they need to turn around and still need support," said Lieutenant McMullan. "Once the jets are cleared off, we tear down pretty quickly, usually within the day. Everything will be down, back into pallets and we'll be ready to go."