16th CAB ALSE keeps aviators in the sky

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, UNITED STATES

03.31.2015

Story by Staff Sgt. Bryan Lewis 

16th Combat Aviation Brigade

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. – When an Army helicopter is seen flying overhead, one can infer that it took Soldiers in a maintenance hangar and others with fuel trucks to prepare it for flight.

“There’s no way we (pilots) could do our job without the ALSE shop,” said Chief Warrant Officer 2 Joel Favre, a UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter pilot. “It’s a requirement for us to have the gear, and any practical person would understand that you don’t want to go fly without it and it being fully mission capable.”

Pilots and crew chiefs generally interact with the shop when they receive their flight gear or when they need to turn in their flight helmet or vest for mandatory routine maintenance, however, rely on the ALSE team for other purposes.

“ALSE touches every part of this brigade. Most people think we just do inspections, but we also do over water training, swim tests, anti-drowning gear, life rafts … and first aid kits in the helicopters,” said Chief Warrant Officer 2 Yogeshwar Sugrim, ALSE officer in charge.

The team, which is comprised of Soldiers from each of the 16th CAB’s battalions, have the vital task of making sure helicopter aviators are prepared to fly with gear that could save their lives.

“It’s challenging because you deal with people from different (battalions), and most of us have never seen this equipment before coming here,” said Sgt. Edwin Laboy, ALSE manager. “But as a group, we help each other and make sure the gear is inspected and issued in the right time.”

An average of 15 to 20 customers a day drop their gear off at the shop’s front desk and require an extremely quick turn-around time so that they can get back in the air.

“When someone brings in a piece of gear to be inspected, it’s a 72-hour process where we make sure everything works. If there is anything that needs to be fixed, we fix or replace it so when the customer shows up, everything is complete,” Laboy said.

The shop’s changes with tracking crew teams’ gear maintenance and training along with the restructuring of personnel duties have drastically increased mission effectiveness.

“Everyone is broken down into teams where they have specific jobs,” Sugrim said. “It’s like being each spoke on a gear. Each spoke keeps the gear moving. That way people aren’t getting overtasked.”

The latest modification to the shop’s mission has been preparing and utilizing six modular, deployable ALSE containers fitted with two work stations. This will allow ALSE teams of two to travel independently on missions with battalions or task forces.

Sugrim and his Soldiers will get to test using the mobile shops for the first time while supporting 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division during a training exercise at the Yakima Training Center in Washington this April.

In addition to becoming a modular, deployable shop, the ALSE Soldiers have taken on issuing gear that shop has never had before and new tasks with training aviators. Their additional focus falls in line with the 16th CAB’s focus to the Pacific and conducting missions over water.

They now inspect floatation devices, life rafts and air canisters that aviators will need in the case of a downed aircraft. The ALSE shop also has four personnel that lifeguard certified and are responsible for conducting swallow water egress training for crew teams.

“Knowing that the gear has been looked at by someone who knows what they’re doing, has had the training and has the manual makes us (pilots) feels extremely comfortable that it’s not going to fail when we need it,” Favre said.

The ALSE shop shows how a few Soldiers can be responsible for a mission that keeps aviators’ gear and training current, which in turn, allows an entire combat aviation brigade to continue completing missions worldwide.

• Date Taken: 03.31.2015
• Date Posted: 03.31.2015 13:21
• Story ID: 158666
• Location: JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, US