Photo By Staff Sgt. Hope Geiger | An F-16 Pilot, assigned to the 180th Fighter Wing, Ohio Air National Guard, prepares...... read more read more
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More than 130 Airmen from the 180th Fighter Wing, Ohio Air National Guard, deployed to Patrick Air Force Base, Florida, to conduct Dissimilar Air Combat Training, Basic Fighter Maneuvers, Defensive Air Counter Tactics and Tactical Intercept missions alongside F-15 Strike Eagles assigned to the 104th Fighter Wing, Barnes Air National Guard Base, Massachusetts, Jan. 25 to Feb. 9, 2019.
During the cold winter months in Ohio, the 180FW is able to maintain its mission ready capabilities by traveling to locations such as Patrick AFB.
“Going to another base during this season allows us more opportunity to train because the weather is better,” said Capt. Seth Murray, an F-16 Fighting Falcon pilot assigned to the 180FW. “This doesn’t just mean weather for takeoff and landing but in the airspace as well.”
This deployment allows our pilots to conduct force integration sorties, training with dissimilar aircraft, fourth and fifth generation fighters like the F-15 Eagle. The airspace surrounding Patrick AFB is less restrictive than Ohio, more aircraft to practice DACT.
“Dissimilar Air Combat Training was a focus while here at Patrick,” Murray explained. “Basic Fighting Maneuvers, or Dogfighting as many know it, against an aircraft different than we are used to fighting allows us to increase our skill. Tactics are slightly different, and each airframe has its own strengths and weaknesses.”
During the two week deployment, the 180FW flew more than 150 sorties, totaling more than 175 flying hours, while practicing tactical intercepts and defensive counter air missions.
“The key is to know your opponent, never lose sight, and capitalize on those weaknesses and any mistakes the other pilot makes,” said Murray. “This is better with another unit because we have more aircraft to fight against.”
The Patrick AFB deployment, also evaluated the effectiveness of the 180FW maintenance teams, ensuring Airmen are qualified to and ready to deploy at any time.
“Our goal for maintenance is always to fulfill our sortie lines,” said Tech. Sgt. Brent Centers, a crew chief assigned to the 180FW. “We typically have two spareaircrafts and this trip we only had one and with all the incentive flights it made it a little more difficult. Even with flying nine out of the 10 jets, or 10 out of 10 jets. There were only three sorties cancelled due to maintenance the whole time. So for maintenance, we were really proud of that.”
“Maintenance did an excellent job with all of the sorties flown and with only 10 jets,” Murray said. “We would typically fly eight or nine jets each mission. That’s a lot of flying with little down time. All of our support personnel are amazing, and without everyone’s support, we couldn’t fly or complete our mission.”
“The weather in Florida, alone, the jets react better to it,” said Centers. “We’ve seen so many more maintenance cancels at home versus just these last two weeks. The warmer weather is always better for the aircraft. At home we have had a lot of more cancels preparing to come to Patrick, because of the jets reacting negatively to the weather, than being here for two weeks.”
Deployments also give Airmen to work on team build and comradery.
“My favorite part of any trip is the people, because you get to know other shops and other people that you don’t at home,” Centers said. “We can crew jets at home or here, it doesn’t matter, but getting to know other people within the unit, that’s the best part of any trip.”
| Date Taken: | 02.12.2019 |
| Date Posted: | 02.14.2019 09:09 |
| Story ID: | 310599 |
| Location: | COCOA BEACH, FL, US |
| Web Views: | 501 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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